Reflections on an Interview with a Zookeeper

The apprehensions I had prior to conducting the interview failed to have alleviated by the time Monday arrived and on Tuesday I still didn’t feel entirely positive about the experience. I really felt I had prepared for the interview. I know the subject well and am familiar with the secondary literature but I don’t think you can ever be fully prepared for something you’re about to embark on for the first time. The interview itself got off to a little bit of a bumpy start. I think it would have been helpful to have perhaps met the interviewee before the interview itself, just to break the ice and get to know each other a little. At the beginning it felt a little awkward but once we got going and settled into a rhythm, that soon subsided. The only other thing was, I had complied with a request to send a list of themes and at the beginning I felt a bit like the answers had been rehearsed. I had avoided sending specific questions for this reason so was a little thrown when my interviewee offered up large chunks of narrative and answered a number of the questions I planned to ask later, all in one go. But that’s the thing isn’t it, to be a good interviewer you need to be prepared for that to happen, to be flexible and to deviate, and while I thought I was prepared for that, it took me a while to find my feet and relax into it. I’d say after about the first 15-20 minutes things were more at pace and the rest of the interview developed more naturally. Questions arose as we went on which I asked and I was always met with a response. You could tell the interviewee was passionate, proud and well informed about zoo keeping and that made for a fascinating interview.

There are some rookies mistakes on the recording. I thought I had communicated by nodding and miming, but I didn’t do that all the time. Especially at the beginning I had this really annoying habit of responding or repeating phrases – what that was about I don’t know. I can also be heard at one point to say “I don’t know what to ask you now” – doh! Aside from that and a few other things, I actually really enjoyed it and learnt an awful lot. There were some really interesting anecdotes and I learnt new information about the profession, especially the interviewees role in some significant developments. I soon realised that I was in the presence of someone who has been very influential in the zoo keeping community. His pride at that came across but so did modesty – it was interesting to see that develop.

I walked away from the interview feeling that it could have gone better, but on reflection and having listened to it back, I’m quite pleased with how it went. All the questions I had intended to ask were answered, as were many more and I achieve my intention of discovering why the interviewee followed this career path, how he got to where he is today and where he thinks the future of zoos is headed. I really enjoyed the experience and learnt a lot about interviewing technique as well as the theme itself. In fact I have had another reply and am keen to follow up this lead as well.

Reflections on My Interview – Dorothy finds her voice

On Thursday and Friday I had the great privilege of interviewing Dorothy, an 82 year old former land girl. After a faltering start – she was quite nervous speaking quietly and hesitantly – the interview soon began to flow.   I had half an eye on my questions but I didn’t use them very much at all, instead allowing Dorothy to direct the interview as her confidence grew.  Metaphorically and quite literally (you can hear on the recording) she begins to find her voice.

Having played the recording back I realise I should have done more to ameliorate the effects of traffic (her flat is very close to a road) and I think the hiss is the warden alarm she has in her OAP block over which I had no control.

During the interview Dorothy found dates difficult to recall so many events were framed i.e. ‘we moved house the day war broke out’.  Possibly she did, possibly she didn’t but this is how she remembers it. I tried to frame my questions to help her recall.

There were many instances of her recalling physical memories, particularly about her time working in a mill in Yorkshire (30+ years so deeply ingrained) but also during the time she was in the land army.  During the interview she re-enacted these actions without prompting; demonstrating how she collected the bobbins from a rapidly moving spinning machine and then picking and chopping sugar beets in the fields of Suffolk as a land girl. This wasn’t for my benefit; it was to take her back to those moments.

I found her experiences fascinating, sometimes funny and frequently moving.  Dorothy  replaced one job involving monotonous, tiring work in a mill with a similar one on a farm in Suffolk but it was worth it for the opportunity it provided for a 17 year old to at last gain some personal freedom and to be in the countryside.  As the eldest girl of six children she was expected to look after her younger siblings, cook, clean and do laundry as well as working at the mill.  So the first taste she had of a social life was as a land girl.  Now she had the freedom to ride a bike, visit the cinema, go to dances and to get walked home by a boy.

Sadly, after a few months and following a concerted effort by Dorothy’s mother and her older brother, she was forced to return to Yorkshire to her previous life.  They needed her to help with the family and to contribute to the family coffers.  Being in the land army also had connotations of sexual promiscuity and this was certainly levelled at Dorothy by her brother.

Dorothy went on to get married and to have a family of her own with all the highs and lows that brings including divorce, however I got a real sense during our interview that those months as a land girl  were amongst the happiest times of her life and, had she been allowed to stay for longer, life may have turned out differently.

Interview Hopes and Concerns- Gillian Gryz

Preparing for my interview is causing me more stress then I had anticipated.  The woman I am interviewing seems very nice and very willing to talk about her life, which has put me more at ease.

My main concerns are technical things, like what if I don’t use the equipment correctly?  I know that if I’m careful and focused this won’t actually be an issue.  I am also concerned about my questions- will I have enough? Too many? What if I ask something that upsets her on accident?  Or, what if, after the interview, I realize I haven’t asked what I wanted to?  I think all of these concerns are normal pre-interview concerns.  I’m very prone to thinking about the worst-case scenario before I do something significant.  As long as I dedicate enough of my time and energy into making sure I cover each area I’m worried about before the interview, I should have little to no issue when the day comes to conduct this interview.

My hopes are that I am able to let this nice woman say what is on her mind.  When I first met her, she told me she had been the subject in an oral history interview once before a few years ago.  She said the interviewer seemed to know what kinds of things she wanted to get out of her subject.  That is something I want to stay away from.  I want to ask questions about things I want to learn more about, of course, but above all, I want to know what was important to HER.  The woman I am interviewing also said she thinks her views have changed on some topics since her last interview, and she would be interested to see if that shows in the interview she will have with me.  The Egham Museum has a transcript of the last interview she did and I was thinking of taking a look at it so I know maybe what kinds of questions to stay away from, or some topics I would like to hear more about.

Overall, I just hope to gain some insight on the inner-workings of the Holloway Sanatorium.  The woman I am interviewing worked there at a pivotal time, just as it became public.  She will have worked with people who worked there for many years before, and can perhaps give insight to what she heard the Sanatorium was like as a private institution.  I want to learn what it was like being a woman in the workplace in the 1950s.  I want to hear what working with the patients was like and how it made her feel.  I want her to come away feeling like she was able to speak freely and has made a contribution to history.