Hayley Malouin is a graduate student studying Comparative Literature and Arts at Brock
University. In her final undergraduate year, she conducted this
interview with rob about his recently published collection of stories, The Uncertainty Principle, as part of a
creative writing class taught by Prof. Natalee Caple. Hayley also works as atheatre critic and editor at DARTcritics, a blog devoted to new and diverse
critical voices created by Prof. Karen Fricker.
1.
Some of these stories were originally tweets.
What do you think the connection between short story writing and social media
platforms is? Do you find Twitter to be an inspiring or creative platform?
I had enormous
fun composing those stories, and found the constraint of 140 characters both
exhilarating and rather tricky. Just what can you pack into a small space?
Given that the entire collection works on that very idea, working to boil down
even further became an interesting experiment. I wrote quite a number of
pieces, composing rather quickly and posting directly to twitter, but only a
half dozen or so made the final manuscript.
I actually
wrote about the process of composing for twitter on my blog, here: http://robmclennan.blogspot.ca/2012/08/how-to-not-be-on-twitter.html
2.
There is a certain brand of Canadian fiction
that you call ‘retelling’. How do you feel your work positions itself in
relation to this kind of national storytelling?
There
is that one story that does deliberately reference a certain kind of Canadian
stereotyping when it comes to fiction, which was far more prevalent in the
1960s and 70s. Somehow, some of these ideas still linger here and there, and I
simply wanted to reference some of those continuing stereotypes.
‘National
storytelling’ – what does that even mean? We tell our stories from the
perspectives we understand, but not all stories from all regions are going to
be the same. There might be some overlap, certainly, here and there, but the
diversity of stories and the ways in which they are told are simply not
acknowledged nearly enough.
3.
Do you feel that living and working in Ottawa
has consciously politicized your work? Phrases like “A parliament, of owls” and
“An army, of herrings” lean towards political commentary. How important is this
to your fiction and non-fiction work?
Proximity to
Parliament Hill, even with my twenty years of living in Centretown, hasn’t
changed a speck of my work. Living in Ottawa has never meant anything in
regards to the political being any more prominent in my day-to-day.
If I’ve begun
to weave the political into any of my writing over the past few years, it has
been through my frustration with the seismic shifts that Stephen Harper’s
Conservatives have made in policy and action, moving further away from a Canada
that I even recognize. His Canada is not mine.
4.
The Uncertainty Principle almost reads
like a collection of poems. What motivated you to move from writing poetry to
writing short stories and novels? Are these connected for you? How are they
different?
One could say
everything I do is connected, even if only through being written by the same
hand. I’m sure there are connections somewhere. This is actually my third work
of fiction (not including a third novel completed before this book this was
published), and I’m already working on two further collections of short
stories. I’ve always been interested in the possibilities of other forms. It
might read like poems through the lyric brevity, but I see them very much as
fiction: they’re built in full sentences, and tell a series of linear
narratives.
Back in the
late 1990s, when I started focusing more on fiction (after nearly a decade of
focusing on poetry), I noticed that utilizing a new form meant that the
‘storytelling’ aspects began to fall away from my poetry, which I found rather
interesting. It allowed my poetry to move in other directions.
5.
Is there anything you are afraid or hesitant to
write?
There are
some elements of the book that speak to the intimate, such as the story about
no longer believing my mother. I wasn’t necessarily afraid or hesitant, but
using more intimate material pushes me to work far harder to get the story just
right.
Precision is
important.
6.
After having these stories compiled from your
Twitter account, blog, etc. do you find that you have received a different type
of critical reception? How is online criticism different from traditional print
criticism?
To
put my work in only one form or place, whatever that might be, automatically
reduces my audience: it presumes that anyone can only interact with my work by
going to one place. It would be the same if I were to ignore print journals
over online, or the other way around. For the same reason, I often review for
print and online journals beyond my own blog: I can’t presume that everyone is
going to come to me to read whatever it is I’m on about.
Having
said that, I don’t think the criticism is any different at all. The form and
forum is simply a tool in which to present and disseminate the work. The same
argument applies via print books vs. e-publications. It’s all just reading.
I
think any writer should always work to publish in a variety of media far wider
than they themselves might actually use. One shouldn’t presume that any reader
that wants to read your work has exactly the same reading habits that you do.
And
the pieces weren’t “compiled from” in any way. I work on book-length projects,
and then send pieces out into the world as appropriate, including sending out
to journals, selecting chapbook-length manuscripts and even posting the
occasional piece on the blog. The book is the main project, and not a matter of
accident after the fact.
7.
I can’t help but be reminded of bell hooks by
the characterization of your name - rob mclennan. Why do you choose to not
capitalize your author name? Does it serve as a kind of nom de plume that
separates you from your work?
Originally,
back in the early 1990s, my logic was two-fold: I wanted to minimize my name in
a certain way, to make the focus on the work and not me, and the fact that I
think it looks far better than “Rob McLennan” – the lower case looks far more
sleek. I wonder, too, if I might have been working to differentiate myself via
writing from the rest of my family (a normal element of being in one’s
twenties, I’m sure).
8.
Why do you choose to self-publish online as
well as through traditional publishers? What are the benefits of publishing
online?
Self-publish:
are you referring to posting occasional poems and short stories to my blog? The
benefits of online publishing, generally, mean that the work can go much
further than traditional print means, and the effects are immediate. For years
now, my blog has been getting upwards of 1,500 daily ‘hits,’ which means that
anything I post to my blog is going to get a far wider audience, both in terms
of numbers and geography, than most trade literary journals in Canada.
9.
Has the rise of the blogosphere and ‘blogger’
as a job title in any way impacted what you write and how you publish it?
Yes
and no. After writing reviews for a weekly paper for four-and-a-half-years, I
originally began my blog so I could focus more on writing than on chasing
venues for errant reviews and essays. The forum has allowed my critical skills
to develop considerably (I’ve since published two collections of critical
essays, for example). I do like the immediacy of the blog: I can publish a
review of a new poetry collection within a week or two of the publication date
(sometimes earlier), instead of having two wait for print journals to catch up,
sometimes six or even twelve months later. A review posted online can be
utilized by both author and publisher, and help push attention towards a
brand-new publication. This seems far more useful than a review months later.
Although, having said that, there are benefits, also, to a review posted months
later: usually the reviewer/critic can go far deeper, allowing for a larger
critical study of a particular work. I focus predominantly on the
relatively-quick piece, to help push the book as it begins its published life.
Also:
I’ve never used such as ‘job title.’ I’m a writer: that encompasses all.
10. Your stories
are inundated with pop culture references, both old and new. Are there
challenges in weaving pop culture into such short stories?
I
don’t see this as a challenge. I exist in the world, so why shouldn’t my
writing reflect that?
As
Gertrude Stein apparently said: write of the world you live in.
No comments:
Post a Comment