Barnstorm Interview: Steve Almond
Steve Almond is the author of eight books of fiction and nonfiction including My Life In Heavy Metal, Candyfreak, and Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life. His most recent collection of short fiction, God Bless America, is hilarious and heartbreaking. Go buy it now! And if you're local, see him read tomorrow night at this benefit for Chester College. Almond talked to Barnstorm about the new collection, his process, and his mandatory reads for all of humanity.
Q: Your new(ish) collection God Bless America is so great. Can you tell me a little bit about how these stories came together?Steve Almond: Yeah, all I was looking to do was gather up the best stories I'd written over the past six or seven years. Me and Ben George, my editor at Lookout, argued a little over which ones to put in there, but we got on the same page pretty quick. I'm not a big believer in writing to a particular theme, or subject. I pretty much just find a character and let them lead me around. Invariably, they're traveling the same path, which is the path of my own obsessions.Q: As the title of the collection suggests, a number of these stories deal with themes about America. For example, in the title story the main character Billy Clamm (haha, that name!) has a sort of deranged optimism that he's got what it takes to be a successful actor. This strikes me as distinctly American. Can you speak about your relationship with American culture?SA: "Ambivalent" would be a charitable way of putting it. America has the greatest ideals of any country in the history of the species. The problem is Americans have gotten so hooked on convenience that they don't live up to those ideals very often. Capitalism has us all mixed up. We're measuring success and worth in the wrong ways. We have so much abundance, but we're emotionally and morally impoverished. Don't you feel that way? So maybe the word I'm looking for is "heartbroken.Q: The collection is published by Lookout Books, which is a small press out of UNC Wilmington dedicated to under-appreciated writers. How did you hook up with these guys?SA: I knew Ben George from working with him at Tin House. He's a remarkable editor. Just beat the crap out of my stories, sentence by sentence. I owe him big time.Q: It seems like the hurdles of being an author are innumerable. After you've beaten the insane odds and actually gotten published, there's the issue of your work finding an audience. How have you approached this challenge?SA: Oh gosh. I guess my "strategy" is just to work on stuff that interests me -- whether it's journalism or a podcast or whatever -- and hope that it leads to someone finding my books. But I also have pretty low expectations.Q: Many of your stories have comic elements. Do you think it's harder to be taken seriously as an author if your stuff has a more comedic sensibility?SA: Not with readings. They just want a good story. And the comic impulse is basically the best way to contend with grief and humiliation, at least that I know of. But there is a bias among writers early in their career, and amongst critics, against funny stuff. I certainly felt that way as a young writer, and my work suffered for it. I was trying to be all "serious" and I was really just boring.Q: What is your process like? For instance, how many hours do you write a day, do you sit in a chair, etc.?SA: I try to work on serious stuff (books, complicated pieces) in the morning, and less serious stuff in the afternoons. But I have two little kids, so the truth is I'm often in chaos. Actually, that was true before the kids. Whatever keeps you in front of the keyboard -- that's the process you should use.Q: Do you have a new project on the horizon? What are you working on now?SA: Working on a failing novel, as I generally am. And considering doing another DIY project -- some erotica I wanna put out.Q: As the author of a book called Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life, you're a music guy. If you had to pick a famous musician equivalent of yourself, who would it be and why? Two examples: Denis Johnson = Neil Young (the heroin thing), John Irving = James Taylor (beloved by old white people sitting in lawn chairs).SA: Hmmm. I'll go for Ike Reilly. Nobody's every heard of him, and he got started late, and he pisses people off, but he also just rocks the fuck out.Q: Follow-up music question: do you listen to music while you write? If so what?SA: Constantly. A new album every week, pretty much. Tim Gearan's new one last week, this week Jukebox the Ghost, next week I'll be on to Los Lobos new one. Mia Dyson. It never stops. Ever.Q: What are your three must-reads for the human race (novels, shorts stories, nonfiction, whatever)?SA: Stoner by John Williams, Mr. & Mrs. Bridge by Evan S. Connell (two novels), and anything by Jane Austen.Q. What advice can you give to young writers who are as of yet unpublished, specifically me?SA: Outlast the doubt.--Erin Somers