From Tape to Page: How a Community Interview Gets Made

Before the recorder is switched on

Every interview begins with a short phone call or a cup of tea, never with a microphone. I introduce myself, explain what Harbourlight Stories is, and describe how the finished piece will look: a first-person story set beside a portrait. People often assume they need something remarkable to say. They do not. Most of the stories we publish come from ordinary routines, a long-held job, a street that has changed, a recipe passed along.

We agree on a place together. A kitchen table, a workshop bench or a quiet corner of a community hall all work well, as long as the room is one the person feels at ease in. Noise matters more than people expect, so I ask about refrigerators, clocks and open windows. A conversation recorded beside a humming freezer is a long evening at the editing desk later.

• A first call to explain the project and answer questions
• A familiar, quiet room chosen by the guest
• Written consent explained before any recording begins

The conversation itself

I bring a short list of topics, not a script. The list is there for the moment the talk goes quiet. Mostly I ask one open question and wait. Silence is useful: people fill it with the detail they had not planned to share, and that detail is usually the heart of the story.

Sessions run from forty minutes to well over an hour. I take notes by hand as well as recording, partly as a backup and partly because writing a word down tells me which moments to return to. If someone becomes uncomfortable, we stop, and they may take back anything they have said. That rule is stated at the start and repeated at the end, and it is never a formality for us.

Turning speech into reading

Spoken language wanders. People repeat themselves, start sentences they never finish, and jump between decades. The first task after the visit is a full transcript, and the second is to read it twice without touching anything. Only then do I begin to shape it, grouping the talk by theme rather than by the order it arrived.

The goal is a piece that sounds like the person, not like me. I keep their turns of phrase, their dry jokes, their pauses where they matter, and I cut the false starts and the detours that lead nowhere. Where I must join two passages, I check that the meaning stays exactly what was said. Nothing is added that the guest did not tell me.

• Full transcript read through before any editing
• Grouped by theme, not by minute
• Wording kept as close to the speaker's own as possible

Checking the draft with the guest

Before anything is published, the guest receives the edited text, either printed or by e-mail, and reads it at their own pace. They can correct a date, soften a remark about a neighbour, or ask that a whole paragraph be removed. I would rather lose a good line than keep one the person regrets.

Some guests change very little. Others rewrite several sentences, and I take that as a sign the process is working, not failing. A second read often brings a name or a memory that was missing the first time. Only when the guest says the piece sounds like them do we move on to the pictures and the layout.

Pairing the words with a portrait

The portrait is made separately from the interview, sometimes the same afternoon, sometimes a week later. By then the guest has seen the text, and the picture can reflect what they actually said. A woman who spoke at length about her garden is photographed among the beds, not against a plain wall.

Our photo editor, Claire Beaulieu, and I look at the frames together with the text beside them. We choose the image that fits the tone of the story, and we write a caption that adds something the paragraph does not already say. The portrait and the words are meant to be read as one piece, each carrying part of the person.

• Portrait made after the guest has approved the text
• Setting chosen to match what was said
• Caption adds information rather than repeating the text

What the reader never sees

A published interview of nine hundred words can come from three hours of tape, two phone calls, a handwritten page of corrections and several evenings of listening. None of that effort belongs on the page, and it should not. The reader should feel only that someone spoke and someone listened carefully.

These autumn weeks tend to bring more invitations, as people gather indoors and have time to remember. I try to make room for each of them, but I would rather do fewer conversations well than many quickly. A story handled with care takes the time it takes, and that pace is a choice we have kept since the beginning.