According to my
spreadsheet, I sent Fair Copy out one
hundred and eighteen times to various contests or open reading periods from
2009 to the first month of 2012. I was a finalist ten times, a runner-up three
times, and a semi-finalist five times. Looking at those numbers really brings
back the feelings I had during those years, that I was yelling into the wind. Also,
that I had no money.
Tell me about the title.
Had it always been Fair Copy? Did it
go through any other changes?
It’s always been Fair Copy.
I would say that Fair Copy is a conceptual book. Can you
explain what that means to you, and what the challenges are of creating a book?
Do you think things like format, structure, and arc change significantly with a
conceptual book versus one that’s not?
The book is conceptual in
that there is a formal element uniting the poems, but it happened almost by
accident – one day I wrote an acrostic off a line of Emily Dickinson’s, and
then thought to keep going, choosing every 29th poem in my Collected
Emily Dickinson. I knew doing so would provide me with a book length amount of
material, but I didn’t for a moment really think I’d do it. But if I consider
the book in terms of the subject matter, the book is less conceptual. Many of
the poems in Fair Copy have different
voices or speakers, with different agendas and concerns; if the formal
framework weren’t there the book would be a more jagged affair. I think of
conceptual books as more unified in subject matter, like American Busboy by Matthew Guenette, where all the poems center
around a restaurant and its wait staff, or almost any book by Jenny Boully, a
poet who really unites the concept and the conceit. But that may just be me
thinking of “conceptual” in a limited way, like an album (do we call cds albums
anymore? Do we even call them cds?) – Pink Floyd’s The Wall, or Joanna Newsom’s Ys.
You also have your second
book, Vow, being published in 2013 by
CSU Press, only a few months after Fair
Copy. Though this is rare for poets, it does happen. Tell us about trying
to write two collections at the same time—if that was the case of course. Which
do you consider your real “first book”? And what are the advantages and
disadvantages, do you think, of having two collections coming out within months
of each other?
I didn’t write them at
the same time; I’m not that good of a multi-tasker. Fair Copy was completed by the time I was at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison for a year as the Jay C. and Ruth Hall Poetry Fellow. During
my year there, I wrote Vow in around
nine months. I wouldn’t consider either to be my real “first book.” I wrote a
manuscript for my MFA thesis called Hinx
Minx; that was my first book. It was not, however, good. I sent it out to a
few contests, and then realized when it placed in one that I really didn’t want
it out in the world. So I shelved it.
Having both books come
out at almost the same time is very strange. I feel like I haven’t had a lot of
time to get used to Fair Copy being
my first book, because the demands of the second book are very much present –
editing, cover questions, marketing, etc. I have readings scheduled, and don’t
know whether I should just read one book at a reading, or try to read parts
from both books at a reading –how does it work?
It seems like there’s a
possible misconception among some poets who are trying to get their first book
published: that they must win a contest. Were you concerned about winning a
contest at any point? What advice would you give to poets sending their book
out now regarding contests versus open reading periods?
I submitted both to
contests and to open reading periods. Fair
Copy won Ohio State University Press’s contest, and Vow didn’t win Cleveland State’s contest but was selected by
Michael Dumanis. I had good feedback from open reading periods, but no success.
I would certainly suggest poets try both, but my experience was just that there
weren’t a lot of open readings available compared to the number of contests.
Passing through the screenings of a book contest is a matter not just of skill
– you get the right preliminary screener, and not the one who has a chip on his/her
shoulder against your aesthetic. You get the right second round screeners. You
get the right final judge. You get lucky, in other words, but you get to be in
that lucky position because you have skills as well. I assume these things
apply to open reading periods and well, though I haven’t been on the other side
of those as I have for contests.
The contest system is
problematic, but it’s hard to know the way out. Contests help support small
presses and journals, and whenever I wrote a check I told myself that’s what I
was doing (sweetened a little when the contest actually included a subscription
or copy of the winning book). I just told myself it was a donation. But knowing
that the money helped support things I cared about still didn’t make the system
any less expensive, and there were definitely other things I wanted that money
for, like car maintenance and repair, or living in a less terrible apartment. The
only way I made back (most of) the money I spent on contests over the years
sending it out was that I won a book contest with a slightly larger than
average prize. The fact remains that these contests are most accessible to
people with some cash to burn – so how many voices are we not hearing because
of that?
Friends of mine suggested
that I try and pick the judges I thought would appreciate my aesthetic, and
there were times I placed in contests where I thought that was the case – and
just as many where my dream judge passed me by. Really, you’re just hoping that
your judge is someone who can see past his or her own preferences, and there’s
no way of knowing if he or she has that kind of breadth.
For what it is worth, my
advice is to only pick the presses you would be proud to be a part of. There’s
so little compensation for poets, monetarily or otherwise, and we are
continually doing work for free – books reviews, interviews (thank you again!),
untold hours at journals and presses that are labors of love. We do these
things because we love them, and because we believe in poetry, but we shouldn’t
then think that our work has no value. We at least need to realize that our own
work deserves a proper setting, among other poets you respect.
What was the process like
assembling the book? How many different versions did it go through as you were
sending it out?
Ordering poems in a
manuscript is not my strength. Everyone has different methods, and after a
while, I felt as if I’d tried them all. The initial order was simply how I’d
written them – every 29th Emily Dickinson poem – but that was
terrible. I tried ordering via narrative – one of a child growing into
womanhood (ala Satan Says), or a
relationship taking a downward trajectory – but it felt forced. I tried
ordering by linking words from poem to poem, so that a poem ending on one word
might match up via word or them to the following poem, but that was overly
precious. I tried ordering by mood, and no surprise, I’d reorder it drastically
whenever I was in a bad one. I tried thinking of it like a mixed tape. I
finally returned to the narrative angle, but it is a fairly buried one.
The book went through
many revisions, but because of the formal constraints the revisions could only
be so radical and maintain the form. There are lines that changed drastically,
and some poems I almost entirely rewrote, which was often a better, though
exhausting, tactic to take rather than jimmying with one stuck line. Mostly,
the style of the book changed a lot from the initial draft to its final
incarnation – when I started I was very interested in jamming in as much as possible
– I kept telling people I wanted the poems to be rococo! – and over the years a
lot of that playful excess got stripped out, as fun as it was, because it was
distracting. So weirdly, as time went on, the book gained a more Dickinsonian
spareness than less.
How involved were you
with the design of the book—interior design, font, cover, etc.? Did you suggest
or have any input regarding the image that was used on the cover?
Ohio State asked me to
send them several possible images for the cover, but it wasn’t guaranteed
they’d choose one of my suggestions. I sent in a number of Victorian and late
nineteenth century illustrations. I actually didn’t know they’d chosen the Kay
Nielsen illustration I’d suggested until they sent me a preliminary proof, so it
was a good surprise! I wasn’t involved in any of the other design aspects for
the book, but they did an amazing job – I love the cover’s font.
What about the
publication of the actual poems in journals and magazines prior to the book
being published? Was there ever a concern for you to have the majority of the
poems published before you were sending out your manuscript?
I never thought about it.
If I had, I suppose I would have sent the poems out more often. I certainly had
some publications, and some journals, like Field and Pleiades, seemed to really
respond to these odd poems, and I am so grateful for that support. I’ve had
more poems taken from Vow, but I also sent out more from Vow, and more often.
It’s only in the last two years that I’ve started submitting more regularly,
basically because friends of mine said I needed to do so.
How much work did you do
as far as editing the poems from the day you knew the book would be published
to its final proofing stage?
With Fair Copy, the
changes were minimal. The book had been through a lot of revisions by the time
it was taken.
What do you remember
about the day when you saw your published book for the first time?
That it felt so strange!
I felt as though I were watching myself. For my entire adult life –even when I
was a teenager – I’d imagined being a published author. So to have that dream
come true felt both amazing and surreal. When the box arrived, my husband and I
opened it together, and he took a picture of me. The expression on my face looks
a little like a kid whose had too much sugar at the fair: happy, but also
possibly about to barf.
How has your life been
different since your book came out?
I feel a little more
exposed to the world, which isn’t a bad thing, but is uncomfortable. A lot of
poets, myself included, have a drive to be noticed and to be read, but also a
deep discomfort with public scrutiny. You toil away for so long as a poet, generally,
and are so used to being unnoticed, that to have someone suddenly take a look
at you can feel really alarming. After the book was published, I was more aware
that other people really could read the things I write. I don’t know why
individual poem publications didn’t trigger that for me, but they didn’t. It’s
a good thing my subsequent book as taken so quickly and unexpectedly – I think
if it hadn’t, I could have second-guessed the work in that book to death.
If you struck up a
conversation next to someone seated on an airplane, and after a few minutes you
eventually told them that you were an author who had a book of poetry
published, how would you answer their next question: “What’s the book about?”
That would be a pretty
self-punishing thing for me to do – I’m actually talking to a stranger in this
scenario? We’re breathing each other’s re-circulated breaths? Terrifying! Well,
assuming the braver, less flight phobic me is in this situation, I would
probably tell them it’s about domesticity and desire, and the difficult of
understanding the truth of either. Then I would quickly pick up the Skymall
catalogue and become very interested in mobile stairs for arthritic dogs.
What have you been doing
to promote Fair Copy, and what have
those experiences been like for you?
I’ve got a number of
readings scheduled in the next few months, and the experience has been awesome
so far, although I’ve just gotten started. I got to read in the Kraken Series
in Denton TX, and back at my alma mater, Davidson College. I’ve been impressed
by the strength of reading series in cities across the country.
What advice do you wish
someone had given you before your first book came out?
I actually think I got all
the good advice! Several of my friends warned me that the experience of having
the book published was in some ways anti-climatic. So I was prepared that I
might not feel as excited as I felt I should
feel. I was also warned that publishing a book wouldn’t change my life, so I
managed not to wake up the next day expecting unicorns. All this sounds a
little bleak –it’s not, I promise! I only mean that it’s easy to think, “I just
need to get this book published and then…” – and to fill in that blank with
whatever secret desire you have about your life. But the publication of the
first book is not a panacea for your anxieties. That first book is just a first
step if you want to keep writing poetry and to keep publishing it. So my advice
is to celebrate – break out the champagne! – then figure out what’s next for
you the following day.
What influence has the
book’s publication had on your subsequent writing? Are there any new projects
in the works?
Before the book was
taken, I felt conscious of it as not finished – for me, finished was to finally
be in print. I had moved on to different work, but every couple of months, had
to look at Fair Copy again, polish it
further, send it out again, etc. I wanted very much to be done with it and
completely free to do something new, but I continually had to try and dip into
the book again and again, editing it while trying to be true to the book’s
beginnings. It was hard to maintain those very different ways of thinking: my
previous aesthetic and the work I was trying to create.
As for new projects, Vow is coming out, which is quite
different from Fair Copy. No formal
constraint to speak of, a number of series with implicit narratives, a lot more
frank in terms of subject matter. I’m also working on a series of ekphrastic
poems based off the works of contemporary female artists’ self-portraits: Cindy
Sherman, Terri Frame, and Julie Heffernan, some of which are included in Tender Trapper, a digital chapbook from
Floating Wolf Quarterly, and some of which will appear in Bad Star, forthcoming from Yes Yes Book’s Vinyl 45 chapbook series.
I’m also working on a series of poems called “Homewreckers,” which look at
disruptions to the home, both literally and figuratively, and which have been
surprisingly fun to write. It’s fun to bring down buildings. It’s fun to break
plates.
Do you believe that
poetry can create change in the world?
It depends on the world.
I’m unlikely to write a poem that makes the entire planet take notice – why
would it? I write out of a very particular set of circumstances and privileges,
and I’m fooling myself if I think my poems might fulfill some universal human
need. There are poets that have come to mean a lot to particular countries – I
think of Inger Christensen, or Pablo Neruda, but that’s rare, and often breaks
down under closer scrutiny. But. But. If we think of the world as a smaller
thing, if we think about the worlds we carry within ourselves – absolutely.
There are poems I can honestly say changed the way I thought about my life and
my place in it.
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Rebecca Hazelton is the
author of Fair Copy (Ohio State University Press, 2012), winner of the
2011 Ohio State University Press / The Journal Award in Poetry, and Vow,
from Cleveland State University Press. She was the 2010-11 Jay C. and Ruth
Halls Poetry Fellow at the University of Wisconsin, Madison Creative Writing
Institute and winner of the “Discovery” / Boston Review 2012 Poetry Contest.
Her poems have appeared in AGNI, The Southern Review, Boston Review, Best New
Poets 2011, and Best American Poetry 2013. Find more at http://rebeccahazelton.net.******************************************************************************************
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