Everyone who has read this blog for long enough knows that I love peeking inside writer’s domains. I want to see where their creativity flows and learn about their tips and tricks, as well as what items they cherish. Today, Mari Coates will share with us her writing space and how she got it all arranged, as we celebrate the publication of her novel, The Pelton Papers by She Writes Press.
But first, here’s a little bit about this historical fiction:
A richly imagined novel based on the life of artist Agnes Pelton, whose life tracks the early days of modernism in America. Born into a family ruined by scandal, Agnes becomes part of the lively New York art scene, finding early success in the famous Armory Show of 1913. Fame seems inevitable, but Agnes is burdened by shyness and instead retreats to a contemplative life, first to a Long Island windmill, and then to the California desert. Undefeated by her history—family ruination in the Beecher-Tilton scandal, a shrouded Brooklyn childhood, and a passionate attachment to another woman—she follows her muse to create more than a hundred luminous and deeply spiritual abstract paintings.
A richly imagined novel based on the life of artist Agnes Pelton, whose life tracks the early days of modernism in America. Born into a family ruined by scandal, Agnes becomes part of the lively New York art scene, finding early success in the famous Armory Show of 1913. Fame seems inevitable, but Agnes is burdened by shyness and instead retreats to a contemplative life, first to a Long Island windmill, and then to the California desert. Undefeated by her history—family ruination in the Beecher-Tilton scandal, a shrouded Brooklyn childhood, and a passionate attachment to another woman—she follows her muse to create more than a hundred luminous and deeply spiritual abstract paintings.Please give Mari Coates a warm welcome and take a peek inside her writing space:
Greetings to all, from my space to yours. These are strange and difficult times, to be sure, but a space of one’s own helps to settle us as writers. We can come home to our writing life in the space we create for it.
Mine? Well, it’s lovely. A room of my very own, as ordered by Virginia. It was about 25 years ago when my wife Gloria and I moved into the house in San Francisco that we rent from her Aunt Rose, our Godmother. Because we needed space for guests and she didn’t mind, Gloria’s room-of-her-own occasionally doubles as the guest room. And because I am a restless writer—much given to getting up and walking around, making tea, etc.—I preferred the first-floor room in the front.
Next step was to borrow a truck and drive to Home Depot, where I bought a piece of plywood—white birch, I think, beautiful! It was four feet wide and eight feet long. I kept the length but had them cut the width to 30 inches. Back home, I sanded it and rubbed it with tung oil. Beautiful! The way the wood came alive! Oh my.
I placed it on an old computer desk from another life and a small file cabinet, and voilà! Next I traded my old, traditional desk to a friend for a set of Ikea desktop drawers. And then I built up the personal. I need a lot of comfort and reassurance when I sit down to write, so I started with a set of New York Library lions, bookends given to me by a wonderful elderly friend of my mother’s, who was widowed by the time I moved to my own NYC apartment, and who enjoyed taking me to programs and events all around the city. Really what I loved was her company—her buoyant spirit, her generosity, her sense of adventure.
The wall I face while writing took a while to arrange, but now I have it as I want it: a paper calendar near the windows (I love the pictures and like being able to see the month laid out) and a pencil drawing of an antique iron my mother used as a doorstop. The drawing was done by my actuary father after my mother’s death and his retirement. To my sister’s and my great surprise, he signed up for art classes at his local community college. I love the detail of this picture, the care, the concern so typical of my dad. Next to it is an ink drawing by a friend from church, Florence Hauser, a now elderly lady who had been an amazing artist in her youth. We had told Florence about my book and that it was about an artist nobody had 
heard of, and she invited us to her house, which is filled with her own beautiful artwork. What a thrill to see that! And then she allowed us each to choose a drawing. Right below Florence’s piece are a photo of a dear departed friend and a framed Christmas card of Central Park West in snow, shot by my old friend Chuck. Next to that, and placed so I look at it all the time is a gorgeous watercolor by another friend, the artist John Zurier, whose career is flourishing. It was painted in Iceland on one of his first trips there. If you don’t know John’s work, do look him up!
Next to John’s watercolor is an archival photo by Nathan Lerner. He made a light box with two holes at either end and, I believe, another hole for the camera lens. Inside the box are simple wooden dowels, and the movement of light across them thrilled me the first time I saw it and still thrills me today. That elusive mystery of light is one of the links between me and Agnes Pelton, and shows me the moment of creation of a work of art. Our rescue kitty Tomaso loves nothing better than to jump up to the top of this bookcase and watch me work.
On the opposite wall is one of my proudest possessions, the walking stick given to all graduates of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers. It’s handmade in Asheville, NC from native rhododendron to always keep us connected to the mountains. Warren Wilson is the reason I have a novel to share with the world, and the community of writers it has created keeps me going year after year.
So there you have it. Now, ready, set, WRITE!
Thanks, Mari, for sharing your lovely workspace with us.
We hope that more novels are forthcoming and that Tomaso doesn’t interrupt you too much.
About the Author:
MARI COATES lives in San Francisco, where, before joining University of California Press as a senior editor, she was an arts writer and theater critic. Her stories have been published in the literary journals HLLQ and Eclipse, and she is grateful for residencies at I-Park, Ragdale, and Hypatia-in-the-Woods, which allowed her to develop and complete The Pelton Papers. She holds degrees from Connecticut College and the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers.
