May 27, 2003

AN INTERVIEW WITH STEVE ALMOND

Author of the acclaimed short story collection, My Life In Heavy Metal
Creative writing teacher at Boston College
Proprietor of stevenalmond.com

How would you describe your book(s)? What are the predominant themes?

1. Know thyself before you stick your willie into someone else.
2. Desire is the human engine.
3. Don’t waste your heart on small-time bets.
4. Pussy, pussy, pussy, cock, cock, cock.

Where do you write and how often and for how long?

In my sun room, during the morning hours, for as long as I can stand it, which usually isn’t very long.

Why do you write?

To alleviate a deep-seated sense of worthlessness.

What feeling do you get if you don’t write?

Severe Judaic guilt. (Symptoms include: dizziness, nausea, hives.)

Describe yourself.

1. Tall, dork, and lonesome.
2. Abject in the service of the heart.
3. Deeply committed to spiritual nudity.
4. Much less funny as time wears on.

What is it about the place where you write?

Music is always playing.

How do you conquer writer’s block?

Hot poker up the ass.

What is your biggest vice when writing?

Chocolate and masturbation. (Also the title of my next book!)

What or who was the biggest influence on your desire to write and why?

Mom was a major-league reader. We read Faulkner together, I remember, which, upon reflection, seems pretty perverse, but there you go. Less Oedipally: a colleague at the El Paso Times named Paul Salopek, the most brilliant journalist on earth. His attention to detail and devotion to storytelling inspired the hell out of me. And Tommy Finkel, my editor at the Miami newspaper where I worked. He was the one who pushed me to write fiction -- probably as a polite way of sparing the world my journalism.

What’s the editing process like?

You read through and blot out all the crap, meaning the ornamentation, meaning the extra words put in by the author to call attention to him or herself. A painful procedure, best performed with drugs nearby.

Does being an author "get you chicks?" If so, what are author groupies like?

Uh, you’re kidding, right? The question is a joke. Yes?

What’s the most overrated book you’ve read?

The Golden Bowl by Henry James. It should win the Nobel Prize in Boredom.

Can you recognize an author before they open their mouth?

They are usually quite ugly.

What’s the biggest myth about being a writer?

That you’re a poor, pathetic loser who can’t find a decent job.

What’s the reality? That you’re a poor, pathetic loser who refuses to find a decent job.

Best author joke you’ve heard.

A famously conceited author (who shall remain unnamed) comes to a college to do a reading. At the after party, this gorgeous, soused grad student totters up to him. “I’ve got a proposal for you,” she says. “I’d like to take you back to my place, run you a hot bath, rub your entire body in coconut oil and give you the best blowjob of your life.”

“Sounds great,” the author says. “But what’s in it for me?

First book you remember reading.

Dr. Seuss. “If I Ran the Circus.” That shit rocks.

What’s the biggest word you know?

Cunnilingus.

Authors tend to be. . .

The ones who got their ass kicked in grammar school

Writing is like...

Ice skating on the surface of a partially-thawed septic tank.

What do you do when you’re trying to avoid writing?

In no particular order: eat, nap, drink, whack off, sweep the floor, mop the floor, count the dust bunnies somehow missed while mopping, scrub the tile, do the dishes, smoke half a cigarette, brush my teeth, do the laundry, pay the bills, work the email thing, work the phone thing, prank call literary rivals, weep disconsolately, curse the day I was born, whack off.

At dinner parties you tell people you are a . . .

Porn merchant.

What do you write on?

A laptop computer, which I place on my lap and which, during the winter months, keeps my privates warm.

What are your writing rituals?

Aside from the vinegar colonic, the Buddhist chanting, and the power yoga, nothing.

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