Elena Ferrante (post 7) says she writes under dictation, reveals self even she may not know, and usually has narrative “I” with alternating, contrasting souls.

“I can’t say precisely…how a story takes shape. When it’s done you try to explain how it happened, but every effort, at least in my case, is insufficient. There is a before, made up of fragments of memory…frantumaglia—bits and pieces of uncertain origin which rattle around in your head, not always comfortably…But how I moved from the frantumaglia…into a story that seemed convincing—that escapes me, I can’t give an honest account…

“I only know one thing for certain—it seems to me that I work well when I can start from a flat, dry tone, that of a strong, lucid, educated woman…Only when the story begins to emerge safely, thanks to that tone, do I begin to wait for the moment when I’ll be able to replace those well-oiled, quiet links with something rustier, raspier, and with a pace that’s disjointed and agitated, even at the growing risk of the story falling apart. The moment I change register for the first time is both exciting and anguished…I enjoy…revealing another, rougher soul underneath, someone raucous, maybe even crude. I work hard to make that change in register come as a surprise and also to make it seem natural when we go back to a more serene style of narration…I always worry that the narrating ‘I’ won’t be able to calm back down…

“It has become natural to think of the author as a particular individual who exists, inevitably, outside the text…Remove that individual from the public eye and…we discover that the text…has taken possession of the person who writes. If we want to find that person, she’s right there, revealing a self that even she may not truly know…

“While I’m writing I think I know a lot about my characters, but then I discover I know much less than my readers. The extraordinary thing about the written word is that by nature it can do without your presence and also, in many respects, without your intentions…Writing…doesn’t need you…

“The state of grace…happens when…you continue to write as if under dictation…For all sixteen hundred pages of the Neapolitan Novels, I never felt the need to restructure events, characters, feelings, turning points, reversals…I am amazed myself…I never resorted to notes, chronologies, plans of any sort…” (1).

1. Sandro and Sandra Ferri (Ferrante’s publishers, who interviewed her in person). “Elena Ferrante, Art of Fiction No. 228.” The Paris Review, Spring 2015 No. 212. http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/6370/art-of-fiction-no-228-elena-ferrante