Uncovering Appalachia’s Hidden Heroines: Pauletta Hansel Reveals Untold Stories in Understory
L.L.: In my own work, which also relies heavily on ancestry, tracing my Kentucky roots, I found it boring and burdensome to uncover ‘only’ dates and names. Like you, I wanted story. Pure story. You write about this in Understory in a poem aptly titled, I Want Stories. Can you speak more about that, please? Do you think you got the stories you so craved?
P.H.: Of course, I wish that I had stories that came to me from my foremothers in more direct ways. Letters, family memories, mentions in history books. But except for stories from my mother about her and my granny, and an occasional remembrance from a cousin or aunt, I simply did not. I include pretty much all of the oral histories I do have in Understory. But for the most part, I had to use a combination of research, imagination, and empathy to make stories of my foremother’s lives.
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