Hamish Clayton is a writer of fiction, essays and criticism. His first novel, Wulf (Penguin New Zealand, 2012), won the New Zealand Society of Authors Best First Book Award, and he is currently working on a second novel. In this interview he speaks about the nature of storytelling, the influence of painting on his writing, and his essay ‘The lie of the land‘ in Griffith REVIEW 43, a ‘biography’ of Russell Drysdale’s iconic painting ‘The Drover’s Wife’, a painting with a complex history not only to Australia’s cultural imaginary but to his own family’s mythology.

You painted before you wrote, and I’m wondering whether that has influenced your work as a writer? Your writing has a sense of having many layers working together at once, which strikes me as quite painterly.