Kasia van Schaik’s debut book of short fiction, We Have Never Lived on Earth, was published by the University of Alberta Press in fall, 2022. The stories in this book follow Charlotte throughout her life—her parents’ divorce, her difficult mother, and through her world travels. Throughout the book, we drop in to certain periods of her life. Kasia van Schaik confidently guides the reader along the periphery of Charlotte’s life, and every once in a while, will throw us an image that plunges us right into its heart.

First, tell me how this book came together. Over how many years did you write these stories? Did you know the entire time that you were going to be writing these stories all about one main character, Charlotte, as in, did you have this book in mind the entire time you were writing these stories or did it come together in your mind after you’d written a few Charlotte stories and decided to go with it? 

The book came together over many years—maybe 10!—and there were many iterations of the collection before I decided upon these linked stories, and then determined their order. There were many other stories in this collection in the beginning. In an early stage of the editing process, a reader suggested that I just stick with the Charlotte stories and follow their throughline. And I’m glad I did.

For the most part, these stories are told from a first-person POV, from Charlotte’s perspective, but there are a few anomalies. “Highwayman” is told from the perspective of Charlotte’s father, in a third-person POV, and “This is Fine,” again in third-person from the perspective of Charlotte’s lover. Why did you decide to let us see Charlotte from these two men’s perspectives and why were there perspectives presented in a third-person POV rather than first-person?

Many of these stories started out in third person, but I switched them to first person, when clustering them around Charlotte’s experience. I like to play around with first and third person, and tenses when writing, to see where the story feels most alive. Both of the male perspectives serve to give the reader another insight into how Charlotte is perceived or believe she’s being perceived. They offer another angle, another fragment of the whole. With “This is Fine” and another more surrealist piece, “Notes on a Separation,” I tried to imagine how Charlotte might go about telling the story. I imagine the narratorial voice in “This is Fine” hovering over the bed, a projection of both misaligned lovers. 

Following from this, I’m curious as to why, in “Highwayman,” you wanted the reader to see Charlotte’s parents’ divorce from her father’s perspective, but you decided not to include a story from her mother’s perspective.

I did have a story from the mother’s perspective in an earlier draft but in the end, I didn’t think this story quite fit with the collection tonally. I almost didn’t include “Highwayman” because I was worried it would be too much of departure, but I did in the end, because this story offers a glimpse of Charlotte as a child and reveals the ways in which our personalities can be inherited but also learned.

The stories in this book are not ordered chronologically. Can you give us a bit of insight into how you decided to order them in the way that you did? What was behind those decisions?

I tried to capture how memory moves—associatively, meandering sideways, backwards, not always chronologically and not always clear. Perhaps I was going for the form to reflect the nomadic themes of the stories and their geographies.

Bodies of water and swimming feature prominently in most of these stories. What did you want to say about the human connection with water—both physically and emotionally?

If I could swim through life I would. I swim laps several times a week in a public pool and edit my writing in my head as I do. I often take long baths, during which I will often start and finish reading a novel. The only place I want to be in the summer is a lake, or beside a lake with a book. So water is very much part of my reading and thinking process. I also feel that there is a strong link between water and memory…it reminds me of the opening of Yoko Tawada’s book Where Europe Begins: 

“Eighty percent of the human body is made of water, so it isn't surprising that one sees a different face in the mirror each morning. The skin of the forehead and cheeks changes shape from moment to moment like the mud of a swamp, shifting with the movements of the water below and the footsteps of the people walking above it.”

In many of these stories, Charlotte is away from home—in Greece, Germany, Amsterdam—do you believe that travelling, removing all of the accessories of everyday existence, is the best way to find or to reflect on who we are?

Interesting this question of home. I don’t really see Charlotte as having a home to be away from. Part of the immigrant syndrome—at least the version I’ve experienced—is the uncanny feeling of being a stranger in both your old country and your new one. This position offers a unique perspective—perhaps a similar perspective to the one that the discomforts, as well as possibilities, of travel can afford. So in this sense, yes, traveling does open up a space for reflection. I think we bring our everyday with us, though, even when moving through new places and experiencing new things. Or perhaps it’s that the everyday finds us, even when we try to hide from it by jumping on a train or a plane or a ship. But it is a slightly defamiliarized, dislocated everyday, and that’s what makes it noteworthy, at least for Charlotte.

I often keep notebooks when I travel and make notes of architecture and landscape. So these books they came in handy when writing the geographies of We Have Never Lived On Earth.

Charlotte also mentions her dreams in a lot of these stories. What role do dreams play in your creative life? Or in the lives of your characters?

I really admire the work of the mid-century film maker Maya Deren, who incorporates dream images and dream logic in her short films. I remember the first time I watched “Meshes of the Afternoon” at a museum in London. I stood there transfixed, watching the film twice. Now I sometimes play the film for my classes and encourage students to free-write while viewing, allowing some of that logic to enter into their work. I think dream allows us to enter into the lyric realm. That’s why I bring into my writing a dream image or line, often sourced from a painting, film or a poem. I don’t use my own dreams as source material. As is the case for most people, my dreams hold no interest for anyone but myself.

You’ve organized a book tour to promote this book, which is fantastic! It seems many authors are not doing this anymore. Can you tell me a bit about your planning process, how did you fund this (your publisher, grants, out of pocket), how did your publisher help with promotion, etc.?

My publisher, the University of Alberta Press, generously offered to fund a reading tour. Planning was quite an exhausting process. I had to make a lot of cold calls and face a lot of rejection. My publisher helped by contacting venues as well, but most often we were told that there was no availability. I think one needs to book a year in advance to be successful. Luckily, I was able to find some wonderful venues across Canada, many recommended to me by friends and locals.

I find self-promotion very unappealing, but I promised myself that after the tour dates I would take a break from promotion and updating social media platforms.  So that helped me push through. I loved the book launches and readings themselves. I got to read alongside so many incredible authors and meet so many wonderful people, like you! That made it all worth it.

What are you working on now?   

I’m working on a nonfiction book about the creative life and how to live it. Maybe I’ll figure out how to do that by the end of the book! Women Among Monuments will be coming out with Dundurn Press in 2025.

One thing I ask authors to do is to provide me with a song list – either songs that are inspired by your book, or maybe songs that you listened to while writing the book.

Here is a little playlist of songs that I’ve listened to and enjoyed over the last decade or more. I don’t usually listen to music while writing, but love to listen while walking. I do mention Joni Mitchell and Neil Young in the book, and they are two musicians I probably listen to the most. In my household we are very good at turning famous songs into odes to our cat. For example, when I find the cat taking up my side of the bed, sprawled across my pillow, I’ll sing Dolly Parton’s Jolene, but substituting “Jolene” for “toe beans” (the soft pads on the underside of a cat’s paws).

Toe beans, Toe Beans, Toe Beans Toe BEheheans…

I’m begging of you please don’t take my man.

So that’s in part why I added Jolene to the list…

Here is the We Have Never Lived on Earth Playlist!

Feeling Good - Nina Simone

Harvest Moon - Neil Young

Hyperballad – Bjork

Twice - Little Dragon

Toxic Town - Emily Millard

Summertime Sadness - Lana Del Rey

Silver Soul - Beach House

Sensual World - Kate Bush

Reckoner - Radiohead

Humming Man – Men I Trust

Keep The Streets Empty For Me - Fever Ray

Tear drop - Massive Attack

Little Green - Joni Mitchell

Heart Of Gold – Neil Young

Jolene - Dolly Parton

Animal – Hello Seahorse!

Here comes the River - Patrick Watson

Both Sides Now - Joni Mitchell

Kasia Van Schaik is the author of the linked story collection We Have Never Lived On Earth, which was a finalist for the 2022 Concordia University First Book Prize, and the poetry chapbook, Sea Burial Laws According to Country. Her writing has appeared in Electric Literature, the LA Review of Books, the Best Canadian Poetry, and the CBC. Her next book, a work of cultural criticism and memoir entitled Women Among Monuments, comes out with Dundurn Press in 2025. Kasia holds a PhD from McGill University and lives in Montreal/Tiohtià:ke, where she is a postdoctoral researcher at Concordia University.