Entertainment

Helen Fielding on why she brought Bridget Jones back

After a 14-year absence, chronically indecisive singleton Bridget Jones is back — and no one’s more surprised by her reappearance than her creator, British novelist Helen Fielding.

The fictional Jones, whose exploits originated in a British newspaper column, topped bestseller lists with the 1996 publication of “Bridget Jones’s Diary” and its 1999 sequel, “Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason.” In the books, a 30-something, weight-conscious Jones treads a shallow dating pool that includes a womanizing boss, Daniel Cleaver, and a charming barrister, Mark Darcy.

Now, Fielding’s latest comedic installment — “Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy” — catches up with Jones as a 51-year-old mother of two [spoiler alert, if you’ve been living in a cave] five years after the death of husband Darcy.

Jones still logs calorie counts and self-help to-do lists in her diary, but she also now juggles parental duties (like dropping the kids at school and battling head lice), the esteem-crushing (for her) social-media wormhole called Twitter and the attention of both a muscled 30-year-old “toy boy” nicknamed Roxster and a suave school teacher named Mr. Wallacker.

Fielding — a former journalist and single, 55-year-old mother of two often credited with jump-starting the empowering female-focused genre known as, for better or worse, “chick lit” — seems mystified by her bumbling heroine’s enduring success. The latest tome hit the top of the UK book charts in its first week.

“For this to happen, after all this time, I didn’t know if people would still be interested and attached to Mark Darcy and Bridget,” she said recently during an interview at the Nougatine restaurant at Trump Hotel Central Park. “After nearly 20 years — it’s wonderful for a writer. More than you could ask for, really. It’s amazing.”

Q: After so long, why did you decide to bring back Bridget?

A: For me. What I did decide to do is, a long time ago, not just churn out another because there was lots of pressure. I’m not going to do that. I care about the character a lot, and I did write the first two books from the heart, really, without much expectation. In March 2012, I wondered if I could write a book about a woman late in life, getting back into the dating scene when the landscape’s completely changed, and paranoid and all those things. And I didn’t tell anybody, so it allowed me to just write in the way I used to write, which is just in my chair with the laptop. It wasn’t even Bridget to start with. And I found the voice was just turning into Bridget.

Q: You also killed off a major character, Darcy. Why?

A: That’s just what happened in my mind. Mark Darcy’s the quintessential gentleman, and he would never leave her. But I was writing about a single mother. I didn’t want to mess with his memory; instead his memory suffuses the book. The book starts five years after he died; it’s not like that’s the end of the book; it’s a new beginning.

Q: Were you worried about the reaction?

A: I wasn’t expecting to see the headline “Mark Darcy’s dead” on the BBC News straight after the Syrian crisis. I was very startled — and very touched that he matters so much. He stands for something, something really good. I went to a local restaurant with a friend and a man came running after me and said, “Did you murder Colin Firth?!” (laughs) Nobody has died, but for people to care so much about a character — it wasn’t just me that created it. It was Colin through the films; that’s something, you know?

Q: How do you feel about the term “chick lit”?

A: Barbara Walters once called me the grandmother of chick lit. I wasn’t keen on the “grandmother.” I would prefer “godmother.” I think, honestly, it was zeitgeist. The image of the single, 30-something woman in fiction hadn’t caught up with what was really going on. It needed a voice. Women were not tragic, barren spinsters — Miss Havisham about to die alone, being eaten by a dog. My book came out first. But if I had that thought, then so did a thousand other people — and a hundred of them were female writers. Much as I’d like to claim it as my own, I think I was lucky.

Q: Are you still amazed that you’re famous?

A: Actually, I’m not that famous; nobody would ever recognize me. Maybe for a minute, for a moment. Nobody really knows my name – they know Bridget’s. It’s a very nice position because it means that you could stream through the world without being any different, which is quite important to me.

Q: But you still retain some notoriety?

A: This is my feeling about fame, why fame is like catching a disease. When Bridget first comes out, I go back to my flat. There’s a photographer out there on a motorbike, and I’m just, like, “Oh, can’t they leave me alone?” But was Domino’s Pizza! Then I was upset – well, not upset. But I was, “Oh, that’s a bit disappointing!” (Laughs). So that exactly sums it up, doesn’t it? You know, you’re only going to be crass or discrete.

Q: Will there be another Bridget Jones book?

A: I want to just live some life now. I wouldn’t do it unless I’ve lived some life, seen some things and have some things I really want to say. I really care about Bridget. I’m not going to just write another one for the sake of it. It would have to mean something to me, and that’s all you can do.

Q: Have there been discussions about a third movie based on this book?

A: I don’t know because, honestly, the book was finished quite close to publication. Once a journalist, always a journalist! (laughs) It’s quite topical — maybe some of all these things won’t all still be fresh. There’s been no discussion. We’ve still got Mark, we’ve still got Daniel, Bridget — and we’ve got these two new, hot male leads.

Q: Would you like it to happen?

A: Well . . .

Q: That’s a yes or no question.

A: I’d like to be at the casting. (laughs)