Interview with Matt Posner

What's your name and occupation, if any, besides writing, and where do you live? 

My name is Suneeta Misra and I live in the suburbs of Washington, DC. Besides being a writer and a documentary film-maker, I am also a teacher and I am currently in special education. I have toyed with the idea of having a pen name for my novels but decided that despite my reserve, brazening it out is the best approach. Now comes the hard part of marketing and laying my soul bare for all to see and pick at. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, is what I tell my students.

What do you write and why do you write it?

My interest is in the education and the empowerment of the girl child in India. I have made a few short films in this area and during the process of film-making, I became interested in making a feature film on a strong female protagonist. Towards that end, I first decided to write a story, which I then have turned into a screenplay. Of course, this could all be a pipe dream and I might never find a financier for turning this story into a motion picture. But one can always hope. Storytelling, in the traditional sense, is what I love to do, no matter the medium.

Describe your current book and your next project.

“Rani of Rampur” is created for a new adult audience and is centered on a young journalist called Rani, which incidentally means a queen in Hindi. She travels to her ancestral village in order to reconnect with her estranged aunt’s family and in the process, stumbles onto intrigue, brutality and murder. My next book is going to have a much younger protagonist, Durga, which is the name of an Indian Goddess who represents power and the destruction of evil. She is a high functioning autistic girl who, despite her challenges, proves to be loyal and brave in the face of danger.

Since your next book features an autistic child, comment about the top autistic fiction out there, Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.

I found the book to be very engrossing and emotional. The protagonist’s (Christopher) voice was well developed and unique. Most importantly, it allowed the reader to delve into the mind of the autistic child. The specific challenges that he faces because of his inability to lie, or to make mental pictures of colloquiums such as “skeletons in a closet,” was heartrending.

What is your reaction to Temple Grandin's writings on autism?

It is an amazing insight into the mind of an autistic child from their own perspective. Special education teachers like me, are taught early on to chunk and scaffold our lessons and to also include sensory activities into our teaching. Autistic children benefit from this kind of innovation in differentiated instruction. My next book, which has an autistic protagonist, focuses on the idea that minds can work differently. As Grandin herself has said, society needs all these different minds. The fact that Grandin can think of ways to make slaughter houses more humane is not something I would be able to think of. To me, slaughter is inhumane, period. Nonetheless, in a meat eating country like America, such understanding is vital.

How is autism viewed and treated differently in India than in the United States?

In India, kids on the lower end of the Autism Rating Scale are viewed as “retarded.” The higher functioning children probably blend with the regular student population. There is little attempt even in big city schools, to differentiate instruction or to have separate classes for children with disabilities. The situation in the rural areas is even worse. These children are not allowed in most schools, even though the Right to Education Act mandates that they be included in regular classes. While making my documentary which is set in an Indian village in Uttar Pradesh, I saw government schools with few resources, and many even lacking bathroom facilities. It is no wonder that children and especially girls drop out in large numbers from such schools. There is no question of providing access to children with disabilities even in private schools frequented by the middle and upper classes. None of the schools I have visited in India even have a ramp for a wheelchair.

Recommend to readers a book by someone else including why you like it

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson is a well-researched book that weaves real events with a fictionalized account of how they unfolded. The characters from the Chicago World Fair are all real, as are the murders committed by a serial killer during the same time period. The narrative is so thrilling that it makes the reader feel that they are living through the events. I highly recommend it because historical mysteries are my weakness and because this is a taut, well written thriller.

Another story I loved reading was “Half of a Yellow Sun,” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie on the  Nigerian Civil War. It tells us that violence can have a transformative impact on the human soul. Very much like the great book “The Things they Carried” by Tim O’Brien, it makes the observation that there is little bravery in going to war despite societal pressures that justify such an extreme option.

Tell an interesting experience from your life as a writer.

My story “Recuperation” was recently made into a short film and as I sat through the editing process with the director and the editor, I was amazed to see the characters come to life. The director’s interpretation was, however, very different from what I had envisioned in my head. It is difficult for an author to come to terms with changes that are inevitably made when translating a story to a different medium.

Tell an interesting experience from a non-writing job you've had.

When making my documentary last summer in India, I had to adjust to life in a rural area, something that I had never experienced before. I had to get used to life without several amenities that I had taken for granted, such as air-conditioning and clean water. It was, nonetheless, a rewarding experience because I was able to bond with the students, parents and teachers in that one village. This allowed them to open up to me about the challenges they face on a daily basis. Eventually this experience enriched both me personally, and my documentary.

Since we are both special education teachers,  let's talk about that. What are the challenges and obstacles, but also the greatest joys of working with special needs kids?

I have been a general education world history teacher for 20 years and a special education teacher for the last one year. It has been enormously difficult to come to terms with the challenges faced by both the students and teachers in this area. It has also been rewarding to see how much I learned by the end of the year. My greatest reward was when an autistic boy who had extremely bad handwriting, wrote me a thank you letter at the end of the 2010-2011 school year, using the template we taught him to use, to better organize his words.

What do you wish politicians properly understood about special education?

That all children can learn but they just learn differently and not necessarily to perform adequately on a standardized test. Children with learning challenges need the modifications they are provided for testing and I feel, the whole testing environment is stressful on them and on the school as a whole. Teachers begin teaching to the test because scores are viewed as a reflection of their capabilities. My school district has adopted a pilot program that provides bonuses for teachers with high test scores at the end of the year. This year, the voluntary evaluation system has become mandatory, leading to much stress across the board.

Write about your favorite teacher.

My favorite teacher was my mathematics teacher in high school, who never gave up on me, despite my frustrations with challenging calculus problems. He has retired now and was thrilled to hear from me when I called recently to wish him happy birthday. When our students come back for a visit to thank us, it gives us an opportunity to see the difference we can make. Most of my students come from poor, immigrant neighborhoods and it is very rewarding to see how much progress a student can make in one year.