Sarah Hall's Literary Inspirations and Reading Journey
Author Sarah Hall reflects on the books and writers that have shaped her life, from early childhood memories to current comfort reads, in a candid exploration of her literary influences.
Earliest Reading Memories
Hall recalls formative experiences in her Cumbrian village primary school, where the headteacher terrified the class with ghost tales. She also remembers her mother singing rhymes like "Oranges and lemons" and her father repeatedly reading the Ant and Bee books after work. Her first independent reading was The Story of Ferdinand by Leaf and Lawson, a book she adored for its gentle bull protagonist.
Teenage Transformations
As a teenager, Hall discovered Z for Zachariah by Robert C O'Brien, which she describes as a "boom! moment." The novel features Ann Burden, a resourceful rural girl surviving a nuclear holocaust and outwitting a male scientist. Hall felt fear, anger, and exhilaration from this heroine's agency and courage, and she has since passed the book to her daughter as an "inheritance track."
Influential Writers and Mind-Changing Books
Angela Carter and Buchi Emecheta taught Hall powerful lessons about female narratives, creativity, and life, emphasizing how not to be submissive or stereotyped. She credits Michael Ondaatje's Coming Through Slaughter with inspiring her to become a writer, praising its dynamism and lack of concern for formal definitions. Hall read it after graduating with an English degree while living in the American south, finding its New Orleans setting vividly alive.
Books Revisited and Avoided
Hall admits to repeatedly trying and failing to finish Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, finding it psychologically inorganic. She often returns to The Story of Ferdinand for its message of non-combatant strength, and she rereads James Salter for his truthful, exquisite prose. However, she could never read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë again, describing it as "quite whingey," though it led her to Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea, which she enjoys.
Later Discoveries and Current Reads
Hall discovered Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy later in life, overcoming her aversion to historical figure novels. She praises Mantel as a "titan of originality" who creates new metaphysics for historical fiction. Currently, Hall is reading Wolves: Behaviour, Ecology and Conservation by L David Mech and Luigi Boitani for research on a film script. Her comfort read is The Little Book of Humanism by Alice Roberts and Andrew Copson, which offers 2,000 years of wisdom in 250 pages with a message of improvement.
Sarah Hall's latest book, Helm, is published in paperback by Faber on 9 April.
