The Writer’s Life
What Ben Franklin Would Have Told Me is Gordon’s debut novel—a story set during the era of Ronald Regan. Lee, a precocious, 13-year-old boy with a premature aging disease holds a special affinity for Benjamin Franklin, the American icon who was an active writer, scientist, inventor, diplomat, printer, publisher and political philosopher. When a mix-up prevents Lee’s financially struggling single mother, Cass--a Broadway Theater make-up artist--to accompany her son on a trip to Philadelphia, Penn. and Washington D.C., Lee’s caretaker, Tomas--a survivor of the Argentina Dirty War, still searching for his wife who was pregnant when they both “disappeared”--agrees to take Lee on the pilgrimage. Their journey becomes a path to self-discovery, resilience and hope.
When you were writing the novel, how did you navigate that balance between each character’s heartbreak and sense of hope?
In order to tell my story, I needed to become each of my characters at different times. I had to get inside their heads to know what mattered to them—what they were willing to risk and what they feared. Truth and humor guided me, along with what I believed to be each character’s need to survive, their need to belong and to love. To live with heartbreak and vulnerability, and to be able to go on, is a powerful theme in the book. It’s a quality each of the characters possesses and recognizes in one another.
As a mother, I knew Cass’s deepest fears, and how she had made a lifetime of sacrifices for Lee. That she had also become estranged in the world. That she still thought and saw things the way an artist did. Her humility enabled her to go on. She would have done anything to protect her son.
Tomás is his own worst enemy. A survivor of Argentina’s Dirty War, he is the character who shows most of the three how he feels, as he struggles to protect himself from imagining the worst about his missing wife and child. After having been blindfold and tortured, the victim of excruciating physical and mental pain--he perhaps shows his emotional skeleton most clearly. Still, he guards his hopes that his family is still alive. My experience interviewing survivors of similar atrocities taught me the importance of listening and bearing witness. Writing Tomás’s character was painful to experience in my own mind and emotions, to put him through such horror. And yet it’s part of his story and couldn’t be overlooked.
Lee is perhaps the character I drew most strongly from myself, particularly the part of me who is resilient in the face of all odds. Even though his best friend Kira has just died, and even though he knows he’ll be next, when Tomás asks for his help, Lee puts worries about himself aside and joins the quest.
His intelligence, curiosity, and fascination with the ingenuity of Ben Franklin propel him through life. He probably would have lived this way with or without Progeria. He’s the center of Cass and Tomás’s lives; his courage activates their courage. His will to live, despite the odds, inspires them to go beyond themselves in ways they didn’t think possible.
Together, these three characters form a triangle in which hope goes beyond fear. It’s how they come together that makes this possible. Fear of death and disappointment are everywhere in the air, but in this story, what they don’t know is just as powerful as what they do know. They believe in one another and that anything is possible, despite sensing that a happy ending—for any of them-- is unlikely.
The story is set during the Ronald Reagan presidency. What advantages did that give you while writing it, and what challenges did that present?
Looking back on the era of the Ronald Reagan presidency, I was able to embrace Time in a linear way. The structure of the story is that of a journey. The Ronald Reagan era was close in time to when events among Argentina’s Disappeared took place. I was able to use that reality to create Tomás’s urgency towards locating his missing family.
I had to do a good amount of research to make sure I got the historical facts right. I made two trips to Washington, D.C. in order to familiarize myself with the setting and with several landmarks. I educated myself about Ben Franklin’s life, writings, and inventions. I had to slow myself down in order to absorb it all, and in order to find the link in myself that would become Lee’s link to Franklin. It was a process of both slowing down and speeding up. Coming to understand Progeria, I became more and more aware of the acceleration of our lives.
What made you decide to include a quest in the story?
In some ways, each of us is on a quest, or multiple quests, over the course of our lives. It’s how we learn, live, and love. How we learn to fight for people we care about. It’s an essential action. The fact that Lee and Tomás were searching for something as vital as missing family increased the drama in the story and propelled the narrative. The structure of a journey enabled me to create sequential steps that brought them closer and closer to discovery and resolution. I think there is a kind of quest in every story, whether it be structured into action or more emotionally subtle.
The novel has been hailed by many as a story that brims with wisdom and light. What life lessons do you hope readers will discover as they engage in the story?
What Ben Franklin Would Have Told Me is a story of persistence and passion. Of never underestimating what people are capable of. Of overriding the odds and the terrible luck that life can throw at someone. The nearly father-son relationship that develops between Tomás and Lee is proof that anything is possible. A certain tenderness and understanding grows between them, making them larger than themselves. Making them reach into a universe that had previously appeared too distant to grasp. There’s wisdom in the way Cass is able to reconcile with Tomás despite her having been deceived. There’s power in the ferocity she conjures in order to protect her son. Each of these characters is as fragile as dust, yet as indestructible as the language that’s created them.
What were some real-life experiences that inspired you to write this novel?
Two seemingly disparate experiences came together to fuel the writing of this novel: While volunteering at Camp Sunshine in Maine (a camp for children with life-threatening illnesses and their families), I met a boy who had Progeria, a rare, premature aging disease. Most of the kids there had cancer and other serious diseases. Their bodies were weak, their heads nearly bald from chemotherapy. The boy, whose name I never learned, stood out with his aged face and small, frail, body. I had never heard of Progeria before. He stood among the circle of children whose hands were placed on one another’s shoulders, practicing silent meditation. It was a moment of stillness I’ll never forget.
I had done a documentary photography project with Amnesty International, “Putting Faces on the Unimaginable: Portraits and Interviews with Former Prisoners of Conscience,” for which I photographed and interviewed 15 people on Amnesty's speakers’ list. The people I met were from all over the world, but living in the U.Ss., people who had been tortured and imprisoned for so-called crimes against the government. I met students and journalists, mothers and fathers. I met a man from Argentina who had been among the Disappeared during the late 1970s under the dictatorship of Jorge Videla. I modeled Tomás after him. The photos with captions I created were exhibited at Harvard’s Fogg Museum, Tufts’ Wessell Library, and Boston’s French Library. It’s a project I’d like to expand into a book.
What Ben Franklin Would Have Told Me by Donna Gordon
Regal House Publishing, $19.95 paperback, 9781646032303, 330 pages
Publication Date: June 8, 2022
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Note: Author Photo by David Kurtis Photography
