You Have Given Me a Country by Neela Vaswani

NEELA VASWANI: I think that I already had the raw material and the base anthropological knowledge. How did you approach the research for this story? Did you conduct in-depth interviews with linguists and ASL workers or did you already have the raw material for story in hand? The article made mention of an American Sign Language (ASL) chimpanzee at the end. Chimpanzees were losing their natural habitat and being hunted for food (in some cases because people were starving, in others for “bushmeat trade”) and “exotic markets” (chimpanzee hands sold as ashtrays). Your author note stated that the story was born after reading a magazine article about the dwindling chimpanzee population in Africa. I was introduced to your art by “The Pelvis Series,” a short story that appeared in the O. Your work is beautiful and imaginative and soul-filling.

LAURA PEGRAM: Thank you for sharing time with Kweli this afternoon. She lives in New York City with her husband, Holter Graham. Neela Vaswani is the author of “Where the Long Grass Bends,” a stunning collection of short stories, “You Have Given Me a Country,” a beautiful mixed genre work that seamlessly blends memoir, history and fiction, and “Same Sun Here,’” a lovely middle grade novel in letters that she co-authored with Silas House. We talked at length about “writing from a place of love,” picking out the raw material for story, and more. Neela sat down cross-legged, “Indian style” in a comfy chair, while I fiddled around with the recorder on my phone.

After lunch, we moved into the parlor for the interview. We ate and laughed and talked about 'living light' and comfortable shoes, language and the music of Nina Simone, the Storylines Project Neela created with the help of her friends, and how her husband Holter's marathon runs renew him after his chemotherapy treatments. Neela volunteered to help and together we brought the steaming bowls of Channa Masala and Saag Paneer to the dining room table. I had been in the kitchen warming up the garlic naan and was just about to put the samosas in the oven. Neela arrived early that September afternoon, with flowers in hand. On SeptemI invited Neela Vaswani to join me for a lunch interview at the Harlem brownstone that has become Kweli’s sanctuary.

You Have Given Me a Country by Neela Vaswani