Earlier this semester I had the privilege of sitting down with Dulcie Everitt, a Connecticut College Graduate from the class of 2020, to discuss her upcoming book Brexlit: The Problem of Englishness in Pre- and Post-Brexit Referendum Literature, and to talk about her time here at Conn.
When you were a student at Conn, what were you involved in, academically and extracurricularly, that led you down the path to becoming a published author?
I was an English major, a Government and Philosophy double minor, and a scholar in the Holleran Center. I was also a member of the Women’s Varsity Swim Team, a Writing Tutor for the Writing Center, and a Holleran Center Fellow. I have wanted to be an author from a young age. I’ve always loved to read and write, and growing up I felt strongly about the importance of books not only as a source of information, but of compassion and understanding, as well. So, I wanted to write a book that makes other people feel the same way. Having said that, up until my senior spring at Conn, it was really just a pipe dream. It was something I had my eye on, but something that I didn’t think I had the skills or the experience to achieve. It was through my English major that I was able to develop as a writer over my four years at Conn, and I received a lot of encouragement from professors. Working as a Writing Tutor was also a huge learning curve; it helped me refine my writing process and gave me the confidence to believe I was a good writer. Even so, it wasn’t really until senior spring that I felt I was capable of having my work published. In the fall, a paper that I’d written for a 400 level English class was accepted to two undergraduate magazines: the UC Berkeley Comparative Literature Undergraduate Journal and The Foundationalist. And then when I was working on my thesis, my advisor, Jeff Strabone, started suggesting that the work I was producing might be worth publishing down the line. That’s where my confidence kicked in. My experiences at Conn helped me reshape my dreams of becoming a fiction writer to becoming an academic author. Maybe one day I’ll branch out into fiction writing, but for now my strengths lie in academia.
Do you remember, looking back at your childhood and high school years, if there was a book or an author that inspired you the most?
I couldn’t pinpoint one, but when I was studying English in my junior and senior year of high school, I started reading more classics on my own. It’s kind of a random one, but I read Dracula, and I got the sense that I wanted to write a book that left a mark like that one. I’m not saying that’s going to be me, but that’s definitely what I aspire to.
Now that you’ve published, how does it feel to have achieved a goal that you’d thought was out of reach? What’s gone through your mind?
It’s all very surreal. My book isn’t officially released until January 2022, but it’s available for pre-order on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Waterstones; and it’s been really exciting to see my name and my book appear on them. Since only a handful of people have read my book, it still feels like a small personal project, but once others start reading it, I think it will hit me a bit more. I’ve definitely had a lot of anxiety about my work being out there. Especially since it’s an academic book, and I only have an undergraduate degree, there’s some concern that others won’t take my work seriously. But, I think, on balance, I’m just really excited and proud to be one of the first voices and first books out there on the subject of Brexlit.
What drew you to the topic of English Literature in the time of Brexit?
The Brexit referendum was a watershed moment for me. I grew up in London, and was 18 at the time of the referendum, so it was only the second time I’d ever cast a vote. Watching the debate unfold that year was a time of introspection for me. I felt engaged with Brexit in a way that I hadn’t been in political decisions before that. I remember in the fall of 2016, after the referendum, when Ali Smith’s Autumn was released, there was a lot of discussion on how quickly she’d published the novel in response to Brexit, I was immediately intrigued. So when it came to designing a thesis proposal my junior year, I thought back to that moment, and started reading up on other texts published quickly in response to Brexit. I started toying with the idea of writing my thesis on Brexlit, but was unsure of myself because of the lack of an existing conversation on this topic outside of book reviews. However, I put the idea forward to my advisor and he encouraged me to go with it.
Did the idea of Englishness as an issue in literature come from reading these books, or was it something that you had in your mind prior?
It was a bit of both. I took on board a lot of information from these book reviews, and from my advisor. But my ideas formed fully from reading the books. The intrigue was definitely there before I started reading because the success of the Leave campaign always raised questions about Englishness and why English people feel more of a desire to leave than Scottish people or Northern Irish people.
How would you describe Englishness? How does it manifest itself as a problem in and outside of literature? May I have an example from the book?
This is a really big question, it’s basically the whole book, so I’ll try and be concise. One of the reasons I was drawn to Englishness is because it’s really difficult to define. I didn’t have much of a sense of what it meant to be English, growing up in England, and I didn’t think much about it. I always thought it was a series of stereotypes, like “keep calm and carry on.” The fact that it’s a difficult identity to describe is part of its problem, but that is on top of the fact that Englishness, or English nationalism, doesn’t match the nation state. English nationalism is considered a proto-nationalism because there is no English State within the United Kingdom, so it’s somewhat unclear what English Nationalism is attached to in this context. When researching for the book, it became clear that Englishness in its current form is built around nostalgia and a longing for a perceived former greatness, referring to the perceived greatness at the height of the British empire –– a greatness that never really existed, at least in moral terms. This is all similar rhetoric to what we saw with Donald Trump and “Make America Great Again.” The appeal to nostalgia is a very common political tool, and it’s used across the political spectrum. That said, it’s mostly used in right-leaning parties to suggest that where we’re going is worse than where we came from. An example I can give from the book is a theory from a book called Heroic Failure by Fintan O’Toole. He suggests that English Nationalism in the age of Brexit can only be described as “self pity.” Which is to say that on one hand, Brexit is fueled by a desire to be in control, but on the other hand, it positions itself as a revolt against oppression, in this case from the EU. In other words, English Nationalism seeks to piece together opposing impulses of dominance and liberation at the same time. Brexlit texts, in many cases, attempt to resolve this form of Englishness and create a new more inclusive version of it.
What was your writing process like with regards to this work? Did you have lulls? Points of enthusiasm? How did this book come to fruition?
Because this started as my senior thesis, I had rough guidelines about how much work I needed to produce at each stage. I needed to have the first chapter done by the end of the first semester, and the rest done by the spring. The way I wrote wasn’t as ordered as that. I didn’t start writing the first part until I’d finished reading a lot of the material, but when writing the second part, as soon as I finished reading one of the texts, I would immediately go and write a paper on it in isolation. It wasn’t until towards the end, when I had a big bank of material, that I looked at them as a group of essays and wove them together. I definitely had lulls, and for me when I’m blocked I need to step away all together. But I would also have days where I would write twenty pages or more. So it happened in fits and starts. One thing to say too, is that it was a continuously evolving piece of work. The revisions were definitely the most important part. In terms of knowing when you’re done, there’s always something more you can do. I guess you know you’re done when you can’t see anything more than words on a screen or when you’re comfortable with the product. So you’re never really done, but it’s helpful knowing that you’ll have a copy editor at the end of it.
Did you enjoy writing this book? Does that extend to other things that you’ve done? Why?
I did enjoy writing this, yeah. It was something that I was deeply invested in, and I was motivated by the fact that I knew I was going to be the first person publishing something on this subject. But, I love to write in general, and I love to write because I love to read. Like I said earlier, I’ve been sentimental since I was kid about how words on a page can offer us new perspectives on the world and hold an incredible amount of power. I think I love writing because I want to give other people moments of seeing things in a new way, which is exactly what I experienced during the research process. It also wasn’t just an academic endeavor, it was a personal journey. I hadn’t understood what it meant to be English, and this helped me understand why I didn’t know. It was a really fun experience.
What’s next? Where do you go from here? Any exciting prospects?
Well, right now I work at a small PR firm in London, but I do hope to pursue a PhD in the not so distant future. For now, I’m going to focus on enjoying the rest of this process, and trying to make this book as big a success as possible. I’m going to be working with a publicist, so I’m excited to get into the promotional side of things and just enjoy it!
In her new book, Dulcie Everitt explores the interesting and fairly new phenomenon of Brexlit. Her book offers a chance to reflect on the immense changes that Brexit brought about, and the not so new problems that were spotlighted in the literary response. I’d like to thank Dulcie once again for the interview, and encourage you to pre-order the book, which is available for pre-order now at Barnes and Noble’s website.
