Painting by Peter Fowler. circa 2007.
What is the working title of the book?
As I was writing it, it was entitled “To Becoming Normal”.
Since its completion, it carries the title “A Normal Line of Work”.
Where did the idea come from for the book?
I had hit on a measure (for the line of the poem) that I
found endlessly creative and beautiful. Writing with this form was for me a
very distinct and productive experience, and I was almost always surprised and
pleased by the results. So, to be brief, the idea came from my writing of
poetry over all the years previous to it.
What genre does your book fall under?
It is a poem, a long poem. I amused myself with a new
label at the time: literary pointillism. Something radical, integral, but
clearly just a drop in the bucket.
What actors would you choose to play the part of your
characters in a movie rendition?
I would choose the first group of people who could stage
it, if each actor took a section and commited it to memory. There needs to be an instrumental
component, but outside of ballads and what I consider pop music, I am not a
composer. I know it has performance potential since it was best realized as a
theater, or performance, event back in 2008. But it is a book.
I like Alec Guinness a lot, and James Stewart, Harriet
Andersson, Julie Christie. I’m not quite up to date on A-list actors. Why don’t
you ask who I’d like to make the movie?
What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
“A Normal Line of Work” is a long poem-as-score for
musical and theatrical performance, coordinated between the extremes of pure
music and recitation.
How long did it take to write the first draft of the
manuscript?
Three years.
Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Poets—early companions—Major Ragain, Alice Cone, Kathy
Korcheck, Jayce Renner, Adam Brodsky (the Cleveland poet, not the anti-folk
guy), then purely historical sources—Kenneth Patchen, bpNichol, and so
on—hundreds of poets I heard at readings before I quit the scene—I guess those
who provided me the space and time to work as a poet for as long as I did with
such concentration (sadly, I do currently work at that level)—the poetics
program at Buffalo: Robert Creeley, Susan Howe, Charles Bernstein, Dennis
Tedlock, those I worked alongside—Michael Basinski, Kristianne Meal, Jonathan
Skinner, many many others. Though my writing process and aims were, in my view,
vastly different than his, the master then and now of the short line is Tom
Raworth—this was made clear to me only when the book was nearly finished. All
the best poets I read and listened to understood this kind of weighting of
sound and silence, textual space and writing. But I was continually inspired by
friends and loved ones who supported me as a poet in Buffalo.
What else about your book might pique the reader’s
interest?
We might wonder if the United States will ever understand
the disastrous problems and self-inflicted wounds it faced in the years
2001-2008. Many Americans do seem to recognize the severity of our crisis in
some places, but too many continue on in ignorance of chronic inequalities and
injustices in many others. I think my choice to work and live as a poet at that
time was either ridiculously foolish or uncommonly brave, depending. Poets, for
good or ill, are tuned to completely unexpected ranges of impression, and in
writing my poem at the level of seriousness I then had, I was truly happy to
have written the book for what I was learning and able to convey. I haven’t had
that assurance since—and once I knew it was done, I didn’t know what was to
come next. I don’t know that I’ll be as close to a combined feeling and
structuring of music in the line ever again. Because I didn’t know exactly what
to do with it—so that it would lead to a further development in my writing—I
didn’t travel with it or share it with audiences in any big way. Also, once it
was finished, when I saw most supports for myself as a writer crumbling
away—both internally and externally—I stopped trying to go on with poetry as my
only serious work. I could muddle along as a clerk or marginalized, adjunct
professor. The sense of my feeling that poetry was all I had may be in
there—the feeling that, while those closest to you accept you and support you,
there is a malicious ocean of discouragement awaiting you for sticking to your
art without obeying the orders of alternately ignorant, commercial,
bureaucratic & totalitarian forces, even in our beloved fine arts
communities. I guess it might pique your interest that I’m not screaming
through the flames, I’m trying to live a relatively boring, middle-class life
as a poet and performer. The absurdity of that might twit your boutonnière. But
look, when even loudmouth poets stop taking poetry seriously as the best of our
intellectual and emotional efforts, then what the hell kind of reception will
poetry get? You’re probably too busy trying to feed your kids or punching the
clock to drift off on my mad trips, anyway.
Will your book be self-published or represented by an
agency?
