Online or Print?

Online vs. print? David Lynn at The Kenyon Review throws his hat into the ring:

Some nuggets:

I set out the questions this way to make the point that this is not merely a hypothetical: something precious to me as a writer is on the line. Because, of course, there’s the larger issue as well: what does the relationship between the print Kenyon Review and the electronic KROnline mean for the writing community? Should authors be as willing — more than merely willing, should they be as happy and enthusiastic — for their work to appear in our online journal as in print?

The question was brought home to me in a recent conversation withG. C. Waldrep. G. C. teaches at Bucknell College and is one of the country’s most knowledgeable and gifted younger poets. He is also a valued editor of The Kenyon Review. Yet he was confessing his own mixed feelings about KRO. On the one hand, he likes the literature we have thus far posted on the site — indeed he has advocated for many of the pieces there — and approves of its design and presentation as well.

Nevertheless, G. C. made it very clear that some authors consider KRO nothing more than a “Kenyon Review–Lite.” Publication there, he argued, has less status, signifies less on a curriculum vita, than the print KR. Some writers, he told me, especially those who have passed through the opening thresholds of their careers, already have a book or two but have not yet been tenured or feel professionally secure, might not even submit their work to us any longer. They worry that if we chose a poem or story for Internet publication instead of print, they wouldn’t want to have to decline the offer and risk offending.

WSJ interview with Cormac McCarthy

Good article with Cormac McCarthy in the Wall Street Journal. What’s yer favorite McCarthy book? Right now, I’d have to say All the Pretty Horses.

So what’s new with jmwwblog? Plenty. Stayed tuned this month for interviews with Emily Peterson, Blake Butler and Shane Jones, Dylan Landis and Marion Winik, and Joseph Young, Mary Miller, and Adam Robinson!

Sherrie Flick: Exploring the Spaces In Between

Sherrie Flick knew at 16 she wanted to become a writer, but “I didn’t exactly know that that meant.” She left the small mill town in Pennsylvania where she grew up to attend the  University of New Hampshire “because I thought writers went to New England.” She earned a bachelor’s of arts in English literature before attending the University of Nebraska where she earned a master’s degree. Along the way, Flick learned exactly what it means to become a writer. She wrote an award-winning flash fiction chapbook, titled, I Call This Flirting, and stories published in numerous anthologies including Norton’s New Sudden Fiction: Short-Short Stories from America and Beyond and Flash Fiction Forward. Her stories have appeared in numerous literary magazines including Prairie Schooner, North American Review, Quarterly West, Puerto del Sol, Quick Fiction, and Freight Stories, among others, and she is the recipient of a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Fellowship.

A freelance writer in Pittsburgh and the artist director of the Gist Street Reading series, Flick’s debut novel, Reconsidering Happiness, has recently been published by University of Nebraska Press. The critically praised novel explores the trajectory of two modern American women navigating through relationships, connections, misconnections, betrayals and the entire landscape of human emotions and conditions as Flick explores the spaces existing in between people who care about and for each other. Flick, who likes to garden and to cook and who writes a mini blog called “Sentences and Food,” came to Baltimore recently to participate in the 5:10 Readings. She and Rosalia Scalia discuss the novel and the writing life for jmww.

Rosalia Scalia: What was the spark for this book? Margaret and Vivette seem parallel in that they both are trying to find their best selves. Was it the notion of being lost or uncertain that intrigued you, or the characters themselves?

Sherrie Flick: I had been thinking about the notion of contentment for some time–how it’s so much more complex than it seems–how being content means different things at different stages in a person’s life. Another idea I was throwing around for bar conversation was: when does leaving get boring? When do people decide to stay in one place, make that place work–and why. All of this is tied into regret, of course. So those were the big ideas hovering over the book.

The character Vivette actually exists in a short story “Slow Fire Pistol” that was published in 2003 in Puerto del Sol. In the story she’s a different person, but she does pick up and leave for Des Moines. I decided to write her–Vivette’s story–more thoroughly. The characters of Robert and Susan are also in the story as well. I recently reread that story, and it was kind of cool to see the origins of the characters but also how they changed in novel form.

RS: What part did you write first?

SF: The first scene has always been Vivette getting in her car and going.  I wrote the book pretty much the way that it reads. I know that’s a little strange since it’s so nonlinear. I wrote the entire first draft of the novel in 4 weeks at an artist residency at the Ucross Foundation in Wyoming.

RS: In a way, this novel explores how women various women survive, thrive, or exist. There’s Vivette and Margaret, but there’s also Susan, whose seemingly perfect relationship is based on an illusion, Olivia who settles with Wesley in what appears to be a mutually beneficial deal, but who may perhaps have the most honest relationship of all, Gert, whose affair with a married man leaves her alone and older…..Vivette gets to see how various choices affect women’s lives. Was this  a conscious decision or happenstance?

SF: I think the novel explores many ways that people interact–in relationships and as friends. I mean, I didn’t sit down and say, “I need this kind of woman and this kind of woman and one of these too.” It was more that I was trying to accurately represent how a community is made up of many complex relationships that overlap in both predictable and surprising ways.

RS: How did you come to structure the book the way you did? Did you have to try out several structures first before you figured out the one that worked best?

SF: I actually wrote the book in its current non-linear structure. I’ve always experimented with time in my writing, and so this kind of fractured narrative wasn’t new to me. Instead, I felt comfortable piecing the story together through fragments of the characters’ pasts. I simply tried to replicate the way we remember things–in bits and pieces and never in an “if a then b” way.

Although I’m an organized person, I think non-linearly, so it wasn’t out of my safety zone to have a story that jumps from Vivette in Nebraska in 1994 to Margaret in San Francisco in 1992 to Vivette in New Hampshire to Margaret in New Hampshire. It became a very real world for me so I could wander through it. It also helped that I had four weeks of free time to work only on my creative project–no cooking, laundry, work, etc. I was able to get lost in the world I was creating, and I really only had to come out of it to eat dinner with the 7 other artists there, who were awesome and got super into the word count of the book and would ask each night at dinner where I was: 20,000 words, 40,000 words, etc.

Once I had the draft, I did the real work, cut a bunch of scenes and added new ones, enhanced characters worked on making everything more believable and complicated, but the basic structure remained the same–the first and last scenes, for instance.

RS: One of the things that struck me is how easily Vivette and Margaret became unmoored from their pasts, previous to showing up at the bakery. At the end, I felt astonished that both characters’ birth or original families didn’t matter that much to them or didn’t factor much into the story arc. Vivette has Grandpa Joe Joe but other than him, no close bonds with any other family members. Can you speak to this? I ask b/c this is a cultural contrast for me.

SF: I think part of what propels the people in this book out of their lives is the search for connection, the search for a kind of family that they maybe never had. In some ways, the women at the bakery serve this purpose, right? They’re like sisters to each other and the community. The groups of friends in Portsmouth are alternative families, too as well as the little household in San Francisco. I think when someone doesn’t quite fit in with their real family, she’ll put together a group that works as a surrogate. So we see some of that in Reconsidering Happiness.

There’s also a kind of loneliness that pervades the story, and I think that does result when there isn’t a supportive, robust family there to pick a person up again and again.

RS: Both Vivette and Margaret have been described as pioneering. Do you agree with that assessment?  Did you set out to write about pioneering women? (I didn’t see them as such, unless the pioneering is internal.)

SF: I do see them as contemporary pioneers–setting out to discover the unknown. It isn’t so much based on geography in this world any more. We know the U.S.–the boundaries and rivers and everything has names. But there’s the idea of leaving all that you know and setting out to discover what’s out there–setting out to discover yourself along the way.

RS: Time is one of the most difficult things to handle in fiction and you do it beautifully. Is this something with which you struggled? Or did the handling time come to you as a piece of cake while something else caused you to struggle?
SF: I’ve always loved to play with time in my stories–in particular the short-short stories I’ve written for years. I feel pretty comfortable free-floating time-wise in my fiction, taking that risk. And I love when it all works out, so thanks so much for saying I handled it beautifully!

For me the main struggle was getting the dialogue complex enough. In my first draft everyone got a long a little too well. I needed to add tension, create conflict in the relationships and this came mainly with crafting and re-crafting the dialogue–something that doesn’t come easily to me in the first place.

RS: Tell me about the male characters–Robert, Peter, Wesley. Which one do you like best and why?

SF: I don’t have a favorite. They all–all the characters in the book–seem so real to me now they seem like friends I’ve simply lost touch with. It’s kind of weird. Who would I like to hang out with right now? Peter because, yes, he’s the most grounded and the most mature. I think we could have a good time talking in the living room or at a bar and nothing would get too weird, although Wesley as an older person would be attentive and smart in conversation and would serve good food and wine. Robert. Not sure I’d want to hang out with Robert for too long one-on-one, but he’d be great at a party or any kind of group excursion.

RS: Did you find it more difficult creating male or female characters?

SF: I didn’t struggle with one over the other. For a while I couldn’t figure out what Susan’s secret was–and then one day when I was hiking in the morning at the residency, it came to me.

RS: When did you realize that Robert had hidden a lot of cheating and how did you decide to let Peter be the one to articulate it?

SF: The relationships were written organically. Robert became the cheater as I was writing the porch scene with all the beer drinking. In the original story published in Puerto del Sol, Susan is actually the one who cheats. Suddenly Vivette was the only one left and then I had her follow him inside to see what would happen next.

RS: Peter is my favorite because he seems wise and more solid than the others. Wesley is more likable as an older man than as a younger one.  But bottom line, they are all as confused and floundering as the women. Can you speak to that? Was that your intention? It surprised me that it ended from Wesley’s p.o.v. how did that decision come about?

SF: Yes, everyone is trying to figure out what to do. Everyone is flawed. The novel isn’t just about the women (although of course Margaret and Vivette are foregrounded in the story) but about the relationships that come together and fall apart and shape us in the present and future, for men and women. That was definitely intentional. I was trying to get the characters to be as rich and complex as possible. Confusion doesn’t break down over gender lines in real life, so I definitely didn’t want it breaking down that way in my book.

Some of the most emotional reactions that I’ve had to the book have been from men who see a bit of themselves in each of the male characters at different times in their lives.

It seemed natural to me to end the book from Wesley’s point of view. He is the character who ties everyone together. He’s also the person who keeps the circle of the bakery formed. He’ll always be a regular, right? He’ll be one of those old men one day. And he’s there with baby Nicole who will probably work at the bakery some day–or she could. I thought he best represented the cycle of small town life–how some people stay and others go and those that go still hang around like ghosts in the memories of those who have stayed put and vice versa.

RS: Tell me about your writing process—not the discipline part but how you come to a story. Do you outline? How did you keep track of all the characters? etc.

SF: No, I don’t outline. I do take little notes and write in my journal each morning before I write. Ideas, snippets of dialogue, something about a character that I eventually want to add. The pre-writing kind of helps with decluttering my brain.

In revision, I use a highlighter and write up little character studies of each person what they do and what they don’t do–decisions, physical attributes, everything. But this is in retrospect–sort of reporting on myself in a way. Then I make changes to characters who aren’t working or who need to be less predictable, etc.

I revise a lot. I feel like revision is the real part–where everything happens. I revise by hand, I revise on screen. It gets very messy. It’s hard for me to stop. I spent four years revising the draft and then it went through 3 more extensive revisions once it had been taken by UNPress. On a sentence level I’m sure every word of the book was changed at least once. I’m pretty obsessed with sentences.

RS: I was always afraid every time Vivette and Peter were left alone that they’d end up in bed, and yet the surprise is that Margaret is the one who kisses a strange man. Tell me about this.

SF: Yes, I wanted to create a very real tension between Vivette and Peter. But without anything amiss. There is a kind of ultimately harmless flirting that happens there. With Margaret, that scene was really hard to get right. Who starts the kiss? Why? How does it end? Where does it end? Margaret has lapsed far back into nostalgia at that moment–it’s like she’s in her past and not in the life she has now. Kissing the professor is a mistake for her, but it’s also what needed to happen once she gave him a ride.

RS: Olivia is an interesting character because she betrays Margaret and approaches the notion of marriage with Wesley as more or less an economic/business transaction. On the surface, Olivia and Wesley appear well-matched as they both come from monied families with expectations, but Wesley does truly seem to love Margaret, despite her less monied background and her more spontaneous approach to life.

SF: Olivia does use Margaret to get to Wesley, but she has been programmed, as Wesley has, to get what they want. And yes, they enter into a passionless marriage, but I think that monied people do that, marry to keep the momentum going, to keep living the life where they have things they want. They come from the same class. Their parents approve and both of them want what comes with that life. But there are sacrifices to be made: Wesley walks away from his passion with Margaret and he regrets it but he lives the life he wants. Olivia sacrifices location, agreeing to stay in a small town in New England when she had planned to go back to New York. There are many passionless marriages like this where there continues to be a certain distance between [spouses]  even though they have children and continue the cycle.

RS: The scene in the laundry mat—where Wesley talks about Margaret needing systems is a metaphor for that, almost.

SF: (Laughs.) I was so happy when I got that scene right. The dialogue was much longer because they talked about laundry and other things, and I cut a lot of it but wanted to keep the subtext. Later when Margaret tells Olivia about the laundry mat discussion, Olivia says, “That’s exactly what his father is like,” which connects Wesley back to his family and the expectations.

RS: Any advice to new writers?

SF: I struggled getting the first draft down. Once I had that part down, I felt relieved because I now had something to work with. The real work of writing comes in the revisions. I think every word in that book has been revised and changed. After that first draft was down, I was then able to go back and rework dialogue, add tension. Revise.

(Sherrie Flick will be reading Wednesday, November 4th, with Laura van den Berg, 7:30 pm, at Rosemont College, McShain Performing Arts Center, Rosemont College, 1400 Montgomery Avenue, Bryn Mawr, PA, as part of the Rosemont Reading Series. For more information, visit http://www.philadelphiastories.org/rosemont-reading-series)

How to Write Badly Well

A friend passed along this link for How to Write Badly Well. I think we’ve seen all these, in some form, in submissions over the years. What is your biggest pet peeve (as writers, editors) in writing? For me, it’s one that’s not included in this list: why was this story written? Sometimes, you just want to know why the author felt compelled to write a particular story in a particular way so that you can at least attempt to care about the story, the characters, understand the author’s passion (or lack thereof) for the contents therein. I don’t think we ask ourselves enough as writers the “whys” of what we’re doing; we seem to be stuck on the “how” to do it.

Stay tuned for Rosalia Scalia’s interview with Sherrie Flick this week!

 

Interview: Roxane Gay

David Erlewine talks with Roxane Gay  about writing, being the editor of PANK (and other editing projects), and being lazy, which should never, ever be used in the same sentence as Roxane Gay (in our opinion):

 

David Erlewine: Like me, you took off around five years from writing.  During that time I believe you wrote a bit but certainly since “re-emerging” you have been getting published in lots of journals.  What happened during those five years?  I recall you saying you now edit and take your time with stories more than you used to.  What else happened during the time away from writing that has contributed to your success?

Roxane Gay: During those five years, I published a lot of genre fiction and I read a great deal and I largely thought I would never participate in the literary fiction community. At the same time, I also looked at a lot of the writing I had been sending out before the break and forced myself to be merciless in assessing the merit or lack thereof of those stories. It was a really useful exercise because I realized that most of that writing just sucked. I was the problem. When I snapped out of my funk, I decided to do better.  I don’t have a really involved writing process but I do now take more time with my work before sending it out. When I started sending work out again I also decided to not give the endeavor more importance than it deserves. Writing is fun and I will keep doing it as long as its fun.

DE: How and when did you start editing for PANK?  Have you been surprised by how much PANK has gained prominence this year?

RG: I consulted on PANK 2 in 2007 because I have served three journals in my department in some editorial capacity. For PANK 2, I just offered advice, as needed to the students who designed that issue. The next year, Matt Seigel, the editor, invited me on as a full time associate editor and I jumped at the opportunity because I wanted to get back into literary magazine editing in a more instrumental manner. I have and I haven’t been surprised by the attention PANK seems to be getting. I’m surprised because we’re a small independent journal whose editors happen to work or study at a technological university. We’re far removed from literary circles. We’re not really plugged in to any scene so it has been amazing to see that people like what we do and are even awareo f our existence. At the same time, it isn’t surprising because while we have a lot of fun and don’t take ourselves too seriously, we also work pretty hard to put out a good product, both online and in print. I’m old-fashioned in that I believe hard work and a genuine love for great writing pay off.

DE: Your story currently in the Collagist deals with a rich, racist white guy living in baltimore.  On fictionaut, when you posted it a few months ago, you made the comment that men liked the narrator existed and you felt it was important to write about them (I’m paraphrasing of course).  I was struck by that comment b/c obviously the world is full of all sorts of awful losers like the narrator.  What about that narrator (and that kind of person) made you want to write the story.

RG: William Livingston III, the antagonist in La Negra Blanca, is that repulsive man who is able to act without consequence and that sort of impunity intrigues me. I always wonder what it must be like to be so wealthy and/or powerful that the rules simply don’t apply. In this story I tried to think through how a man like Livingston gets to a place where he can act unspeakably and shrug it off.

DE: How does editing for PANK affect your writing/submitting approach?  I know you have said that some folks use LOL and other such terms in their PANK submissions.  As an editor, are you able to take their stories seriously?

RG: Editing has certainly made me (I hope) a more considerate and conscientious writer and submitter. I simply try not to do all of the very annoying things writers tend to do. I am not often successful with this but I do try. I absolutely cannot take a submission seriously if text message/internet chat speak is used in a cover letter or submission but I do read it nonetheless just in case there might be a flash of brilliance. That has yet to happen.

DE: You have also been vocal about cover letters, commenting on writers who list 10-20 of the journals they’ve appeared in.  What should someone submitting to PANK want to put in their cover letter?

RG: I actually love cover letters–I talk about them a lot because they are so interesting to me and we receive a fascinating range of letters and approaches. As such, I’m not looking for anything specific. Having said that, I don’t mind seeing a list of publications but listing 3-5 is enough. I don’t care that you’ve been published in 20 places–that’s not impressive. Show me where I can find your best work. I am really starting to hate people who say things like, “I’ve been published in a few places” or “I’ve been published here and there.” What is the purpose of that? If you want me to know where you’ve been published, then tell me where you’ve been published, otherwise you’re just babbling pointlessly.

DE: Folks like you and Jac Jmec blog about your rejections.  Some writers love that, saying that if folks like you two are so open about their rejections…it’s good for other writers too, helps them deal with their own rejections.  When did you decide to start talking about which particular journals rejected you?

RG: When I decided to start blogging I thought I would share my rejections because I think Duotrope should share writer’s names for rejections the way they do for acceptances. It’s important to take credit for both possible outcomes in the writing process. I also think it’s a way of saying, we are not alone here. We all get rejections, lots and lots of rejections. And just like rejections aren’t personal, neither is my dissection thereof. I clearly have a bit of extra time on my hands if I can sit around blogging about rejections.

DE: You’ve gotten into places like Diagram, Wigleaf, Storyglossia, Necessary Fiction, and the Collagist this year (and about 75 other places).  What is on your list of places to get in?  I believe you’ve talked about SmokeLong and FRiGG…anywhere else?

RG: I don’t have a specific list of places where I’d like my work to appear but I am now primarily submitting to big print journals because I want to challenge myself to write the kinds of stories that belong in markets like Ninth Letter, The Missouri Review, Tin House, The New Yorker, etc. I have a story forthcoming in FRiGG. I fear I shall never click with Smokelong but I keep trying.

DE: What do you like/dislike about Fictionaut?  You appear to be in the “minority” of editors who have accepted work appearing on Fictionaut, even after Fictionaut went “public.”  You took P.H. Madore’s piece after it appeared on the Fictionaut main boards, etc.

RG: I love Fictionaut as a workshop and a place to showcase work. The only things I don’t like about Fictionaut are issues I’m quite sure will be addressed by the amazing team of people who run the show. I wish it was easier to track recent activity, particularly with regard to group conversations. If they ever institute notifications, I will be a very happy writer but even if the site never changed from where it is now, I would still think it is a valuable resource and a fun place to converse with other writers. I don’t consider a story appearing on Fictionaut as a publication because the work there isn’t reviewed or curated (a word I generally hate with regard to editorial work). There are many different opinions on what constitutes a publication but I’m all for any venue where a writer’s work can receive more exposure.

DE: Now that you are a contributing editor to htmlgiant, is there anything else you can do to get your name out there?  I don’t know how you keep track of everything between editing for PANK, guest-editing for anthologies and Emprise Review, writing, getting your PhD, writing articles, etc.  And yet you claim on your blog that you are lazy.  Do you really consider yourself lazy as that word is “objectively” used?

RG: I am not trying to get my name out there. I like to promote my work by sharing new publications with friends but I would do what I do whether I was read by one person or 100 people. I participate in projects I enjoy and the html giant thing was a real surprise but it has also been (thus far) very interesting and amusing. Some of the commenters there are… special. I absolutely believe (and know) I am lazy. I am not ashamed. Right now, I’m watching Cold Case when I should be doing approx. 7 other things, not the least of which is grading an ridiculous stack of technical reports and planning Wednesday’s and Friday’s classes.

DE: You’ve talked about possibly writing a novel based on your story that appeared in Necessary Fiction.  What are your plans with the novel, time-wise?  Do you have any time-line for the novel writing/submitting to agents/etc.?

RG: I cannot realistically work on my novel until I graduate in May. I need to focus on my dissertation and getting a job. This makes me sad, but it is a necessity and I have to prioritize my day job right now. I poke at the manuscript every now and then but I will get serious about it this coming summer. At that time I’ll also try to get an agent. I should have done that a while ago, but agents aren’t terribly interested in short story collections so I figured i’d wait until I had something to show them.

DE: Talk about Aaron Burch’s winning chapbook.  Obviously Aaron is a talented guy writer and his title sounds quite interesting.  What set his submission apart from the others?

RG: Aaron Burch’s chapbook is visual, visceral, vivid, and imaginative. We received many amazing manuscripts. I am not exaggerating when I say that all but one or two received serious consideration and those manuscripts on our shortlist were all collections we wanted to publish right now. The main thing that set Aaron’s submission apart was that it had a real structure and coherence. It was a project with a thoughtful, thematic approach, not just a collection of stories (not that there’s anything wrong with that). The writing was powerful, deliberate, at times challenging and despite some of the… darker elements of some of the writing, I felt that the chapbook had a real emotional core. I’m really excited for people to read Aaron’s book which is, incidentally, available for pre-order on the PANK website.

DE: Look at our synergy!  I was going to ask about how to order it.  Check out this page, peoples:  http://www.pankmagazine.com/?page_id=83

Interview: Paula Bomer, Artistically Declined Press

It always amazes me there are so many writer/editors/publishers in the independent writing community, but it really shouldn’t. I know, as the editor of jmww, that I just can’t quit it. I have to be involved as much as I can, getting my own work out there, and getting others’ work recognized as well. So when two crazy-talented writers–Paula Bomer and Ryan Bradley–got together to create Artistically Declined Press, I was officially stoked.

Jen Michalski: How did you and Ryan cross paths?

Paula Bomer: Ryan and I became acquainted through hanging at other indie lit blogs and websites, in particular htmlgiant. We just hit it off in some general sense. We trust each other, communicate well, and enjoy each other.

JM: How did the idea for Artistically Declined Press/the journal Sententia come about?

PB: The idea for the press and the journal was all Ryan’s, I have to admit that. It took some convincing on his part to get me involved, but now I’m loving it. At first, I was going to be the invisible partner and then I realized that it’s OK to put myself out there. Ryan had wanted to do a press and journal for a long time–he already had the name of the press and the website registered–and then we came up with the journal’s name together.

JM: In these times of indie press/journal explosion, what do you and Ryan hope to bring to the conversation?

PB: I think we bring our unique, different backgrounds and talents and experiences. Ryan’s enthusiasm is the most important and is quite catchy. He’s the young, energetic one and undoubtedly the one with the vision. I’m the middle-aged “experienced” one, having been an assistant editor at Fiction Magazine, the managing editor of Persea Books, as well as a foreign scout for the European publishers, Rizzoli, Plaza y Janes, and Goldman Verlag.

JM: You say on your site that you’re turned on by good writing; however, is there a particular aesthetic toward which you gravitate? Ryan?

PB: We actually are completely avoiding any singular aesthetic. That is something with which Ryan and I are in complete agreement–we really want an eclectic mix of styles. Our first book is Hush Up And Listen Stinky Poo Butt by Ken Sparling, a wonderful contemplation of fatherhood and what it means to be human by a Canadian author who is sometimes known as the author of “anti-novels.” Our first issue of Sententia, the journal, has powerful, non-traditional, mind-bending works by Keith Nathan Brown and Steven Trull, gorgeous poetry by the award-winning poet Geoffrey Nutter, a semi-autobiographical story by Shya Scanlon whose main character is named Shya, a stellar story by Mary Miller, the author of the great collection, Big World, as well as a truly outrageous and inappropriate piece by Scott Wrobel. And that’s just some of it. Ryan, who is handling the e-books himself and doing all of our design work, has already published our first one, Arise, by Bradley Bates, with the next one being by J.A. Tyler.

JM: You also state on the website that you have “big plans” for the press. Any hints for those of us who are impatient?

PB: Our big plans involve growth! More books! A more frequently published journal! Jackie Corley from Word Riot, Adam Robinson from Publishing Genius, Giancarlo DiTrapano from The New York Tyrant, and Roxane Gay at Pank! are our inspirations.

Everybody Is Doing It These Days: Michael Kimball’s Postcard Life Stories Are Written by and for Everybody

When Michael Kimball’s changed his wildly popular postcard project Michael Kimball Writes Your Life Story (on a postcard) to Everybody Writes Your Life Story (on a postcard), I had to know why. So I caught up with Michael and asked him a few questions:

Jen Michalski: You posted a blog last week, Everybody Writes Your Life Story (on a postcard),  about your decision to open up Postcard Life Stories, which came as a surprise to me and yet was entirely understandable, considering how long you’ve been doing it and how many you’ve written. A few other writers have written postcards for you before (Sam Ligon wrote your life story; Bridget Holding wrote one for Jackie Juno). Was there a specific incident this time that fueled your decision to open it up to everybody?

Michael Kimball: There were a couple of things that led to the decision to open the project up. One is that I became swamped with requests after NPR’s All Things Considered covered the project back in July. I couldn’t keep up and the waiting list kept getting longer and I wanted everybody who wanted one to have one. Another is that Bridget Holding got in touch with me and told me that she had started using the project in her work as a psychotherapist. We had a nice chat about writing them for people, what it is like to do that, and I realized that I shouldn’t keep this to myself anymore. I was a little surprised by the response, but happily so. Right now, there are about 20 writers working on life stories for different people.

JM: Have you thought about creating physical spaces, eg, Baltimore Is Reads, where people can read the life stories of people in their own cities? A simultaneously run gallery exhibit or public space or such? A documentary?

MK: Luca Dipierro (my partner in Little Burn Films) and I have talked about filming one of them, the interview and the writing of it, but we haven’t gotten to that yet. A bunch of them were re-published as art objects in Locus Magazine; I was really happy about that. And Cat Rocketship is in the early stages of getting a bunch of artists together to illustrate some of them and then have an art show around them. For anybody with other ideas, I’m open. I’ve always thought of this as a collaborative project at its heart (that is, I couldn’t write the life stories if people didn’t share them with me).

JM: At some point, everything comes to an end. When you read the first postcard and the last postcard of Postcard Life Stories, what will be different about them? The same?

MK: #1 Bart O’Reilly is already very different from #222 Alan Reese. The obvious difference is that they are much longer and hold a lot more details of a person’s life. The thing that has stayed the same is the tone, an attempt to honor each person’s life in an objective fashion.

I also have to say that I’m not sure this project will ever end (as long as there are people to write about). The new goal of the project is to write the postcard life story for everybody (in the world). My hope is that the project keeps getting bigger and bigger—more writers, more lives (so, you know, if you’re interested, please get in touch).

JM: This really isn’t a question, but thanks for doing the Postcard Life Stories. It strikes me, in the age of Facebook and Twitter and reality television, that we still don’t know anybody. But your postcards have always made me feel a lot closer to so many people I may never meet. And I’m sure many people feel the same way, or it wouldn’t have become as successful as it did.

(Jen Michalski’s Postcard Life Story can be found here.)

Winner!

The winner of Donald Breckenridge’s YOU ARE HERE is Jenny O’Grady. Congratulations Jenny!

Donald Breckenridge Is Here

Actually, author and Brooklyn Rail editor Donald Breckenridge has never been gone. But his new novel, YOU ARE HERE (Stacherone Press, 2009), is out in a big way and is getting plenty attention from Word Riot and Bookforum, among others. I caught up with Donald after a reading he gave in Baltimore, and we talked about the book, New York, and the competitiveness of air hockey.

Jen Michalski: I guess the reader will know what she is getting into when she opens the book and there’s a quote from Eugene Ionesco on the first page. But YOU ARE HERE feels much more than the theater of the absurd. There are four central characters—Janet and James, Stephanie and Alan—who hook up, break up, in addition to their peripheral friends, over two separate times points–2001 and 2004—and even a character named Donald Breckenridge. They all write plays, short stories, novels, based on these two relationships, attempting to infuse them with meaning or maybe deconstruct them. There’s more than a sense of absurdist irrelevancy in them, though. For one, there’s a constant naming of “concrete” things in the spliced, intersecting stories—the Deer Park delivery truck parked out on the sidewalk, the subway trains, planes flying out of JFK, even as people’s realities are constantly shifting, morphing as characters in stories, actors in plays. It’s almost as if you give the reader an anchor point, ie, “you are here,” which I like. And it’s also an anchor point for the characters, too, if they actually decide to get out of their self-absorbed heads and look around them. YOU ARE HERE seems very much a metatextual, postmodern novel for the “instant-messaging, fluid-Facebook identity generation” (for lack of a better word). Am I on the right track?

Donald Breckenridge: YOU ARE HERE was my attempt at capturing in a novel the disastrous years between ’01 and ’04 in NYC—with a peripheral eye on the rest of the world—and the direct and indirect results of 9/11. It was a very bleak and paranoid time. I’ve attempted to etch a kaleidoscopic and fragmentary element onto the various narratives unfolding and deconstructing throughout YOU ARE HERE and that is a direct and multifaceted response to the unending present and the immediacy of recent history here in New York.

I have always been very invested in creating dynamic visual elements and allowing their implications to inform my fiction. In my late teens and early twenties I was seriously considering pursing a career in photography, also, devouring authors such as Emmanuel Bove, Juan Carlos Onetti, Claude Simon, and Yasunari Kawabata, whose skills at effortlessly capturing and greatly nuancing their narratives with stunning visual elements, played a crucial role in my developing abilities as a writer long before I even considered writing fiction. Also, writing about the recent past in New York City, where I have lived for 20 years, is a relatively easy, inexpensive and very satisfying way to capture the frames that hold the characters delivering this highly fragmented narrative.

JM: At a reading you did in Baltimore recently, Michael Kimball introduced your work as being very distinctly New York. Of course, both of your novels have been set in New York, but do you feel that you are a distinctly New York writer? Could YOU ARE HERE been set in Boise, Idaho?

DB: My novella ROCKAWAY WHEREIN takes place in Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Queens; the same can be said for the novels 6/2/95 and YOU ARE HERE. The novel I am working on right now takes place in New York as well. So yes, I am very much a New York writer, and I have a great love for this city, I’d like to think that comes out in the work. However, my novel that is forthcoming from Autonomedia, THIS YOUNG GIRL PASSING, takes place in Upstate New York, just south of Utica in Oneida County. THIS YOUNG GIRL PASSING is based on the true story of a high school French teacher who has an affair with one of his students in the mid to late 1970s. The teacher ends their relationship after she graduates and then twenty-years later they renew their affair. Although the chapters alternate between the 1970s and the 1990s, the novel isn’t as fragmented and kaleidoscopic as YOU ARE HERE because the story itself is much more straightforward. It will be interesting to see how people respond to this book.

JM: You’ve written a ton of plays in addition to three novels. Do you find you have more freedom to pursue ideas, nonlinear or otherwise, in one medium or another? Does one medium inform the other?

DB: In the fall of ‘89 I founded The Open Window Theater Company with a small but dedicated group of actors with whom I had attended The American Academy of Dramatic Arts. I wrote plays for a group of truly talented actors who were committed to performing a wide variety of plays and were willing to do so for no money. We occupied a former paint factory beneath the Williamsburg Bridge. I wrote and produced many of my one-act plays there, in addition to running a gallery space upstairs, tending bar, and hosting readings. I would write a play and the day after it was completed we would begin rehearsals, and a few weeks later the play would be performed in a small black box theater before a group of visual artists, musicians, performance artists, writers, and like-minded pioneering hedonists living in and around South Williamsburg long before the neighborhood was gentrified. I did that for three years and that was how I learned to write, it was always in front of an audience.

I came to New York to study acting and was kicked out of a school that I had no business being in, so I began writing plays and slowly became a novelist. Working with that company was a very productive and romantic episode from my early twenties, although I was completely broke, half-starved, stoned, drunk, and or hung-over nearly all of the time. I came to fiction a few years later, after the theater company disbanded, when it became prohibitily expensive for me to mount plays here. I began writing fiction because it was impossible to get my plays preformed. All of my writing begins with a conversation between two people, it’s really quite simple, and all of my fiction could be easily broken down for the stage. My fragmented writing style is a failed attempt at simultaneity, I am simply trying to recreate the experience of watching actors performing on stage. YOU ARE HERE was going to be a play and then I was going to turn it into a novel that exploded the two separate acts while interweaving the actual rehearsal and production process—so that the actors who were playing the characters in the play would also have major roles in the novel—into the two story lines. I couldn’t write the play because it became a novel when I was writing out the dialog for the first act, when Janet and James are in the French restaurant, my play was somehow corrupted and that derailed my plans, I think that had a lot to do with the desperation I was feeling in the spring of ’04, and it was a very strange experience.

JM: There’s a scene in the book where a Fassbinder poster is on the wall is noted, which heightened my awareness of your visual framing of places, scenes. Where people are in space. Another anchor for the reader, for sure, but it’s almost a deliberate decision by you to keep them for becoming fluid themselves, to keep the reader out of the book, in a way. Which is ironic, considering there’s a character named Donald Breckenridge. What’s up with the fourth wall? It makes me think of another New York writer, Jay McInerney, who on the other hand flaunts it often. Am I interpreting correctly?

DB: Seeing Fassbinder’s “The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant” was incredibly motivating for me, after watching the film for the first time, I knew just how I wanted YOU ARE HERE to look and what I wanted the book to feel like. I wanted to leave the reader alienated and at the same time I wanted them to be aware of their empathy. Fassbinder came out of the anti-theater, which was a theater of alienation, it was shocking and grotesque, somewhat contrived and yet it was also highly lucid and deeply humane. I think his films really resonated with me after 9/11 because he was raised in the aftermath, literally in the rubble of Germany after the Second World War, so, no matter how superficial or seemingly gratuitous his plots may seem there is always an emotionally honesty shadowing his work. YOU ARE HERE is in many ways a homage to Fassbinder and also for Esther Tusquets and her extraordinary second novel LOVE IS A SOLITARY GAME, which explores a highly contrived romance between a young and ambitious poet, a shy teenage girl and an older woman. This is a novel that I read nearly twenty years ago and it has stayed with me since…and in part of YOU ARE HERE we have the relationship with Janet the recent divorcee in her mid-forties, the twenty-four year old aspiring writer James, and Cindy the director of the play who is also one of Janet’s many lovers. Also, I named Janet’s cat Esther after Esther Tusquets.

JM: How does a novel like this get written? Do you map the intersecting arcs of these characters before, write all of a certain character’s scenes first, then link them together? I admire so much what you’ve done but couldn’t even begin to think how I would approach it as a writer.

DB: After struggling with YOU ARE HERE first being a play and then giving up on that and letting it become a novel, I wrote out a solid draft of the Janet and James section of the book, this began around April of ’04 and ended in the winter of ’06. I began the Stephanie and Alan section of the book in the spring of ’06 and finished it in the late spring of ’07. It was always my intention of weaving those chapters together, so the plots would contrast, also it was a good way to highlight the dramatic changes the city had undergone between the summer of ’01 and the spring, summer and fall of ’04.

JM: How did you decide on the section titles? They are so specific, ie, “Third Friday in June,” and yet, in the greater scheme of four years in these character’s lives—2001 to 2004—they’re not very meaningful at all.

DB: No, they aren’t very meaningful at all, neither are the character’s lives and that was the point.

JM: Another physical marker in the book is 9/11, the beginning of the second Gulf War, and George W. Bush’s re-election in 2004, told throughout various newspaper headlines. Did you choose this frame specifically, knowing it might open the book up to criticism of it being a “9/11 book”?

DB: Bush wasn’t re-elected in 04, the ’00 election was stolen, Bush’s election in ’04 was as much a tragedy to me as were the attacks on 9/11. I was shocked and appalled by the election results, and my response was writing YOU ARE HERE, a novel that is book-ended by these two catastrophic events. This was a very painful and difficult book to write and I think if anyone were to criticize me for simply writing a “9/11 book” I’ll know that they probably haven’t even bothered to read it and I try not to suffer fools.

JM: What are you reading these days? Are you working on anything now?

DB: I am reading and really enjoying Arthur Machen’s complete twelve-volume translation of Casanova’s autobiography, also Gilbert Sorrentino’s last novel THE ABYSS OF HUMAN ILLUSION is quite extraordinary and that is due out from Coffee House in the winter of ’10. Also, I am slowly working on a new novel, while launching two other novels, which has been strange and quite distracting. I’ve never been in this position before, but I am looking forward to digging in with the new novel once THIS YOUNG GIRL PASSING is finally out.

JM: Stacherone seems like a great press—Thaddeus Rutkowski, Leslie Scalapino—what’s your experience been like?

DB: It has been a real pleasure working with Ted Pelton, he is honest and works hard and I think Rebecca Maslen did a great job laying out YOU ARE HERE. After Leslie Scalapino blurbed YOU ARE EHRE she submitted her novel FLOATS HORSE-FLOATS OR HORSE FLOWS to Starcherone on my recommendation and after it was accepted Ted asked me to usher it through the production process, and that has been a real pleasure as I love Leslie’s writing, I’ve published her quite a few times in The Brooklyn Rail, and this novel is really amazing. I am not very familiar with Thaddeus Rutkowski’s work and that is something I’ll explore in the coming months.

JM: What’s your relationship like with your partner (fellow writer Johannah Rodgers)? Do you critique each other’s work? Is it hard living with someone vying for the same air in the literary world? Or is there more air in the room because you’re together?

DB: Johannah and I are very competitive when it comes to air hockey, poker, paddle ball, and putt-putt golf, and she really hates to lose. Fortunately, we don’t compete as writers, and we have been each other’s first readers for the last ten years. Johannah is wonderful writer and a very attentive reader.

***Win a signed and “illustrated” copy of Donald Breckenridge’s YOU ARE HERE by commenting on this interview! Your comment will be your entry. The winner will be announced early next week.***

We Take Molly Apart (and carefully put her back the way we found her)

There is no rest for David Erlewine or Molly Gaudry. Fresh from his own interview with Michelle Reale on jmwwblog, he speaks with Molly Gaudry about her novella in verse, We Take Me Apart, forthcoming from Mud Luscious Press, her journals and presses, and the Doppelgangers she must have helping her to be the hardest-working woman in the lit business. Okay, maybe we made that last part up.

DE: After asking you to do this interview, I checked out your blog. It said you are no longer blogging because of a busy life and not having much to talk about. Would it be weak sauce to ask you to talk about why you don’t have much to blog about? Yeah, it would, but could you offer a few words? I don’t blog myself much but have always enjoyed thoughtful bloggers like you and Brad Green, among others.

MG: I’ve been conflicted lately about why I blog; I think it’s always been a source of interest for me—why I keep a diary, more or less, publicly and online. I don’t want to blame my day job for my disappearance, but I do have young college students and, perhaps, their parents to worry about. When I blog, I tend to speak freely, profanely, as I share some of my deepest worries, doubts, and late-night, often insomniac-induced (rambling, sometimes angry, sometimes seriously upsetting) thoughts. When the term began, I consciously censored myself out of fear of potential backlash; and although it may not be a valid concern on my part, I just do not want to jeopardize my professional life in any way—especially not because of some off-the-cuff remark made in a moment of self-absorption.

Additionally, I haven’t written or submitted in months, so there is just no news to report on these fronts—certainly not with the frequency that there once was. And I’ve not been able to keep up with my online reading as much, either; and this has led to a decrease in possible blog material. I used to read the freshly launched issues of so many magazines and announce these on my blog, but now it seems everyone else is doing it faster, better (the PANK blog, for instance, and Ethel Rohan’s, among others).

As I type these thoughts now, I can’t help thinking, too, that perhaps the truest thing of all is that I’m not unhappy.

My blog was always a place to go, mostly at night, alone and lonely while I worked out whatever mental meanderings had weighed on me throughout the day. When I began blogging, I was in Cincinnati and going through a rough, post-grad-school phase, wondering what to do with my life. The blog saw me through a serious transition—from Cincinnati to the east coast, from working in a head shop to working at a university, from being relatively unknown and unpublished to now having a book, a Pushcart nomination (thanks, PANK!), and several anthologized works (thanks, Best of the Web and Main Street Rag!). And it’s safe to say that now, about halfway through this first semester, I’m feeling as if I’ve finally begun to settle in—both at work and at home in yet another new city. Life is pretty good, and, for me, that means I just don’t have much to share. For now, anyway.

DE: Kudos on all of your success – a Pushcart nomination and Best of the Web anthology in one year is damn tight. I’m thrilled to hear life is good. I am curious about your thoughts on the possible correlation between happiness and creative output (blogging, writing, reading). During my five-year break from writing, I was pretty damn happy or at least satisfied. I wrote a story about every 18 months and watched a lot of football, hung out with my kids, and didn’t really think much about literature. It’s not that I’m unhappy now, but maybe just more attuned to my former/future suffering. Ha ha. So, with that in mind, I presume that fans of your blog/fiction/poetry should, uh, hope unhappiness finds you?

MG: I think, yes, for me, there is a bit of a relationship between being lonely (which makes me emotional) and (having more time for?) creative output. This said, because life’s been so busy lately (mid-term week, Homecoming weekend, and everything else—including final edits for Issue 2 of Twelve Stories), I haven’t felt so lonely. Or, I haven’t had time to feel it as much. And I still managed to knock out a sestina two days ago. I don’t know. What am I saying?

I’m saying that there’s a slight correlation, yes. But I’m also saying that I think, for me, I need down time, away from writing, during which I just ruminate and let my ideas simmer. I’ve gotten to the point where I can’t sustain the mental energy to actually complete a fully drafted project unless I can do it in a contained period of time. If other responsibilities get in the way, I get totally derailed. This means that although I’m not writing much now—nothing long, anyway—I’m at least thinking about the next manuscript(s). And, come winter break, I’d like to knock out a rough draft of this water ballet herstory I’ve been worrying about; come spring break, I’d like to start over, from scratch, this manuscript titled Rosalia, which details the women of a town called Rosalia, as they prepare for the annual celebration/orgy/feast called Rosalia. Then, this summer, it’d be great to really dig into the revisions of these mss.

Bottom line, then, is this: yes, life is good, and soon, when life (e.g. job responsibilities) settles down a bit, I’d like to get back into the habit of writing ten to twelve hours a day (as I did while writing We Take Me Apart).

DE: Keyhole, 12 Stories, Willows Wept, We Take Me Apart, working, etc. Talk to me. What is your life like? How do you edit for three journals? Do you segment your reading by night or do you sometimes find yourself read subs from all three journals in the same sitting? What is Peter Cole like?

MG: Oh, dear. And don’t forget I’m now the book reviewer for East&West Magazine, which has a monthly print run of 15,000 and is available mostly in 5-star hotels. On top of that, I’ve just signed on to be a regular contributor for a new online project, Big Other. I take on too much, and I tend to sometimes get behind schedule, but the truth is that without all these things I’d rot, mentally.

I’ll try and break it all down: I get very few submissions for WWR, and I read and respond to them immediately. For WWP, which publishes two books a year, I get to take about a four-month break, during which I don’t have to think about the press at all, but then it’s crunch time for two months, and in these two months the authors and I do everything. Currently, it’s one of those two-month frenzies. Scott Garson’s chapbook, American Gymnopédies, is a stunner, and we’re working out the cover art now. I plan to release it in January 2010.

As for 12S, Blythe and I have a great partnership and it’s become second nature how we deal with each other and the work in the inbox; I think it’s safe to say that I function as a first reader, reject most of the slush about once a month or so, and leave the promising pieces in the inbox so that she and I can discuss them together, which we try to do about every other week. In many ways, she’s more a stickler for details than I, so the workload balances out—as she’s got a sharp editorial eye and also maintains the website, all of which she designed herself (with a bit of “That looks good,” and “Okay, I like that,” and “Sure, mmhmm,” from me, occasionally). We’re not the fastest readers, but we work at a pace that suits each of us, and it’s working well so far.

And poor Keyhole. I used to read a lot more, but man do the submissions just pour in. Peter needs a team of readers to wade through the slush. I don’t know how he does it. He is absolutely the hardest working man in show biz. Don’t believe me? Volunteer to join the team and see for yourself. Best of all, despite himself, he cares about the final product more than anyone else I know. It’s inspiring. He’s inspiring.

DE: Hmm, that is all great information but now my brain is afire. I could see myself volunteering for Keyhole and being deluged! Dogzplot was insane for me, the number of people subbing and subbing and subbing. I started getting angry re-reading certain bios. I would think, can’t you change one word about this? Then I’d think why am I reading their bio again? It was too much for me. jmww is working out much better, in terms of me being able to handle it better mentally. In any event, thanks, it’s great to visualize how you handle your business. Speaking of business (hiyo!), one of the coolest things Fictionaut was seeing you solicit Kathy Fish’s piece “See Jane” for Willows Wept. I loved the story immediately, even more during subsequent reads. After which read did you post a comment with the link to Willows Wept? Was the story so good that it only took one read? I want to write like Kathy Fish. How do I do that?

MG: I read it once, quickly (as I tend to read everything on Fictionaut, when I read anything on Fictionaut), left the link, and crossed my fingers. In fact, now that I think of it, I’d closed submissions for the summer issue by then, but I liked the piece so much I made an exception and asked Kathy if I could include it. It seemed the perfect final piece to wrap up the season. As I’ve yet to put up anything for the fall issue, Kathy’s piece is still on the site’s main page, which I just love—the idea that hers is the first thing anyone sees upon navigating to the journal.

As for how you might write like Kathy, I’m just not sure exactly. She’s long been a favorite of mine, ever since I read A Peculiar Feeling of Restlessness. Hers were the stories that really stood out to me. Since then, I’ve grown quite fond of Claudia Smith as well, but back then, when I was just opening up to the idea of short-short fiction, or flash fiction, Kathy really stunned me, again and again, with how brevity could be used to a piece’s benefit. It may well be Kathy Fish who is responsible for my attempting to write flash, myself. As for you, Dave, you may just have to tap into your feminine side a bit. Pluck some tulips, try a bit of mascara, and, for God’s sake, don’t trip in those heels.

DE: That’s cool that Kathy may have gotten you into flash. She definitely got me into it. When I wasn’t writing anything b/w 2003-2008, sometimes I would go onto Zoetrope and read pieces by her, Randall Brown, Alicia Gifford, and others. For a few minutes, I’d feel so deflated about not writing anything, so envious of what they were doing. Kathy was always so supportive, and remains so. Hmm, the mascara and heels image is working for me, but I digress.

Your Hobart Interview made me feel like an ant. It made me feel like I should take off another five years from writing and do nothing but read and get smart. Do you like making me feel small and pointless? If I had sent these draft questions to Amy Minton, she probably would have laughed and said, “Knock yourself out.”

MG: In fact, yes, I do like making you feel small and pointless. Of course not, Dave! I’ll tell you what, though: I read those questions (Amy’s just about the gentlest kind of ferocious there is) and about barfed. I was like, “Cormac McCarthy! Lydia Millet!” And then I died. I sort of want to just sigh right now, if that’s okay. I mean, I never got so many chills all at once before. It was a great feeling, knowing someone like Amy put that much time and effort into asking me such studied questions. Best of all, I really got the feeling she wanted to know the answers. I don’t think that sort of interviewing style can be faked, you know?

DE: I can imagine, Molly, it must have been so exciting to get those questions! Those chills are what it’s all about. When someone gets something I write or when I read something that will forever alter how I look at things, and those chills kick in, all the other stuff fades. Indeed, you can’t fake that.

Switching gears, how does Philly compare to Cincinnati? As a UC Law grad and renter in one of the big three beautiful high-rise grad apartments, I am especially curious about your move. I went from Cincy to Baltimore and was fine, but I’d grown up on the east coast. Why do I keep thinking you are in Brasilia?

MG: Philadelphia is a dirty, dirty city. I imagine all the busted up, broken down parts of Cincinnati and think, Yeah, that seems about right for Philadelphia. Is this unfair? Yes. I think the best things about Cincinnati just can’t even hold a candle to the best things about Philadelphia. I mean, Cincinnati’s proximity to Covington, Kentucky isn’t much at all like Philly’s proximity to New York. Know what I mean? Anyway, I feel oddly inspired to mention that there’s a vibrant visual arts scene in Philadelphia, and I’m grateful for it. Life seems to have become something else entirely, lately, as a result of having been in Philadelphia at the right place and the right time, which is to say, I guess, that there are a lot of artists in Philly who’ve been good for my once weary (and wary) soul.

I remember you telling me you were a fellow Bearcat. I sometimes miss Cincinnati, but I know, too, that it was just time to move on with my life. I’m glad I made the decision, tough as it was, and I’m glad I am where I am—which, ah, getting a bit out of order here, has to do with why you think I’m in Brasilia, Brazil. In any case, I plan to hit the road again in 2010. I don’t know where, but I’ll figure it out along the way.

DE: Where were you before Cincy? Cincy is a pretty conservative town, no? Did you like your time there? I know the UC campus has lots of fun stuff going on. Well, I heard that at least. I was always studying or watching TV or reading.

MG: Before Cincinnati, I was in southern California, for college. It was okay. I drank a lot. I wasn’t much of a student, which is why I took some time off before moving to Cincinnati and finishing my undergrad degree there. It is, yes, a conservative town, but the most open-minded, liberated teenagers in all of Ohio must, I’m sure, attend the School for Creative and Performing Arts, which will celebrate its final year in the heart of Over the Rhine (ah, for those of you unfamiliar with OTR, this means: the ghetto). SCPA will finally move into its brand new, state-of-the-art facility for the 2010-2011 school year. I’m hoping it works out for them. As an alumnus, I’ve got a soft spot for that institution.

Final word: I have no idea if the UC campus has a lot of fun stuff going on; I, like you, was always studying, reading, or working.

DE: I have a softish spot for the school, I think, but the law school has been calling me recently for money. I am a terrible donor. Actually, I’m not technically a donor. I told the guy who called last time that I just spent my money on Kevin Wilson’s new short story collection. He laughed, one of those big laughs, and then there was lots of silence before we hung up. Oh wow, Over the Rhine! I forgot about OTR. I saw some great shows there, including Richard Buckner. I love that guy. Next time the law school calls (always from the same number), should I let it go to voice mail? I need an answer quickly as I expect a call tonight.

MG: Oh, no. You should speak to them in a different language, Dutch, perhaps: “David Erlewine is niet hier. David Erlewine haat u. David Erlewine leeft niet hier meer. Who is David Erlewine? Wat wilt u met hem? Waarom houdt u roepend? Ga weg!”

DE: Ha ha, of course, that’s how I’ll play it.

After (or near the end of?) last year’s AWP, you wrote a touching Facebook update. You talked about many funny and sad things, including how much you already missed Blythe. How is the co-editing thing going for 12 Stories with her? When you all got started, were you both in Cincy? Have the dynamics changed since moving?

MG: I miss Blythe every damn day, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. She’s about three weeks from her due date, and then, suddenly, she’s going to be a mommy and I’m going to be her weird freaky friend who’ll be nothing but a bad influence on her otherwise wholesome family. I plan to return to Cincinnati after the baby’s born. How could I not return to Cincinnati to see that bundle of awesome? And as for AWP, it’s a little-known fact (or a well-known fact, depending on who you ask) that Blythe and I shared a room at the Hilton; originally, we’d booked a room with two beds. But then I had to go in a night early because of the Orange Alert reading, and the only room available had only one bed, which we agreed we could share without indulging in any hanky-panky. It was heartbreaking to say goodbye to Blythe in Chicago, after the conference. But the coolest thing about being there with her was that she was pregnant then and didn’t yet know it. We shared that bed, the three of us—me, Blythe, and her soon-to-be baby girl. I’ll cherish that forever.

DE: Talk to me about JA Tyler. You could add up all the other writers’ credits against his and call it evey stevey. What prompted you to challenge him, even facetiously, on your blog? Will someone be updating your blog to keep track of his placements (he’s had three since we started).

MG: He’s well over a hundred publications in 2009 now, that’s for sure. What prompted me to challenge him? The simple truth is I was inspired by his 2008 year-in-review post. He’d met his goal of 100 publications, and I thought how amazing that was. To take him on, I think, was a great way to inspire myself to work harder, to push forward, to write every day.

DE: I loved your Barrelhouse piece “I Cook, I Clean.” I was happy to see your piece there. I greatly enjoyed being on the Barrelhouse group flash fiction panel with you earlier this year. Any interest in doing more panels in the future?

MG: It was great to be on that panel with you, too, Dave. Thank you for the kindness, re: “I Cook, I Clean.” And, yes, of course, I’m always down to be a panelist. Makes me feel smart or some such.

DE: Describe to me how this novella in verses came about? It’s available for pre-order now, and hits for real in December? What’s it like working with JA? One of the coolest things I’ve seen, blurb-wise, is “With language, Gaudry is as loving and careful as one is with a matchbook…when wishing to set the whole word on fire.” How does reading that feel?

MG: The novella in verse came about as a result of my move to Philadelphia in February of 2009, immediately following the AWP conference. I’d packed my bags, hit the road for the conference, moved into the Hilton, then hit the road for Philly, with a brief pit-stop in Cleveland where I slept for a few hours. On the drive from Ohio to Philadelphia, I repeated the phrase “we take me apart” over and over again. I loved everything about it—its suggestiveness, its aural qualities, and the way it prompted all these thoughts about the literal and metaphorical process of dissembling a human body, mine. Upon arrival to Philadelphia, I moved into my room-for-rent, shut the door, and wrote a ten-page, single-spaced poem that I then blogged about. I said it was too long to be a poem, too short to be a story, too weird to be either, really, and the best thing I’d ever put on paper. I knew that if anyone would get it, that person would be J. A. Tyler. I queried him for the mini-chapbook series, told him I knew it was over the 1,000 word limit but wondered if he’d make an exception. He said he’d give it a read.

I then blogged about how I thought it could become something longer, a full-length work, perhaps. He read that post, I guess, and a few days later sent me a note saying he’d like to read it again when I’d turned what I had into a longer work. We set a deadline, and as it approached I began to freak out. What I’d sent him just wasn’t going anywhere. I kept trying to force this longer storyline, and it was awful. The deadline grew closer and closer, and at the final hour I abandoned all the new pages and started over from scratch, borrowing key phrases from Gertrude Stein’s Tender Buttons. I sent J. A. a note saying, “Hey, I started over, I hope you don’t mind, and here’s what I’ve got,” and he was nothing but encouraging. I think, probably, most publishers would have pulled the plug right there, but J. A. supported the new material. When the deadline arrived, I sent him the first draft of what is now We Take Me Apart. In no way does it resemble the original poem (which is to be published as an e-chapbook titled “Anatomy for the Artist” by Blossombones), but the essence of the initial idea—the taking apart and putting back together again—remains. Without the pressure to deliver (on time) to the guy who was willing to publish my first book, and without his support and encouragement, and, later, his editorial genius, I might have given up altogether. I will be eternally grateful to him for everything he gave me—most importantly, his belief in me.

As for Kate Bernheimer’s blurb, I’m still in shock. Here’s a woman whose writing I absolutely love, a writer who ignored all my fan mail, a (now-former) professor at the university that rejected my MFA application, and what does she do for me totally out of the blue? She writes the best damn blurb a doe-eyed fan could have asked for. I want to hug her. I will hug her. When she calls security and I’m led kicking and screaming from this year’s AWP, you’ll know why.