How did you begin writing and what keeps you going?
I remember I read a lot as a kid, mainly comic books and sci-fi, and I always did well in English classes (seemingly innately as my family background was working class poor and little or no education in the Arts [though both my parents [[oddly enough]] had excellent penmanship, for whatever reason, my dad in particular, since he was born left-handed and was forced to turn right-handed lest he lose his soul to the Devil, meanwhile, I remain a southpaw, set at odds under the tyranny of a right-handed world and almost guaranteed a hot date in Hell when I expire]), especially when it came to writing stories. In fact, at one point a teacher accused me of plagiarism. Well, I had absolutely no idea what that was or even how to begin to spell it, but I figured by the way she said it, it must be bad. She let me off with a warning (and a good grade, which is all that mattered to me), for what, as I said, I’m not sure: PLAGIARISM. I probably headed to my next class, or lunch, or ball practice, I don’t know. Anyhow, I guess I managed to get through that “traumatic experience” reasonably unscathed, as I have little recollection of the incident and no scars that show.
I wasn’t into poetry at all, found the stuff we were meant to study a heady bore and nothing romantic about the Romantics. Then a female student teacher arrived: young, beautiful, blonde, a hippie-type with a broken leg from a skiing accident and sporting a hip-to-ankle plaster cast all decorated with best wishes and colourful flowers and paisley patterns. She put on a Leonard Cohen album and explained to the class how songs were a more popular form of poetry. I was impressed (perhaps also brain-addled due to teenage raging hormones) at the time, but the fervor soon passed, and poetry returned once again to its dark and dusty corner.
Freud said people become artists in order to obtain fame, fortune and beautiful lovers. I wasn’t aware of that at the time, but it makes some sense. For me, I just liked playing with words and stringing them together into stories. Getting some published was an added kick (thanks, by the way, for accepting my prose poem and for the interview opportunity!). Then it became a habit. Next, an addiction. Then, a type of insanity (people with real jobs are amazed how/why I continue to write “on spec”). I’ve basically painted myself into a corner with no way to free myself. Also, I find it helps to self-medicate: cheers! I imagine I’ll keep at it until the little grey cells eventually dim and die. I say this even in the face of constant rejection (my poetry, especially, now, being unable to find a publisher). I’ve begun writing long poems, chapbook sized, as a way of broaching new presses. No guarantees, of course. Ever. Cheers!
How has the process of putting together a ms evolved? How do you decide on the shape and size of a ms?
Hm, I’m not really sure how to answer this. At the most basic level, it really begins with the information provided by the publishers. A poetry collection should be between this and that many pages. No self-help, no political or religious tracts or manifestoes, no hate or racist or homophobic material, no violence toward women, children or animals, nothing overtly sexual or pornographic, ETC. Same with a book of stories, or a novella or a novel. There are guidelines and if one checks out some examples, one can figure out what they’re after, sort of. My accumulation of individual poems for a particular manuscript generally revolves around a theme which I play off of, so it’s simply a matter of arriving at the appropriate number of pages with a wide variety of examples (I like to alter voice and form so as not to bore myself and others).
Prose is different in that there’s a story line, usually, and you write until you get to the end. The expectation is that the quality/craft of the material is satisfactory-to-high and shouldn’t be in question, though, of course, it is, publishers being “human all too human” and having their own personal and professional notions of what does or does not constitute some accepted standard of “literary” quality/craftmanship. Subject matter is a whole different kettle of stinking halibut along with who-knows-what other hidden criteria/agendas editors and publishers have to deal with these days, including potential marketability and sales.
Given you work with fiction, poetry and plays, how do the multiple sides of your writing interact?
So, post-job, post-house in the ‘burbs, post-divorce, I went to university to try my luck at academia. It was SFU and still pretty radical and experimental at the time. A creative writing prof (d.h. sullivan) suggested I try my hand at poetry in order to tighten and hone my prose. He recommended I read Richard Brautigan, an exemplar of compact verse. He also gave me a stunningly clear example of one major difference between a poem and a pop song (whether it was coincidence or kismet, it turned out to be from Leonard Cohen’s “Suzanne” [shades of high school and the young, beautiful, blonde, student teacher]). As a song, it ends with “she touched your perfect body with her mind” thus completing the happy circle of love, suitable for a popular radio audience. In the poem, however, it ends “she touched her perfect body with her mind” thus interrupting the idyllic mood and opening a whole new world of interpretation(s) and teenage angst. Intrigued, I tried my hand at poetry and enjoyed the challenge. I next started taking theatre classes primarily to help me perform live readings. One thing led to another and I got into playwriting. A prof said that it was vital to develop your own personal signature to make your work immediately recognizable to an audience, and I think this is something I’ve strived for and have had some success in achieving. I like it when people tell me no matter how different my books can be, one from the other, they remain recognizably STAN ROGAL.
While I believe the three sides of my writing are different, with their own sets of challenges and techniques — in a play I want to leave room for the actors and director (lights, sound, set) to fill in the blanks and help enact the story, whereas more is needed from the writer in a novel; in a play an actor can play several roles, in a novel all characters require their own identifiable tics and mannerisms (in fact, I’ve taken to re-writing some of my plays as either short stories or novels, especially as no one wants to produce them [insert here, long, sad, boring account of possible reasons why this situation is the way it is, blah, blah, blah…]) — there’s an interaction (whether naturally or not) in terms of themes (the human condition [esp the grey-er areas], the nature of identity, the frailty of personal relationships/sex, 21st C disease…) using an active, dynamic voice (lifting techniques from film, as well: jump cuts, soundtracks…) and concentrating on the language and construction of the pieces to bring them to life.
What poets have influenced the way you write?
The list is long and has changed over the years (though containing, as a rule, a majority of outlaws, suicides and mad hatters), inevitably, as I’ve changed. I found a copy of Jack Spicer’s collected works in a used book bin at SFU and he was a big early influence. John Berryman’s Dream Songs. Ginsberg’s Howl. Anne Sexton’s Transformations. Crow by Ted Hughes. Rimbaud. T.S. Eliot. Pound. Later, Judith Fitzgerald, Marjorie Welish, Leslie Scalapino, Hiromi Ito, Robert Creeley… Of course, influences outside of individual poets are many and varied, and we are all, in some fashion, I suppose, aeolian harps, open to influences, creating music from any passing breeze (you see? I can be vaguely lyrical/Romantic when the situation warrants).
How important has mentorship been to your work? Is there anyone who specifically assisted your development as a writer?
I want to say that there’s been no single mentor in my life, that my work has developed by pinching things from here and there; various persons, various texts, various experiences, and relying on them for guidance and solace, such as: simile is one bird that comes down all too easily; avoid adjectives, they bleed nouns; insist, always, on the verb; show don’t tell; utilize a bump, or pimple, or hinge in the poems to disrupt the flow and/or upset expectations; ideas are beautiful in themselves… There might be others, but these rank at the top. I’m sure a mentor can be useful, though there are a handful out there (who will remain anonymous) with fingers in many pies — write, teach, edit, publish — who, in my opinion, do more harm than good (OMG, did I say that out loud? [insert here, long, drawn-out, vitriolic diatribe condemning these folks for having either missed or ignored the modernist movement [[never mind the post-modernist movement]] along with Dadaism, the Futurists, the Automatists, the Surrealists, the Black Mountain Group, TISH, Conceptualism, Flarf… and who add to the present overall hangdog state-of-the-arts in this country, promoting the same sentimental/lyric/narrative mediocrity and — aw, shaddup already, yer givin’ me a pain with yer bellyachin’ so give it a rest, yer embarrassing yerself — yeah, you’re right, fine, beauty in the eye of the beholder and whatever]).
I believe what I’ve really missed (and required) was a champion of my work (beyond my publishers whom I’m ever grateful to), someone in a position of power, able to promote and influence and generally move mountains to have my work prominently displayed both in the public realm as well as within the literary canon, as I’m obviously incapable of performing that task myself.
I don’t want to sound egotistical and say that I’m self-made (though I don’t share my work or seek crit or feedback with anyone as it’s being written, nor do I belong to any sort of writing and/or support group), nor that I sprung from the head of Zeus fully equipped, no, I am definitely a certain breed of broken-coated mongrel dog born of a suspect and chequered lineage.
I, of course, have never mentored anyone.
What are you currently working on?
I’m completing a long poem that takes its inspiration from the Surrealist movement in Quebec. I’m also completing a post-modernist novel about an LA movie company in 1959 making a film noir based in 1949, while the whole thing is a movie being shot in Toronto in 2019. I don’t expect either of these works to see the light of day in terms of a publisher, but, who knows? I keep sending my work out there (like a fool) to see if anyone bites.
Can you name a poet you think should be receiving more attention?
Given that poetry is paid, at best, lip service in this country, with little or no fanfare, prize winners generally ignored by media, publishers cutting back, reviews and reviewers dried up, I don’t see much hope, except, perhaps, within the ivory walls of academia, where poetry can afford to be bandied about and practiced somewhat seriously among an appreciative audience. While in the REAL world, high praise to those fine folks who continue to fight the good fight — ie: Train and its editors — Stuart Ross, rob mclennan, Amanda Earl, ET AL, against impossible odds and who are deserving of medals.
All this said, I did spot a name at a reading a year ago, and looked up some poems by this person that I thought were great, so I attended the event with the express purpose of letting her know and perhaps offering her some names of publishers (as she was yet to have a book) who might also like her work. She was very polite and modest and let me know that she did in fact have a batch of poems that amounted to a manuscript, and the collection was with an editor (which I thought meant for critiquing), but thank you for the consideration. Little did I know (but I was to find out soon enough, through some sort of coincidence) that the woman was already a rising superstar in the academic poetry strata and the manuscript was with Anansi, likely to be published, and certainly she did not need my help in any way, shape or form. I take consolation believing that at least my instincts were/are sharp and correct. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Julia Polyck-O’Neill, artist, curator, critic and writer. Cheers!
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