I had decided to retire the literary Would You Rather series, but didn't want to stop interviews on the site all together. Instead, I've pulled together 40ish questions - some bookish, some silly - and have asked authors to limit themselves to answering only 10 of them. That way, it keeps the interviews fresh and connectable for all of us!
Joining us today is James Dickson, Poet, teacher, eater of too much food, Author of Some Sweet Vandal, available from Kelsay Books.
Why do you write?
I can’t help it. It’s like biting my fingernails.
What do you do when you’re not
writing?
My day job is teaching high school English,
which I’ve done for 22 years.
What’s your kryptonite as a
writer?
Fatigue.
Describe your book poorly.
Dead teenagers.
If you could spend the day with
another author, who would you choose and why?
Langston Hughes. He was my gateway poet, and I’d like to cook
him dinner to show my gratitude.
What are you currently reading?
Volume 1 of Blyth’s haiku anthology and
student essays. Always student
essays.
What’s the one book someone else
wrote that you wish you had written?
Most of the books I’ve read fall into this
category, but one title in particular is CD Wright’s The Poet, the Lion. . .
The wildness of that book is
awe-inspiring. Rita Dove is another poet
who induces both great admiration and jealousy from me.
What’s the single best line you’ve
ever read?
“Small, close sounds, and coolness touched
her.” From Eudora Welty’s short story “A
Curtain of Green.” I’ve never heard a
better description of incoming rain.
You have to choose an animal or
cartoon character that best represents you. Which is it and why?
I’ve been compared to Uncle Iroh from Avatar:
The Last Airbender, and I’m ok with this.
I drink a lot of tea, am generally laid back, and truly enjoy a good
meal.
If you were stuck on a deserted
island, what’s the one book you wish you had with you?
Paradise Lost.
There’s always something new when I read it. It’s so pretty, so layered,
so lovely.
Too often, contemporary poetry presents itself as a document
of truth and beauty, but here in James Dickson’s excellent collection Some
Sweet Vandal, we’re treated to a more realistic and nuanced worldview: the
landscape described by an eye that sees the entire panorama and understands
that scars and broken flowers can be as beautiful as any pastoral setting. If
beauty is the beginning of terror, these intricately crafted poems remind us of
what happens when angels open their mouths to speak, that poetry can be the
place where healing begins, and that sometimes it is our words that bind our
experiences together into a slender yet elegant ray of longing and melancholy
that makes art out of our darkest experiences.
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