The author, poet and essayist talks to Bertie Brandes about her new book Death Valley, her approach to writing and whether you can ever escape the voice in your head
Bertie Brandes: What do you read if you want to feel comforted? Melissa Broder: I love May Sarton’s Journal of a Solitude and The House by the Sea. She was a novelist and a poet but I actually love her journals. I’m obsessed with her journals. Bertie Brandes: I read Veronica by Mary Gaitskill for the first time recently and I sent a passage of it to someone I know because I thought it was so beautiful, and he was like, “This is going to make you feel more insane, this is so chaotic.
” But there is something about reading that kind of intimate writing, especially female characters who are so emotionally vulnerable, that can be at once very difficult and incredibly comforting. Melissa Broder: Definitely. I feel that way about Long Live the Post Horn! by Vigdis Hjorth – it’s about a woman sort of having an existential crisis. Bertie Brandes: Finally, you’ve spoken really honestly about struggling with your inner critic.