In Larissa Pham’s precise and spellbinding new novel, Discipline, an artist named Christine goes on tour to promote her debut book, while continuing to reckon with the very story its based on: an affair she’d had with a former professor, the messy consequences of which led Christine to stop pursuing painting. That knotty relationship, as propulsive as it is maddening, forces the reader to wonder: How do you separate your art from the people—and painful experiences—that helped to forge it?
This week, Vogue spoke to Pham about navigating the mentor–mentee artistic dynamic, differentiating herself from her narrator, falling in love with the landscape of Maine, and taking inspiration from visual artists like Helen Frankenthaler and Jennifer Packer.
Vogue: How did writing Discipline differ from the process of writing your first essay collection, Pop Song?
Larissa Pham: I think the main difference is that Pop Song was an essay collection, so I was able to kind of work on it in pieces and in a non-chronological way, whereas with Discipline, it was encouraged by one of my graduate advisors at Bennington, where I went for my MFA, to try to write a novel chronologically. She was like, “I don’t want to read from anything that’s not chronological.” [Laughs.] Writing fiction is really trying to stay in this world that you’re creating, whereas I think nonfiction writing involves a lot more interplay.
What were some of the first elements that came to you when you started conceiving of Christine as a character?
Christine came to me mostly through her choices. I think because she’s [written from the] first-person, it’s really about following her and seeing what she’s doing and what she decides to do. That first chapter arrived almost in its complete form, it just kind of glued itself into my brain, and having it set in an airport, I was like, Oh, this is a woman who’s used to traveling. She travels with just one suitcase, and with everything she owns in that suitcase. She hates letting it out of her sight. She doesn’t like sweets, she doesn’t really listen to music. I think maybe the most crucial thing about Christine that came early on was that she’s taller than me. Before she had a name, when she was just sort of an unnamed first-person narrator, it helped me to distinguish myself from her. it felt very important to separate myself from her, so I could actually get to know her as a character.
Your novel and another one—Housemates by Emma Copley Eisenberg—got me thinking about mentorship in the creative arts, and the potential for it to go awry. What do you think it is about mentorship in arts fields that seems so ripe for complexity, or even potential boundary-crossing?
I think for better or for worse, especially in the US, there’s not a really robust arts education that covers all aspects of making a life as a creative person. Sometimes you go to school and there’s a lot of conceptual work, but there’s nothing about actually writing an artist statement, or applying to residencies, or trying to get representation, and then maybe you go to an MFA for writing and there are a lot of workshops and whatnot, but there’s less focus on practical aspects. These are just two examples, but that’s where mentorship kind of comes in.
When you are in a creative field, the work is often very personal, whether it’s fiction or nonfiction, autobiographical or not, representational or not. It’s this really heated environment where people are making really personal stuff and working closely with mentors who are in charge of providing all this information about what it means to embark on this path, and I can totally see how that’s a space where signals can cross. I’m now friendly with a lot of my graduate advisors for my MFA program. We text or whatever, but I’m also like, I couldn’t have done this when I was a student.
I love the way you portray the landscape of Maine; is that a place where you’ve spent a lot of time?
Yeah, I actually visited Maine in the fall of 2022. A the family of a childhood friend of mine has had this really tiny little house on this island in Maine for generations; they all pick a week in the summer and they take turns. It’s very sweet. I got to join for a week and we were just hanging out, swimming, eating, doing puzzles. It was my first time in Maine properly, and I was just so enamored by how remote it was and how austere the landscape is. It was such a startling beauty that I just hadn’t experienced before. I had a kind of similar experience when I went to New Mexico for the first time. I was like, Christine should go to Maine. This is cool. I want to keep writing about this place.
This novel is bookended by art and by the experience of looking at art. What’s the best show or exhibition you’ve seen recently?
Seeing visual art is quite central to my life and is something I try to keep up on, although I have been kind of expanding into seeing dance performances and musical performances as well. It’s something that I gave Christine for a number of reasons, but I think because I do like writing about visual art. The last museum show that I saw was actually Helen Frankenthaler, which was really exciting, and the last gallery show I saw that I really loved was Jennifer Packer, who’s a really, really wonderful painter. I think Packer is probably one of my favorite living artists working right now. I think what she’s doing with, like the figure and color and the thickness of paint is just really, really beautiful to look at.
What’s the most exciting thing you’ve done to celebrate Discipline’s debut?
Well, my last book came out during the pandemic; it wasn’t deep, deep pandemic, but it was like, We’re not hanging out. We’re not gathering in groups. This time around, I decided I was going to pound the pavement and go to all these bookstores and be like, Hello, I’m signing books. It’s been really, really sweet to get to talk to people in bookstores, who are some of the unsung heroes of this industry. I’m also hoping to get a massage soon.
This conversation has been edited and condensed.
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