Maíra Metelo has relaunched her debut novel Only If You Don’t Know Me and is working on new projects for Saci Books, her publishing project. We asked Maíra about her novel, translating and her favourite Brazilian authors.
Puentes Review: You’ve relaunched your book Only If You Don’t Know Me. Congratulations! Tell us how the book came about and why you decided to relaunch it.
Maíra Metelo: The main idea—having a party where people could wear masks and be whoever they wished—came about in 2018, while talking to my husband in the kitchen. It was one of our profound conversations about cultural differences and how I was still grasping why everyone seemed so happily contented in Australia, but no one really spoke about politics, the health system, the housing crisis, immigration, wealth concentration, the excessive use of alcohol as a resource to having a good time, amongst other things. As we talked, I thought, “What if no one knew who they were? What if their reputation, title and name would never be stained by what they say? Then what? Would they be freer, more open?” And the story evolved from there. Only If You Don’t Know Me was written intuitively. I didn’t make a lot of plans beforehand; I just kept remembering what the Chilean writer Isabel Allende once said, “Write quickly and then work hard to increase the tension.” That’s what I did.
Relaunching the book was a natural process. The first time I published it, the book was entitled That Which Lies Between, and I used the pseudonym Annabelle Delavigne. As much as I can justify that the use of the pseudonym was an artistic decision to create an extension of the novel’s central idea, I can see now that I wasn’t ready to take ownership of it. I didn’t understand the publishing market as well as I do now. I was shy to reach out to bookstores for launches and events, and worried that my job as an architect would clash with the perception of my writing skills. “A Brazilian architect is writing about a Brazilian architect … how unimaginative,” people would think. I’m past this now. It’s a valid proposition as a writer to create fiction from what you know, particularly when you have other commitments, such as a full-time job. Writing, as with any career and craft, will develop with time, and the most important thing is how the writer connects with readers in a way that is truthful and meaningful. I used to hide myself because I don’t have a Master’s in Creative Writing, so I felt like an impostor. I watched a bunch of masterclasses and took advice from Lee Child, “To become a writer, you must have read a lot, that’s all you need” and from Margaret Atwood, “You are a writer if you write.” It’s time to call myself a writer and own my work.
Only If You Don’t Know Me seems a romance at first glance, but it also deals with racism and abuse. What is the reason behind your preference for this approach?
I like stories with flawed characters because they resemble life— and life is about this balance, this mess, to have things going well at the same time other things don’t. It wasn’t a conscious, strategic decision. I don’t fight my characters, they take life within the story. If the story is leading to a particular scene, emotion, or resolution I didn’t anticipate but feels right for the character, then I will write it. I would never write about any subject if it wasn’t right for the character and the story. Racism is something all immigrants experience. Not placing this in the book would not be truthful. The abuse is something that gradually sunk into the main character’s life, like a crack in the roof letting water sip through over the years until the ceiling collapsed. It wasn’t something I wanted to write. I had to stop several times to create that scene. I thought about it, tried to find a way out that was more diplomatic, but nothing seemed believable. It was right for the story.
Many people say that there is something interesting about switching from your native language as it gives you this opportunity to wear a mask or start afresh. When you switched to writing fiction and non-fiction in English, how did your writing change?
I love this question! Wear the second language as a mask. Just like my novel, but with a metaphorical mask instead!
English is my language of comfort. It’s introspective. It’s the voice of nurture and empathy. It’s the language of balance, of love (yes, love!), yet it’s the language of logic and reason. It’s my technical language for non-fiction—I don’t write non-fiction in Portuguese—and my most truthful language for dialogues in fiction. I, embarrassingly, discovered I can swear easily in English but not in Portuguese. Unfortunately, but understandably so, English is also my language of doubt. As fluent as I am, I always feel I’m making a grammatical mistake, particularly with prepositions. I often wonder if my paragraphs are too long and if my poetic language makes people feel anything at all. English for me is purple, a colour that resembles spiritual uplifting or the complete opposite, sadness and longing.
Portuguese (Brazilian) is my core. It’s my ancestor’s language. It’s where I learnt to think, understand the world, appreciate rhythm, cadence, poems and literature. I’m confident in it. It’s polished or colloquial when the situation needs it. I flow easily with it. It’s expansive, political, loud, funny, sarcastic. It’s red, yellow and all the bright colours.
Something interesting is happening as I write my second novel. Although I never before mixed the two languages, I’ve noticed that the dialogues are coming out in English, but some of the descriptions and poetic thinking are happening in Portuguese. I can’t really explain how this happens. Perhaps I have been in Australia for too long.
I love how Elif Shafak puts it: “Are we slightly different people in different languages?” I think we are not different, but we definitely express ourselves differently.”
What were the challenges and opportunities of translating Only If You Don’t Know Me to Portuguese?
Translation was the hardest part of the publishing process. I wrote the first draft in Portuguese, then, after a revision, I decided to find a professional translator because it would be too hard for me to translate it and not change the story. However, after months of looking for one, I couldn’t find anyone available. So, I did it myself and that’s when the process got interesting and lengthy. While translating, I ended up editing dialogues, because they would flow better in English. As annoyed as I was to edit the novel after being revised at length, I knew I had to do it. So, it became this very challenging process of translating from Portuguese to English, re-writing in English some parts and then translating back into Portuguese. It gave me the opportunity to increase tension, to develop and see things in the story that weren’t working, so I’m glad about that. It was a painful process, and I don’t think I want to do that again.
You also have a publishing house and have launched the children’s book The Boy Who Didn’t Like the Night. Are you planning to publish more children’s books?
Definitely! I have a few picture books lined up about Brazilian mythology, and I’ve started a middle grade book that I will focus on once my second novel goes for developmental editing. I published some short stories in Saci Books Patreon account too.
The premise of my publishing house was to get children to write or illustrate stories. It all began when my then four-year-old son came to me crying in pure distress. When I asked what happened, he said he didn’t want the night to come because he wanted to play. I asked him how and what he wanted to play and his story was born. It was my first step into the publishing industry, and it was a lot of fun! I helped my son choose the scenarios he wanted to present in the story. I illustrated—with his input—and published it. You can still buy copies of The Boy Who Didn’t Like the Night. I’m preparing the hardcover edition, and my son and I are working on a theatre adaptation.
Children have this incredible potential to observe and create worlds, but their imaginations get trimmed in early childhood and most of them lose the ability. When I published Who Has The Key to Lockdown? as a result of a competition during the pandemic with kids from all over Australia, I discovered how hard it would be to work with children. Not because of the children, but because parents can polish, influence and change what the kid is creating before it reaches the publisher. The project was very time-consuming and became financially unviable. I haven’t given up yet. I am planning a more streamlined system.
I’m also leading creative writing workshops in schools, and I’ve recently worked on a few story templates that allow children to create their own stories online and order personalised books.
How does your architecture practice inform your approach to writing?
Deadlines! I’m great at setting deadlines and sticking to them. Because I wrote Only If You Don’t Know Me very intuitively, I saw that the process could have been better optimised. For my second novel, I’m trying a different approach that uses my skills in project management.
From a content perspective, architecture is everything. Training to become an architect in Latin America is holistic. Architects are urban designers, philosophers, politicians, economists, scientists, psychologists, project managers, artists, teachers and engineers. We learn about the complexities of the world on a local, regional and global scale. Although the practice of architecture is very pragmatic, the study and view of the world that we develop forms us to find the intricacies between opposing ideas and needs. Architecture is about relationships between all these forces. This is fundamental for me to create interesting and realistic characters, to never find a linear and simple solution to a problem in the story, to describe spaces using all senses and the different influences that affect our perception of the world.
Which Brazilian writers do you think everyone should read?
There are so many, but I will list the ones I’ve enjoyed reading the most. Our classics are Machado de Assis, Ariano Suassuna, Jorge Amado, Luís Fernando Veríssimo and, my absolute favourite, Clarice Lispector. For Machado de Assis, I suggest reading The Posthumous Memoirs of Bras Cubas translated by Flora Thomson-DeVeaux. I bought the book in English recently because everyone was raving about the translation and it’s spot on.
The new literary scene is bringing some excellent writers. I’ve just started reading Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieira Junior and it’s taking me off my feet. Jefferson Tenório’s The Dark Side of Skin won the Jabuti, the most prestigious literature award in Brazil. It’s an emotional reading. I cried so much because I know the way the main character is treated happens daily. I don’t know if the following writers have been translated to English, but keep an eye out for Carla Madeira, Conceição Evaristo and Mariana Salomão Carrara.
For kids, if you can get a hold of Ruth Rocha, Ana Maria Machado, Ziraldo (there’s a series on Netflix called The Nutty Boy based on one of his beloved characters) and the comics Turma da Mônica, please do.