Sharon Berg Interviews Marlis Wesseler

(Thistledown Press, 2024)

Marlis Wesseler

Sharon Berg: I’m glad to be able to conduct this interview with you about your book, The Beech Forest, Marlis. Your main protagonist, Lisa Braun, struggles deeply with both her own relationship to her daughter and her husband’s forgiving approach to their daughter’s issues. The parallel this makes to the different responses from various countries surrounding Germany as to how they treated Jewish peoples during WWII seems unavoidable. Was that contrast intentional? Please explain.
 
Marlis Wesseler: That is an interesting analogy, but no, I have to say that didn’t occur to me, certainly not as I was writing. I simply wanted Lisa to have a serious problem. Primo Levi wrote, comparing normal life to life in the camps, that we live in the ‘comfort and suffering’ of our own homes. I wanted to highlight an ordinary worry of the type that we all live through in different ways as being just that—ordinary, compared to the inconceivable horrors of the Holocaust. Lisa’s daughter’s problems show an example of the suffering normal life burdens us with. A friend of mine once said (maybe she was quoting someone else) that you’re only ever as happy as your unhappiest child, and I think that’s quite true. Lisa’s worry about her daughter is always thrumming somewhere in her subconscious, even when she’s not thinking of her. As well, I wanted to show the effects the Holocaust may have had on younger generations, true certainly in Jewish families but also to a lesser extent in German ones.
 
SB: Can you speak to the reason Lisa focuses on Danes and Bulgarians as opposed to the French, Swiss, or other countries that protested the treatment of Jews during WWII? The theme of The Beech Forest is not an easy one. To clarify, Lisa Braun reflects on cultural guilt during peacetime, recognizing the ability of certain human beings to separate themselves from the choices they made during WWII. She wonders about the difference in reaction between German people toward their Jewish neighbours as compared to Danish or Bulgarian people.
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MW: I first read Hannah Arendt’s Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil over twenty years ago and kept a strong impression of her depictions of the only two countries that, even though they were invaded by the Nazis, refused, officially and within their populations, to cooperate with them, especially regarding the rounding up of their Jewish citizens. I’m still interested in what the difference was between these two seemingly very different peoples and other countries, many of whom, as France famously did, had strong underground resistance movements, but had segments of society, like backers of France’s Vichy government, supporting the Nazis. Sweden and Switzerland certainly helped and took in Jewish refugees, but they were allowed to remain neutral; they weren’t subject to the trauma of invasion.
 
SB: In your novel, Lisa looks deeply into herself and the psyche of her husband and his family, considering their current-day response to WWII. When she learns of the ‘crime’ her Jewish friend Ben Meisner commits out of love, to prevent suffering during the Holocaust, she is thrown into emotional turmoil. It’s implied there may be others like Ben. While law distinguishes intent as a necessary component for a first-degree murder charge, despite his reason for committing the act, Ben Meisner convicts himself. Do you think law is an appropriate guide for society in response to a story like Ben Meisner’s?
 
MW: No, I don’t. The lawlessness of the Nazi regime’s horrors visited on its own Jewish citizens and others justifies Meisner’s actions, and as he himself says, he was in a state of agonized worry and suffering from such trauma; it caused a form of insanity. I think Lisa was already thrown into emotional turmoil by the first part of his story, and the revelation of his ‘crime’ simply exacerbated these feelings, partly out of sympathy—who would want to live with the memory of having killed their parents?
 
On a lighter, maybe rather silly, note, I’ve just had the thought that I should have said ‘spoiler alert’ here.
 
SB: Well, we may see different responses to the reason a spoiler alert is necessary for this novel but not for news channels bringing us tales of plane crashes and wars around the world.
 
I wonder if you can offer an idea of the literary surrounds for this work in your experience? What books most impressed you while you were working on it? Were there any people/events/ live performances that you feel influenced this book?
 
MW:   Since my marriage, like Lisa, to a German, and being of part German heritage myself, I have long wondered how the brutalities of the Holocaust could have been possible. I’ve read a number of books on the subject over many years, both fiction and nonfiction. For information about the experiences of the victims, the books by Eli Wiesel and Primo Levi stand out of course, but also the internet sites that focus on Holocaust memories, particularly testimonials published on the Claims Conference’s website as part of their work to seek recompense for those who survived Nazi medical experimentation. An early, condensed version of the Buchenwald Report shocked and overwhelmed me, helping me to create the memories of my character, Ben Meisner. Hannah Arendt’s and Gita Sereny’s books were insightful and valuable. The one novel that stands out as providing at least a modicum of understanding of the German psyche or mindset during the darkness of that time is Every Man Dies Alone, by Hans Fallada. In the end, however, as my novel ultimately concludes, no amount of reading can provide coherent reasons for such great evil.
 
SB: Titles are often difficult to come up with though some authors seem to begin there. What was your experience in developing a title for The Beech Forest?
 
MW: I have a somewhat dubious tendency to create puns, and I appreciate word play of any kind. Even as I was first contemplating the writing of this novel, I thought The Beech Forest would be an appropriate title, as it translates into German as der Buchenwald. The juxtaposition of the peace and beauty of a beech forest and the horror and suffering in Buchenwald concentration camp seemed apt right from the start.
 
SB: Wow! Knowing the translation of that phrase now puts a different spin on things. Your reasoning is both riveting and completely understandable.
 
Is this a book that seemed to fall onto the page quickly, as if it were channelled, or did you need to put a lot of effort into its structure? Was there a developmental process? Please elaborate.
 
MW: This book developed slowly with years of revision after an initial first draft that was written in only a few months. The structure and plot changed quite drastically, as in writing the final drafts, I eventually cut a large section that I just couldn’t get to work. Cutting such a substantial piece of it meant rewriting the whole novel yet again. It was a slow, sometimes frustrating, process.
 
SB: So part of your early draft was removed from the book. Do you think that section offers the starting-off point for a second book? Help us to understand your decision to cut it. Was it simply developing in a different direction from the rest of the text?
 
MW: My initial idea for this novel had my protagonist, married to a German, having an affair with a Jewish carpenter, and after it was over, becoming obsessed with the Holocaust and meeting a survivor of Buchenwald through her own initiative. I was enamoured with this plot. I thought it so intriguing and interesting. I kept inventing various scenarios in which the affair could happen, in the end having her go on a trip to Mexico with a woman friend and meeting him (the carpenter) there. I was rather pleased with this version and kept revising, but I just couldn’t get it to seem authentic. Finally, one of my most trusted readers suggested the affair was unnecessary to the novel. The real story happens because of, and leading up to, her meeting Mr. Meisner. So I bit the bullet and got rid of the Jewish lover, with some sadness I must say, and I rewrote the book. My reader was right. It works much better without that side story. And yes, I think the section about the affair could be a starting point for another kind of novel or make up a short story on its own. But right now I’m working on something entirely different.
 
SB: Some books require intensive research of a topic, or an historical era, or some other aspect of the story. Please describe the most intensive research you did for The Beech Forest. How far did you travel to conduct your research? Have you done most of your research on the internet or through books and printed documents?
 
MW: In a way, I began research for this novel long before I conceived the idea of writing it. Married to a German from Berlin, I travelled with my husband to visit his relatives every few years, and my memories and impressions colour parts of this novel. I didn’t meet my husband in Israel, but before we were married, we did travel there. So I read about the Holocaust both before and after I started to do the conscious research for a novel. My internet searches started only after I had the idea for the book and I went through some painful times, preoccupied a little bit like my main character with Holocaust websites.
 
SB: We’ve already skirted this question, but readers are often interested in knowing how much of a work is invented and how much is autobiographical. Would you care to share your approach/thoughts on this aspect of your readers’ curiosity?
 
MW:   Like Lisa, I do live in Saskatchewan, although in a city, not on an acreage near a small town. I was married to my late husband for many years, and he was from Germany. He was a man with a strong character, and I found it almost impossible to imagine any German husband without using some of his own traits to create Lisa’s husband. He may or may not have appreciated this, but passed away before the novel was finished. Any other similarities to my own life are limited mainly to Lisa’s interest in gardening and some of her travel experiences or impressions. I don’t have a daughter; I have never talked to a Holocaust survivor. Lisa’s continued bewilderment about how the Holocaust was allowed to happen is similar to mine. But I see what’s happening south of our border here, and the tendency toward the extreme right in countries even in Europe and I am afraid history might be repeating itself.
 
SB: Lastly, I wonder how this book fits in the stream of your literary works? Is there a fundamental difference between The Beech Forest and your prior work?
 
MW: The Beech Forest, as I’ve noted, has some autobiographical elements. This is also true for some of my short stories and my novel South of the Border, although all have plots that are entirely fabricated. My novels Elvis Unplugged and The Last Chance Ladies’ Book Club do not have any similarities to my own life, except that they happen in small-town Saskatchewan, with which I’m familiar. I don’t think there is what I would call a fundamental difference between The Beech Forest and my previous work. My straightforward, rather wry, writing style is similar to that in my early work, the collections of stories Life Skills and Imitating Art. One difference in my later work may be in theme. In my last two books, I seem to be preoccupied with how one deals with evil. The Last Chance Ladies’ Book Club is about a group of people living in a small-town seniors complex who have to deal with a now-elderly child molester moving into their midst. And of course The Beech Forest focuses on the evil of the Holocaust. My newest work, still in its first draft, is something of a crime novel from the point of view of the criminal. One thing all my books have in common, no matter what they’re about, is a certain amount of humour. Some of it includes, I’ve noted on rereading later with some chagrin, some fairly bad puns, but I can’t seem to stifle myself.
 
SB: I am certainly glad that you laid out this tale the way that you did, Marlis. It is both an intriguing story and a disturbing one, which means it will call upon both the emotions and the critical analysis of every reader.
 
MW: Thank you very much for choosing me and my book for an interview, Sharon. It was a pleasure to talk to you.

​Marlis Wesseler grew up on a farm in Saskatchewan and attended university in both Saskatoon and Regina. In her twenties, she taught school in Northern Saskatchewan and travelled. While spending a year in Europe, she met her husband, Lutz, with whom she settled in Regina and raised their son, Evan. She obtained an honours degree in English and, getting to know some writers and encouraged by one of her professors, tried her hand at creating short stories. She joined a writer's group called The Bombay Bicycle Club and made lifelong friends. Over the years, she worked on contracts for the Dept. of Education, was first reader for Coteau Books and has had other writing-related employment. She has been awarded a grant from the Saskatchewan Arts Board for every one of her books, has been nominated for ten Saskatchewan Book Awards, and won a John Hicks long fiction manuscript award and a High Plains Book Award for her fifth book, The Last Chance Ladies’ Book Club. The Beech Forest is her sixth book of fiction.

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​Sharon Berg attended the Banff School of Fine Arts Writing Studio in 1982 and was accepted to Banff’s Leighton Artist Colony in 1987. She is also an alumni of Humber College’s Writing Program. She did her B.A. in Indigenous Studies at Laurentian U, followed by her B.Ed for Primary Education at U of T. Her M.Ed focused on First Nations Education at York U, and her D.Ed focused on Indigenous Education at UBC. She also received a Certificate in Magazine Journalism from Ryerson U. Sharon founded and operated the international literary E-Zine Big Pond Rumours (2006-2019) and its associated press, which released chapbooks of Canadian poets as prizes for the magazine’s contests. She's published five full books and three chapbooks, working in poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. Her work appears in periodicals across Canada, the USA, Mexico, the UK, the Netherlands, India, Germany, Singapore, and Australia. Her 3rd poetry collection Stars in the Junkyard (Cyberwit 2020) was a Finalist in the 2022 International Book Awards, and her narrative history The Name Unspoken: Wandering Spirit Survival School (Big Pond Rumours Press 2019) won a 2020 IPPY Award for Regional Nonfiction. When she retired from teaching, she opened Oceanview Writers Retreat in Charlottetown (Terra Nova National Park) Newfoundland.