I would not even want to go back and
count. Some version of the book had been making the rounds for a year or so; it
had been a finalist in several contests and had received a few of those
rejections that helps you believe in a book more than disbelieve in it. But I
did a major revision in the summer of 2009, and shortly after that it was
picked up. There are aspects of the older manuscript I miss in the published
version, particularly its less overtly narrative structure and that it was, as Schlegel
might have called it, a book of “mixed means.” Insofar as one wants a first
book to declare one’s intentions and range as an artist, I think the previous
version did that more comprehensively, more forcefully. But it did become a
tightly coherent book, and readers have responded to that.
Tell me about
the title. Had it always been Kingdom Come? Did it go through any other changes?
The title prior
to that revision was Sufficient Wildness, which is a phrase of Thoreau’s
from
“Walking” and also a poem in the book. I was attempting
to capture some essence of the compromises at the heart of the book. On one
hand, the personal compromises involved in marriage and family, the site—or
presumed site—of many of the poems. And on the other hand, the aesthetic
compromise at the heart of the book, between my typical language-centered mode the
shift—part chosen, part innate brought on by the threshold I was crossing—toward biographical narrative. The poetics were attempting to track with a deeper immersion
in and acceptance of my own material existence, a thing unavoidable when one
founds a household. It’s something like when James Gatz first kisses Daisy: he
feels that love draw him irrevocably into his humanity such that “his mind will
never again romp like God’s.” (As if). It may also be the inevitable discovery
getting older that the mind of God—a figure for freedom—is not opposed to but
rather dependent upon being sunk into the midst of one’s life, which becomes
possible in new ways once others are bound to you. Poetry is one means of navigating those attachments.
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?
Considering
that honor is the coin of our mostly-coinless realm, yes, I had hoped to win a
contest. One reason is purely pragmatic: as you know, the majority of avenues for first-book publishing are through
contests, and many publishers, even if they end up publishing some finalists,
still don’t consider other books outside their contests. We must
enter then, even though it can become quite expensive (and heartbreaking). Also, considering the near non-existent marketing budgets of
small presses, the exposure that comes from winning a contest—people do
notice—is difficult to replicate. And I don’t think wanting to win an entirely selfish desire, either; we all know we’re not entirely
the authors of our poems. Any worthy poem comes in part as a gift in whose
fashioning we are fortunate enough to participate, and the same can be said of our books. So the hope of seeing that work honored is a natural hope. One merely needs
to keep it all in perspective.
But this wish was not without its flip-side; one knows contests are
something of a racket, something of a crapshoot, and come (usually)
without any commitment beyond that book. Most contest publishers publish a book a
judge chose and not necessarily a book they would have selected, and so it’s no
surprise that they feel no longterm investment in the work or career of that
poet. This is a pretty odd situation if you think about it, and just the kind of
transaction money is good at instituting. I am romantic
enough that even as I pursued this end I would often say that I’d
much prefer to have the book picked up by a publisher who believed in the work and wanted
to see it exist in the world, and that’s what happened.
What was the
process like assembling the book? How many different versions did it go through
as you were sending it out?
As I said, the book evolved over a couple
years, but at its kernel was a chapbook, called Swerve, that had won a
Chapbook Fellowship from the Poetry Society of America. That little book traced
in a brief arc my movement from an ascetically-minded artist to a husband and
father struggling to keep hold of my artistic-practice-as-I-understood-it in
the midst of those new conditions. But I wanted to build on that, and had more
poems in that vein, so the book was an exercise in expansion (some have said
too much expansion) into an arc that now spans five sections. I gave the
sections somewhat jokey titles (structured after the chapters in A.A. Milne’s
books), which I have some mind to revise in a future edition, but they do serve
one primary end—to remove all doubt about the narrative structure. One chooses
the work one wants a reader to do, and I realized that trying to unearth a
buried narrative was not the thing I wanted readers attending to. So I try in
each section to trouble what might initially feel like excessive clarity as
much as possible, which I’m sure attentive (or patient, whichever) readers
notice.
How involved were
you with the design of the book—interior design, font, cover, etc.?
Somewhat by
accident I was more intimately involved than is anywhere near normal. The press’ book designer was out of the country for an extended trip when it
came time to start assembling the book, and since I have experience in design
they allowed me to get the process started and I just kept going. So my
influence on the book’s look and feel was complete. I’m happy with how it
turned out; people pick it up and call it a beautiful book, which is gratifying
and about all I could hope for.
Did you suggest
or have any input regarding the image that was used on the cover?
The cover image—these are always a
treasure-hunt, aren’t they—was discovered on an airplane back from an AWP conference,
when I happened to be sitting next to a photographer who was organizing photos
on his laptop. We fell into conversation, he sent me some pictures, and I chose
the aspen stand which wraps it front to back, which I felt was not only
striking but significant enough.
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?
This was, and I suppose remains, an
obsessive concern, yes.
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?
The unique design situation meant that I
had control of the poems far longer than is typical and I took advantage of it,
revising poems up until it went to press. One long poem that serves as the
book’s climax remained to be written (or it occurred to me needed to be
written) after the book’s acceptance, but the others kept shifting—largely in
response to each other—and I felt truly satisfied by time of publication that
I’d taken every poem as far as I could take it. It was an especially
instructive exercise in the assembly of a book, to see just how deeply one can
or even must get to know one’s own work, which helped me to discover and solve
problems I didn’t even know existed with some of the poems. If it hadn’t been
for that year and a half of revision that took place during the design process
(a process delayed, too, by a major move from Missouri to Ohio and the start of
a new job) it would be a different book, maybe a less complete figure. But
again, there is always something to be said for the unfinished quality of
everything, which I hope it retains.
What do you remember
about the day when you saw your published book for the first time?
You hear so many stories about the thrill
of that unboxing, but I was terrified to open the box for fear of finding a
problem and didn’t do so immediately. Well, as befits my karma and my intuitive
expectation, there was a printing error with that first press run and that
moment I’d worked toward for almost 10 years was much more disappointment and
grief than pride, relief, joy or whatever at that moment. Fortunately we got all
that fixed and the finsihed book finally arrived, but you just can’t recreate a
first time.
How has your
life been different since your book came out?
One thing I was
not prepared for was the sensation that having a book can be a kind of burden. It has an independent existence
and it can—if you let it—exert (or extract) certain demands. I made a choice in
the summer after the book came out to try and promote and sell the book rather
than, as I really wanted, to start work on the next one. This meant putting
together a tour, finding ways to promote it, etc. I enjoy doing readings—even
the ones done for just a few people—and it’s always gratifying to find readers
(and they must be searched down). While more reviews and sales are always to be
hoped for, I have felt that in some small measure the world registered my
offering. The book is a gentle tyrant by and large, and we co-exist peaceably.
But having a book published does impose
changes, at least insofar as ratifying your identity as a poet or writer; here
is proof, beyond the fantasies of your imagination and a hope in a distant
event, that you are what you say you are. At least for now. It makes getting
work possible, and it relieves a lot of psychic tension bound up in those
uncertainties. One hopes that it’s a good book, and that it encourages more,
even better, work. In my case, the choice not to dive into the second book
right away—coupled with a busy job, a young family, everything in between—has
meant two years passing before I had another manuscript ready. I try to trust
that the delay, which has not been without its pain, has been a good investment
all around. We’ll see.
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?”
Funny, since as I told you above that
actually happened to me and I got a cover photo out of it. This is a question I
duck as much as possible; it’s impossible not to be reductive and I wouldn’t
want to be guilty of confirming anyone’s worst assumptions about potery. But
because of the way I’ve structured it and the presence of those domestic
concerns, the book is about something. There is an attempt to speak to
various common experience—marriage, child-birth, art, ambivalence about these
things—and it was for that reason I worked as hard as I did to find an audience
for it. Nonetheless it is poetry, and so my success at finding those readers
has been mixed at best. But the good thing about a book of poetry is there is
no hurry; poems wait around for a reader to find them.
What advice do
you wish someone had given you before your first book came out?
More than any advice what I could have
used was pretty practical information: a more efficient means of getting the
book disseminated to people and places that might be willing to buy or stock it
or host readings. The library system is a black box, and the independent
booksellers are geared almost entirely toward fiction and non-fiction. One is
left to a lot of email writing, a lot of guesswork, trial and error. Even after
being pretty industrious about all that, I’m pretty willing to let the
marketing department take over.
What influence
has the book’s publication had on your subsequent writing? Are there any new
projects in the works?
I have a new book in manuscript, called Stop
Motion Still Life that is starting to be sent out, another one in
development. I started a film project last summer, which may or may not amount
to anything. I can’t claim that the book has influenced later writing, except
insofar as it let me deal squarely with some matters that I don’t feel the need
to address again any time soon, at least not so dead on. Life keeps going.
There is that phenomenon called The Empty Attic of Achievment, which is good to
see filling up again with the next thing. Maybe that’s about as good as one can
say about finishing a book, is that it gets out of the way so that the next one
can emerge. And so forth.
Do you believe
that poetry can create change in the world?
I think poetry changes poets, and that
kind of certainty is enough for me. I’m suspicious of mass movements, and
probably wouldn’t like a world created by poetry anymore than I like the world
created by all the non-poetic forces at work on it. And certainly individuals
are transformed, or at least informed, by reading, and the world would be a
better place if more people read better things (including me). So my ambitions are
fairly modest; if a poem were to instigate even one reader to tilt her head at
even a slightly new or different angle to the universe, then it has done
a lot, maybe all that it can do.
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John Estes is director of the creative writing program at Malone University in Canton, Ohio. Recent poems and prose have appeared in Tin House, New Orleans Review, Southern Review, Crazyhorse, AGNI, and other places. He is author of one book of poems, Kingdom Come (C&R Press, 2011) and two chapbooks: Breakfast with Blake at the Laocoön (Finishing Line Press, 2007) and Swerve, which won a 2008 National Chapbook Fellowship from the Poetry Society of America. Fine more at his website: http://johnestes.org
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John Estes is director of the creative writing program at Malone University in Canton, Ohio. Recent poems and prose have appeared in Tin House, New Orleans Review, Southern Review, Crazyhorse, AGNI, and other places. He is author of one book of poems, Kingdom Come (C&R Press, 2011) and two chapbooks: Breakfast with Blake at the Laocoön (Finishing Line Press, 2007) and Swerve, which won a 2008 National Chapbook Fellowship from the Poetry Society of America. Fine more at his website: http://johnestes.org
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