"I really wanted to get to the heart of America..."
— Jack Bowen
It's not like he's unambitious! Apparently, it's Philosophy Week here at The Agony Column, so I thought we'd finish up hearing a pithy interview with Jack Bowen, who came to the Capitola Book Café And Recording Studio to talk about his book, 'If You Can Read This: The Philosophy of Bumper Stickers.'
So, you're thinking, sure, that's a short book, and it is — but therein lie both the charm and the intelligence. Bowen is not out to teach you the sort of stultifying, mind numbing stuff that guys in togas yak on about. He's here to make your drive, and as it happens, your world view more entertaining.
Bowen and I talked not so much about the many humorous bumper stickers he's collected (not purchased outright, but rather collected via writing them down, etc), but more about how he teases the smart stuff out of the sticky strips of paper that people like to put on their bumpers.
Now for the record, I have no bumper stickers, and this is mostly because I've never found anything worth advertising thusly. Unfortunately, there is a distinct lack of Stanislaw Lem bumper stickers. Or fortunately. It depends on how you look at these things.
I think the best way to approach this book and this interview is to remember that Bowen teaches the Stanford Summer Philosophy Camp. In a sense that very phrase could be an effective bumper sticker, since it combines some unexpected opposites in a manner that makes sense, ultimately and will give readers and listeners a good idea of what to expect; smart, witty fun, which you can find via Jack Bowen's agile mind by following this link to the MP3 audio file.
03-25-10: Terry Bisson Interviewed at SF in SF on March 13, 2010
"I'm an open source guy, if they want to do it, it's all right with me ..."
—Terry Bisson
Terry Bisson is the moderator for SF in SF, but as readers should be well aware of, he's also an accomplished writer. At the last SF in SF, he told me he had just come from a literary conference for PM Press, where he's working on a series of new books. Some of them he's helping choose, and others he's written himself. I see Terry on a regular basis at SF in SF, and I try, try, try to give him a break, and not interview him every time. But this PM Press seems like a pretty big deal, and I did have a couple of questions for him.
Bisson is a writer with a chameleonic nature. One second, he's writing brilliant science fiction stories that are replicated over the internet with more frequency than the Good Times virus; that is, "They're Made of Meat." Take a second now and read it, just to remind yourself of How It Is Done.
OK, back now? I hope you can see why I really curious as to what Bisson is up to with PM Press, where he's got Kim Stanley Robinson, and some other folks you may have heard of (I'll let him spill most of the good news).
So here we are standing at SF in SF and it was my turn to get nice little download on Bisson's latest work, which is happily voluminous.
If you've listened to the panel discussions that he's hosted over the years I've been podcasting SF in SF, you'll have fond that Bisson is a man of many talents, a true working writer, who can match his prodigious imagination to any task at hand.
03-24-10: Chaz Brenchley Interviewed at SF in SF on March 13, 2010
A Not-So-Quick-Guide to Writing in China
Write what you know, write what you know, write what you know — how many books about finding a good local burrito joint does this world need? Probably not so many as are waiting to be written by the millions of qualified writers-in-training. So if we've got the local burrito joint genre covered. But lets say, you want to try something a little more ambitious.
Let's say you want to write a fantasy set in a medieval China; with a dragon under the sea, and jade an agent of magical mutation. And let's just presume that you're bread-and-butter British suspense and horror writer, with a single foray into fantasy. It's probably going to be a bit more involved that checking out the carnitas at the latest taqueria to open down by the Boardwalk.
Chaz Brenchley doesn't do things halfway. It's probably a good thing that he does not have access to a time machine or alternate quantum timeline technology, because he might just get literally lost in his research.
I talked to Brenchley about the creation of his latest fantasies at SF in SF on April 13, and he had quite an interesting tale to spin, not surprisingly, one nearly as the fantasies that spring from his "research."
I do put the word in quotes, because to my mind, any experience that involves a limousine is, well it can be research, but I'm tilting towards vacation.
Though in the long haul, Brenchley really did put in the sort of time that can only be called either research or masochism.
It is interesting as ever to see the variety of approaches writers take when it comes to their process. I remember that early on I was cautioned against, or at least talked to about, "asking process questions."
And I don't think that is all one should as an interviewer, but doing so opens up a real strong perspective on the writing. Chaz definitely belongs to a certain school, and that seems like the obvious choice — until you talk to the next writer, then the next.
I don't believe, however that's what Malinda Lo was thinking. She took the actual research route to create 'Ash,' not the "read-stuff-I-like-and-call-it-research" route. The upshot is a very menacing bit of writing.
What Lo's version of Cinderella has is a lot of heft for a YA title; I said it last time and listening to this conversation brings it back to mind, that this is a just a good book, regardless of the entry level.
Talking to Lo after the reading was a lot of fun as well. She has a very clear vision of what she is doing and why. Moreover, she has some great and very pertinent experiences to share with readers. This is a woman who did a season in hell, or rather, read through the slush piles for a major mystery publisher.
I was really quite struck by Lo's creation of the hunt, which seemed pretty savage and frankly rather tragic. Her descriptions of the stag's flight and death had the feel of an old painting, or series of paintings that you might find hanging in some musty English manor, sort of sun-bleached and faded — but still powerful and creepy.
"..receptivity to new or contradictory knowledge is really important..."
—Stephen S. Hall
That is to say, that it is compelling. At least in hands of Stephen S. Hall, whose new book 'Wisdom' actually succeeds in making the reader want to read about "wisdom" and furthermore, in having something interesting and, yes, compelling to say about wisdom that is not snarky, not smarmy, not holier-smarter-and-better-looking than thou. Hall gets to the core of wisdom, breaks it down, helps us understand the core components, and does it all in manner that manages to be quite entertaining. Of course this is all in the written format, where he can plot, plan, write, revise and architect his ideas. Fortunately he does just as well when he walks into a studio.
It was a good thing that Hall arrived half an hour early for our conversation, because by the time we finished, we were running really quite late — and we could have kept on talking longer. Hall's a veteran science journalist who has been writing for The New York Times Magazine for almost thirty years. He's like the Babe Ruth of science reporting. But what he told me about this book was really pretty surprising.
For one, thing, 'Wisdom' came together really rather quickly — he told me after the interview that it took a mere two years, and that's lightning-like in the world of non-fiction. On the other hand, you need to be lightning-like when you're working with cutting edge science, and Hall freely admits that the science isn't quite all the way here yet. That's one of the things that makes talking to him so interesting, because you can more easily wrap your brain around the speed with which all of this is unfolding.
Now usually, I podcast something like this, which is longer than an hour by six minutes, in two segments. And I may indeed split it into two for those of you lucky enough to have a short commute. But the message here is really interesting, and I think Hall manages to do something very, very difficult in an easygoing manner. I think that just about every reader has spoken with someone, probably a few friends to be sure who have purported to dispense wisdom. Hall manages to go them all one better. He defines wisdom, and it's a damn good definition. It'll make you think. Let the words enter your brain by following this link to the MP3 audio file.
New to the Agony Column
09-01-10: Commentary : Tim Pratt Finds 'Sympathy for the Devil' : "...Hell for the company..."
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Dan Basta at the Blue Ocean Film Festival : "Experiential learning is the way we learn best."
08-31-10: Commentary : Peter S. Beagle Reveals 'The Secret History of Fantasy' : : Telling Lies for a Living
08-30-10: Commentary : David Doubilet Captures 'Water Time Light' : Painting with Pixels
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview With David Doubilet and Jennifer Hayes : "Everything people have always feared about photography comes true underwater."
08-25-10: Commentary : Vendela Vida 'The Lovers' : Reading and Revelation
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A Live Reading and Interview with Vendela Vida At Bookshop Santa Cruz : "...there was an owl that came into this place we were renting one day..."
08-24-10: Commentary : Jeff VanderMeer and 'The Third Bear' : Absurd Is as Absurd Does
08-20-10: Commentary : Joe R. Lansdale Takes 'Deadman's Road' : Deader Than Thou
Agony Column Podcast News Report : On the Phone with Vendela Vida : "You do all this background information, most of which never makes it into the book."
08-19-10: Commentary : Gary Shteyngart Tells a 'Super Sad True Love Story' : Retro-Prescience
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Gary Shteyngart Live Reading and Interview at Bookshop Santa Cruz : "...please like me, this will make up for Hebrew school if all of you like me.."
08-18-10: Commentary : Mark Pilkington Unleashes Weapons of Mass Deception : "ECM+CIA=UFO"
Agony Column Podcast News Report : David Corbett and Barry Eisler for The Agony Column Live at Capitola Book Café, August 7, 2010 Q and A : "This is NewSpeak."
08-16-10: Commentary : Howard Norman Asks 'What is Left the Daughter' : The Past Always Rises
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Howard Norman : "I'd wanted to write from the beginning an epistolary novel; this is just an epistolary novel that's consisting of one letter."
08-12-10: Commentary : James O'Neal Copies 'The Double Human' : Proceeding into the Future
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Barry Eisler and David Corbett Live at Capitola Book Café on August 7, 2010 : "If anyone thinks it's absurd that the government might assassinate the founder of WikiLeaks, it's quite a bit less absurd than I wish it were".... — Barry Eisler
08-11-10: Commentary : Joe R. Lansdale Takes Huck Finn to 'Dread Island' : "Classics Mutilated"
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Barry Eisler Reads at The Agony Column Live on August 7, 2010 : "...they'll pick up that angle and run interference for us..."
08-10-10: Commentary : David Corbett Asks 'Do They Know I'm Running?' : Crossing Borders
Agony Column Podcast News Report : David Corbett Reads at The Agony Column Live on August 7, 2010 : "These Families are making incredible sacrifices..."
08-09-10: Commentary : David Mitchell and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet : The World is Ever the World
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with David Mitchell : "The periodic table of the human heart is still the same now as it was then."
08-06-10: Commentary : Tim Powers Sails 'On Stranger Tides' : History, Fantasy and the Reality of Reading
08-03-10: Commentary : Robert M. Price Spins 'The Tindalos Cycle' : Terrorize, Horrify, Repeat
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A Short Chat with Gary Shteyngart : "...the technology is outpacing our ability to absorb what it is doing to us..."
08-02-10: Commentary : A Second Tour Through 'The Passage' : Sending Characters into Time
07-30-10: Commentary : Subterranean Press and Robert R. McCammon Wake at 'The Wolf's Hour' : The Time Before Cheese
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Three Books with Alan Cheuse : Allegra Goodman, 'The Cookbook Collector,' Noam Shpancer's 'The Good Psychologist' and Elie Wiesel 'The Sonderberg Case'
07-28-10: Commentary : Rule Britannia, In Space 2 : En Route, RJ Frith and Peter F. Hamilton
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Brian and Wendy Froud at SF in SF on Monday, July 19, 2010: Q & A : "The people you deal with at the publishers ... if they last the end of the week, you're lucky."
07-27-10: Commentary : Rule Britannia, In Space : UK Space Opera Demonstrates Excess is Not Enough (Part one, the Arrived)
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Brian and Wendy Froud at SF in SF on Monday, July 19, 2010 : "Well, I thought if I do faeries then nobody's going to say that I've got it wrong."
07-26-10: Commentary : Brian and Wendy Froud Seek 'The Heart of Faerie Oracle' : Cards, Books and a New Perspective
