Nancy Reddy: Shaking the Words Loose

How did motherhood change your creative practice? 

I was in grad school when I had my babies (I’d finished an MFA in poetry and run right through into a PhD), and I’d absorbed all these really negative messages about what kids would do to my creative life and my ambition. I’d heard these cautionary tales about women who had babies in grad school and never finished, women whose brains were turned to mush by motherhood. So I was really determined, as I entered motherhood, that having a baby wouldn’t mean I stopped being me–that I wouldn’t stop writing. 

(And, of course, I can now recognize the role that structural support plays–that those women were absorbed by their babies at least in part because high-quality, affordable daycare was basically impossible to come by! No wonder it was hard for them to finish dissertations when they were juggling childcare, teaching, and research!) 

But one of the joys of motherhood, for me, has been how my children have enriched my creative life. I’d thought of babies as the enemies of art, and I’ve found that really the opposite is true. Seeing the world through my sons’ eyes has done so much to change how I look. And, practically, motherhood has been the subject of my work for several years now–my most recent book of poetry, Pocket Universe, is very much informed by my difficult early years of motherhood, and I also co-edited, along with fellow mother-poet Emily Pérez, the anthology The Long Devotion: Poets Writing Motherhood, which is really focused on the question of the relationship between mothering and making art. I’m currently working on a nonfiction book, The Good Mother Myth, that’s also about motherhood. So mothering, both as a practice and a site of intellectual inquiry, has really become the focus of my creative work.

When do you feel most creative? 

My brain is definitely sharpest first thing in the morning, so in my ideal world, I’d be able to wake up, have a cup of coffee, maybe read a paragraph or so of a book I like, then start writing, all without speaking to anyone until at least lunch. But in my actual life, I’ve got kids who always seem to need things in the morning, like freezer waffles and packed lunches and to be told a dozen times to put on their socks and shoes instead of laying on the ground petting the dog. 

I’ve found that I can recreate that sharp morning brain with a walk between school or camp dropoff and when I start working. It’s amazing how even 10 or 15 minutes of a no-phone stroll can shake things loose in my brain.

What’s your favorite super easy creative practice to do when you’re looking for fresh ideas?

Two ideas: 

1. I keep a notebook, but I’m pretty bad about having an organized practice for going through the notes I have in there. But on the plus side, that means if I flip through, there are often interesting ideas and weird phrases and nubs of images that can be developed into something else. So sometimes when I’m stuck, I’ll flip through old notebooks and highlight the pieces I can work with, then copy them into a new word doc or onto index cards. It’s good to be reminded that even when I don’t feel fresh and full of ideas, I’ve at least had good ideas in the past that I can draw on for inspiration.

2. Often, when I’m stuck, it’s because I’m bored with my language–I’ve settled on a stock set of phrases or tone, and it’s not working. So I’ll flip through a book I like but that’s pretty different from my writing, pick a bunch of words I haven’t used in my own work, and go from there. Concrete nouns and verbs are great for this. Books of poetry work especially well.

If you could give everyone a small treat, what would it be?

This is cheating, but: ice cream, a new pen, and a sunny spot to sit and think.

—

Nancy Reddy is a poet and essayist who’s interested in how mothering can enrich and complicate a creative practice. Her most recent books are the poetry collection Pocket Universe and the anthology The Long Devotion: Poets Writing Motherhood, and she’s currently working on her first nonfiction book, The Good Mother Myth, forthcoming from St. Martin’s in 2025. She’s the mother of two boys, age 8 and 10. She writes the newsletter Write More, Be Less Careful about why writing is hard and how to do it anyway. You can also read her work on sites like Catapult, Coffee and Crumbs, and Slate. Follow her on Instagram @nancy.o.reddy and read her thoughtful Substack Write More, Be Less Careful.

—

Hi! I’m Heidi. Writer. Editor. Mother. I’m interviewing 100 creative mothers, because I believe the more we see other mothers making beauty and meaning in small moments, the more we will be inspired to make our own kind of art, whatever that may look like during this intense season of life. Support the project by sharing with a friend.