I’m excited to have gotten tickets for Dog’s Tales, a night run by Chris Flynn which is usually on at the Dogs Bar in St Kilda, but for the MWF will spend a night at the Toff in Town. My dazzling non-fiction teacher Kalinda Ashton will be performing, as well as one of my favourite authors Josephine Rowe, and the woman who introduced to me the idea that short stories can be truly magical, Carmel Bird. Should be an incredible night!
Apart from this, I have some exciting MWF-related news: some of my micropoetry has been accepted for the RMIT Poetry 4 U program, which can be followed on Twitter throughout the festival, as well as selected pieces running across the LED screens at Federation Square between 12pm and 2pm daily throughout the festival. I’ve seen some of the entries from last year, and there was some great work, so follow the project or head down to Fed Square one day to check it out!
The general public are also invited to participate via Twitter, just add the #poetry4u hashtag to any nanofiction or micropoetry you might want to put out there.
I was introduced to Sage Francis’ music about four years ago. I didn’t listen to a lot of hip hop then, but I loved poetry and my boyfriend knew that. As soon as I heard his music, it was the start of something that felt really special. You know that feeling when you find an artist who just captures it all perfectly? That was Sage Francis for me then, and still is now. His finger is spot on the pulse.
I admire his work because it breaks from the norm – at least, the norm as I know it in Australia. Sage Francis is not only a white guy producing really good hip hop, but he’s putting poetry to music. And that poetry shines, it really does. His subject matter oscillates between confessional and social commentary.
It’s easy for confessional work to become self-indulgent… Sage’s doesn’t. It speaks to the darker side of me. His comments on society aren’t just a rant – they’re intellectual, they’re insightful observations of where we’re at. They’re important and accessible.
He was kind enough to answer some questions for LGWABP.
Sage Francis
Q: -Your beard’s a bit epic. Tells us about that. A: My beard grows wildly. I must be part viking. I would braid my beard if it didn’t hurt so much.
Q: -Come to think of it, B. Dolan’s beard’s a bit epic too. Is it some crazy Rhode Island thing? A: We have different breeds of beard. His grows sideways while mine grows downward. We’re both part Irish so maybe the beard gene stems from Ireland but probably not. Because they are different species of beard.
Q: -Before hip hop you were a slam poet – what you do now is a beautiful mashing-together of the two. How did this happen? A: Common misperception. I was not a slam poet before hiphop. I found out about spoken word poetry (which then introduced me to slam) many years after I had already been rapping. Since I was already writing by the time I stumbled into performance poetry I figured it was a good medium to present my material to an audience. I was right. What I’m most thankful for, in regard to my involvement with the spoken word scene, is that it opened me up to different subject matter which then was infused into my rap songs. The slam thing was inspirational in the beginning but it quickly wore thin and uninteresting to me. Much like the battle scene in hiphop. Competitive based art, when graded and judged by people you are performing in front of, almost always results in bad art. Those are not creative scenes, nor are they supportive scenes. At first they are, but they quickly fall to the way side once people figure out the “tricks.”
Q: -Your latest album ‘Li(f)e’ is very diverse sounding – it’s much less beats-based and uses a lot of really different instrumentation, and you’ve worked with a lot of great musicians on this one. Each song certainly has its own distinct feel. Tell us about that. A: You said all that I think needs to be said about that. I mean, those are the basics right there. I deviated from a beat-based soundscape and delivered my raps on top of live instrumentation. This has annoyed some of the more hard-lined hiphop fans and opened up some of the non-hiphop fans. I wanted to create an album with a whole new sound and doggone it…we did. I believe that rap is much more flexible than people give it credit for, and I always have these impulses to explore the territories that other rappers or musicians are hesitant to go. As long as my ideas and words have room to breathe I am happy.
Q: -When listening to your music, I often discover a new line after I’ve heard the song fifty times. Do you intentionally make your lyrics that way, or do you just have so much to say that you try to fit it all in? A: That’s what makes writing so fun. Setting up the traps, pitfalls, escape routes and alternate meanings. The power of poetry, as far as I’m concerned, is being able to stuff as much meaning into as few words as possible. That’s the fun part of what I do.
Q: -For “Little Houdini”, the first track off your latest album, the inspiration came from a news article you found. Do you do this a lot? And where else does your inspiration come from? A: I don’t often derive my subject matter from news stories. In fact, Little Houdini is the only time I did that. It was a story I found so inspirational that I held onto it for a few years and then decided I wanted to tell the story. The only other song that followed a similar pattern is Makeshift Patriot, but in that instance it was the events that occured after 9/11 that inspired the song. Although my lyrics consisted of actual phrases from news reports, it really wasn’t the same kind of thing. My inspiration for songs usually just comes from whatever subject matter is plaguing my mind. That typically comes from personal experience or information that I come across in one way or another through regular day-to-day stuff.
Q: -Your lyrics often hold a mirror up to society – do you see social commentary as a big part of hip hop’s role? A: Well…yeah. It used to be like that anyway. That’s a big part of what drew me into hiphop in the first place.
Q: -Your songs seem to be equal parts confessional and social commentary. Is that intentional? A: Sometimes you have to turn the mirror on yourself. I don’t really like looking at myself in the mirror anymore, but I need to be fair.
Q: -The slam scene in America is quite different to what it is here in Australia – over there you can pack out stadiums with poetry… Here we hold tournaments in warehouses and pubs, but it’s a push to pack it out. It’s a small but very enthusiastic scene. Do you have any advice for those of us trying to get this thing to take off? A: It belongs in pubs. Not stadiums. Let the small pack of people stay enthusiastic and creative. Don’t bastardize the shit like we tend to do with everything in the states.
Q: -A lot of what you tackle with your work is really heavy, but there’s alsothis videofloating around on Youtube, of you battling the Strange Famous Records intern in your parking lot. Care to comment? A: Well…that battle took place in the Epitaph parking lot. It was totally random and off-the-cuff. While I was in Los Angeles I dropped by their office to have some face time with the Epitaph folks. While I was making my rounds I came across this intern who would dance on command. He was told to dance for me…and he did. The office burst into laughter and I got mad. I was like, “That ain’t shit. It’s time to battle.” And the whole office was like, “Ooooooohhhh.” So they immediately set up an event to take place in their parking lot so the intern and I could do a dance off. The rest is history.
Q: -Tell us a bit about how you create. A: When all goes well I fall into a trance-like state and let my mind run wild. That’s just when I’m feeling metaphysical though. It takes a fair amount of peyote to get me there. A lot of the time I just imagine something that I want to bring to fruition…and that’s that. Nothing too complicated there. Once I put my pen to the page I do my best to avoid typicality. A lot of ideas are bad ideas so it’s important to be a good editor. Editing can turn shit into gold if you know what you’re doing. And vice verse if you don’t know what you’re doing. I probably do both.
Q: -You’ve recently announced that you won’t be touring anymore, and you’re taking an
indefinite break – what bought this on? A: I’ve found this to be very difficult to explain to people which I didn’t expect but I understand why there may be confusion. I’ve been a road dog for over 10 years now. I’ve traveled this world many times over. I’ve seen many clubs. I’ve had the same small talk conversation with thousands of people. I’ve wrecked my throat and body, risked life and limb, ruined my relationships with people back home and have a career to show for it. Yay. It worked. I don’t want to do it anymore. I’m a pseudo-recluse. I can function while in the company of others but it’s not comfortable at all. That’s not me. I don’t know what I’m going to do, or if things will change for me, but for right now I have to be fair and honest with myself as well as with my fans. I won’t be able to do long strings of shows anymore. It’s doing some serious damage to my life. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth it.
Q: -And what will you be doing instead? A: I’ll try to live a life of stability and creativity. If that doesn’t work then I’ll be back on the road telling myself “It’s the journey, not the destination.” Repeatedly. Over and over. Oh, journey…you fuckfaced mistress…gimme a death kiss already.
Thanks to Sage Francis for supporting a blog like mine, and answering my questions. He will be in Melbourne on the 15th of October for the Melbourne International Arts Festival – you can buy tickets here. Check out the rest of MIAF’s program too, there’s some exciting stuff on.
Today I spent the day in a room. With. John. Marsden.
…and THEN. Steven. Amsterdam!
WAHHHHHHHH!
Today was the first “Big Splash” at the Wheeler Centre, run by Express Media. The day was a mini-festival featuring a keynote speech from Jessica Au and writing workshops by John Marsden and Steven Amsterdam. And what a day it was – as the first event of its kind, Express Media got it spot-on first go.
Jessica Au’s opening speech was a reflection on her recent reading of Virginia Woolf, who once said that a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction. Jessica talked about what a woman today might need in order to write. Money was still a concern – “they say time is money, but for a writer, money is time,” Jessica said. The means to afford time for our writing is important. And not just time for our writing, but time for everything that goes with it – time to get distracted, time for uncertainty, time for re-writing and editing. Also essential are engagement with critical culture, and a good balance between egoism and pessimism. Later in the day Jessica shared her experience in getting published and dealing with publishers – she’s a very well-spoken lady, and while I haven’t read any of her work yet, I’ll be on the lookout for it!
The next part of the day saw the group of 28 attendants split in two, each going with a different writer, which would swap later in the day. The first workshop for me was with John Marsden.
John Marsden‘s importance to me simply cannot be understated. I was part of that generation who chewed hungrily through the “Tomorrow, When The War Began” series, got to the back cover of the last one, then started it all again because I just didn’t want it to end. “So Much To Tell You” is one of the first books I ever remember buying, and “Dear Miffy” the first thing with really explicit material (I remember the sentence too – “squeeze me like a lemon baby, your juice runs down my legs”) that I snuck past my dad out of the library. He’s been with me for about as long as I can remember reading, and now he’s coming with me into my writing life too.
Some notes on Mr Marsden – swears like a trooper. Natural story-teller. Rambles, but in a totally engaging way. Has a natural fascination in people and playing with status in real-life situations. Watches a lot of different movies – Pretty Woman, Terminator, some avant-garde French thing…
John’s been running workshops for about 20 years – and it shows. He does it incredibly well. While the first 45 minutes or so were a ramble about status, he eventually looked down at his watch and said “Shit, this is meant to be a writing workshop, we better do some writing!”.
His exercises were short and to-the-point. We looked at how stories need solutions, and how solutions don’t have to be absolutely unexpected to be good. We talked about how all stories are essentially “What If’s”. The example I came up with for this was, “What if I go home today to find another family living in my house, and find out that that family has been living there for a long time, just when I’m not home, and today I just catch them by chance?”. It certainly got me thinking(/paranoid)… I’ve been keeping an eye out for clues of their whereabouts since I got home.
John also came out with something really comforting – someone said something about a plot they’d come up with, then undermined it by saying “I know it’s just like (some popular thing) but…”. To this, John said: “Sometimes people are apologetic about their work being derivative, but you shouldn’t be, because everything is. You should only be apologetic if your writing lacks energy.”
Speaking to Express Media’s artistic director later, Bel Schenk, she said that John told her we were the best workshop group he’d ever had. It may have been hyperbole, but I’m claiming it. That’s right, folks, I was part of the best writing workshop John Marsden has ever run. YAH!
The next part of the day was with Steven Amsterdam. Recently, Steven Amsterdam has wow-ed me with “Things We Didn’t See Coming”, which I picked up at the EWF, and was thankful for every page of. The man writes well. Really ridiculously well. You should pick up a copy.
Steven’s workshop had a lot more “heads-down” kind of writing, but was no less enjoyable for it. We used visual prompts to produce a pretty sizable body of story starters. Steven kept one guiding principle in our minds as a way to always push our work forward – “What’s the core value of your story?” he’d ask. And for the most part, by identifying what that is, there was a logical way forward.
This piece of advice is pretty priceless for me. I so often get stuck with a story, with a beginning and most of a middle – I know where it needs to end, but I’m not so sure how to make everything reach that point. Often I’ve been spending time writing really detailed character sketches outside of the story in order to figure out what would logically happen. This idea of keeping focussed on the core value of a story really helps with this process.
Steven also said something great about making story ideas original. With our visual prompts, we were mashing together seemingly unrelated ideas. Steven likened this to googlewhacking… I very much like this idea.
The day wound up with what was called an “informal panel session” but which was executed in a circle, with people throwing questions to the three writers, who chewed on them for a bit. It was incredibly relaxed, and felt so much better and completely different to any other author/writer event I’ve been to.
Both Steven Amsterdam and John Marsden are so incredibly friendly and approachable that I managed to have a chat with both outside of alloted time. Both were lovely enough to sign their books for me…
"Sam, Best Wishes, John Marsden""Sam, Keep it strange, Good luck! Steven Amsterdam"
…and John Marsden signed his using MY PEN… I absolutely loved my pen before, but it’s just taken on a whole new element. John Marsden wrote with my pen!
Beloved Pen, now graced by the hand of Marsden!
Best day I’ve had in quite some time, by far. Thanks Express Media, can’t wait for the next one!
So I thought I’d post weekly highlights for the month of July, while I do the LitLife Comment July Challenge.
This first week has proved harder than I thought it would – 5 comments a day, not so hard? Actually, incredibly hard! I’m also trying really hard to make my comments more substantial than “Great post!”. This, at times, seems to be an exercise in showing how little I really have to contribute to discussions…
However, there have been some good discussions, and some great posts to comment on. So here’s my top five from the past week (in no particular order):
I said “New Meme” in the heading TWICE because I needed to. That’s how exciting this is.
It’s been in the ideas-bank for a while now, but it’s finally here and ready to launch. And it’ll be happening tomorrow.
The new meme is called Admiration/Inspiration Thursdays. Appearing weekly (on Thursdays – who’d have guessed?!) it will feature interviews with people who inspire me, articles about people/things I admire, and collections of things that are currently inspiring my writing.
Check back tomorrow for the first installment of A/I Thursdays!
Megan has realised that she’s a lurker. She reads a ton of blogs every day, but comments on a very small percentage of them. I’m the same. I don’t let fellow bloggers know that I enjoyed their posts often enough, I don’t often contribute to threads worthy of a discussion. Sorry, blog world.
Here’s how we make amends:
For the entire month of July, I (and Megan, and the other people who have also taken Megan’s vow of commenty) pledge to comment on at least five blogs per day, in an effort to better connect myself with the blogs I read, and make sure that the producer of said blogs feel the love.
As part of her vow Megan is posting links to her comments so her devoted readers can take part in the discussions. I’ll be posting highlights weekly, so you can keep track of where I’ve been having some commenty-fun.
Hats off to Miss Megan for such an awesome idea! Head over to her site to make your own pledge, and spread happiness and light with the Comment July Challenge.
You’ll have noticed my blog has been incredibly quiet of late. I apologise.
I’ve written very little. I’ve blogged hardly at all. I’ve read only to wind-down before bed or else I’d never sleep. I’ve seen hardly anyone and I haven’t had a beer in over a week.
This is life on the arse-end of the semester. Four assignments due in a three-week period. We’re still in that period, the last one’s due on Tuesday.
So I’m still not blogging and all of the above.
But in the name of procrastination and pride, I thought I’d post the following interviews I did for Yartz, with Lisa Dempster and Emilie Zoey Baker. They were done just before the EWF, there’s just been a little delay in getting them up – technical stuff. Computers, hey?
It’s Latin for “from the pen”. Dig? I think it’s a smart name.
Ex Calamus is a publishing collective powered by RMIT Creative Writing students. We were looking for a way to keep ourselves writing and get in practise for actual publication, and so Ex Calamus was born.
The Ex Calamus webzine is a weekly publication. On Thursday night, all Ex Calamus writers are emailed a theme. The deadline is 6am Sunday morning. So Ex Calamus is a high-pressure quick-turn-around project.
In its third week now, the Ex Calamus webzine’s past themes – “Gold”, “So don’t close the blinds”, and “This Space Intentionally Left Blank”. A different writer from the group nominates the theme each week.
I submitted a short story called “Johnno in the Easement”, about a kid who is forced to grow up in the blank space between his parents’ garage and the fence.
The webzine is available for download as a PDF document, and is uploaded on Monday afternoons. Keep your eyes on it!
Sam van Zweden 
Comment July Challenge, Week 1 Wrap-Up
So I thought I’d post weekly highlights for the month of July, while I do the LitLife Comment July Challenge.
This first week has proved harder than I thought it would – 5 comments a day, not so hard? Actually, incredibly hard! I’m also trying really hard to make my comments more substantial than “Great post!”. This, at times, seems to be an exercise in showing how little I really have to contribute to discussions…
However, there have been some good discussions, and some great posts to comment on. So here’s my top five from the past week (in no particular order):
1. Lisa Dempster’s “How to Blog When You’re Not Blogging”
2. Liam Wood’s “What’s Hipster Than Being Cool?” on Virgule
3. Megan Burke’s “What We Can Learn From Mia Freedman” on Literary Life
4. Jo Case’s “Why The Internet Turned Me On (To Creative Writing)” on Kill Your Darlings
5. Q & A Monday with Lisa Dempster on Virgule
Are you part of the Comment July Challenge? How’s your week been?