Interviews with Real People: A Trio of Poets

Author Paul Bowers doesn't just give his readers a good book-they occasionally find a good recipe (like what?) nestled in his work. His formal education in the field of English, he says, makes it seem like he planned to be a writer all along, but this was not the case. In fact, he didn't decide to become a writer until he discovered he couldn't NOT be one.

Though he doesn't recognize any particular writing style in his work, he thinks he probably has one-though judging from what I've read thus far, I'd say his style is most simply labeled 'good.' Paul spends most of his time writing, even when he isn't-but you don't have to be afraid of talking to him, no. See, he makes up the people he knows (and the characters you'll find in his work) so you never have to wonder if 'that character' in his book is you. When he's not writing (or eating, sleeping, running, riding, or watching) he's probably reading-perhaps the book he'd said he'd gladly read over and over for the rest of his life: Whitman's Leaves of Grass.

Interestingly, he types backwards more often than forwards, a talent that comes from deleting more words and sentences than he keeps. He did manage to keep enough to make up his first book--Like Men, Made Various-a collection of short stories published by Lost Horse Press in 2006.

According to Gordon Greene, good writing is... "a grabber opening, a memorable ending and about 1500 well-chosen words in between."

Gordon Greene hopes to inspire his readers to buy a lot more of his work-not a difficult task for the author of four collections and a formatting manual for writers. Those works are:

1.Colored Water & Other Illusions: Award-winning Short Short Stories

2. Reflections from the Heartland: Essays for People Who Never Liked Essays

3. Do Birds Know Love? and Other Poems

4. How to Format Your Manuscripts: A Guide for Professional Writers (and those who want to be)

5. Candles in the Dark: new poems by Gordon Greene

Greene isn't a one trick pony, though-his career began in the theatre where he has worked as a professional actor, director, playwright, and theatre manager, in addition to teaching theatre at the college level. His own education includes an undergraduate degree in secondary education in English, Speech, and Drama from East Tennessee State University, a Master's of Theatre Arts from Northwestern University, and an additional year at Wayne State University in Detroit, which Greene took in order to act with the first season of the Hilberry Classic Repertory Theatre, where they devoted nine months to rehearsing and performing four Shakespearean plays, rotating them over and over in true repertory.

Through courses in art, art appreciation, and art history, he also discovered a passion for painting (mostly watercolors and acrylics). Also an American History buff, he is in the process of collecting material for a series he's working on titled Great Ironies in American History. When he's not knee-deep in his research, he performs one-man shows and gives a number of talks and readings each year.

Greene's current project has taken him back into the theatre. He says, "I'm trying to interest more theatres and university drama departments in producing my Readers' Theatre drama, The Scopes Monkey Trial: What Really Happened. Unlike Inherit the Wind (a good piece of theatre, but fiction) my play is an historically accurate account of what many legal scholars regard as the most important trial in American history. It's about the 1925 trial in which the ACLU challenged a Tennessee law forbidding the teaching of evolution. As 2009 marks the bicentennial of Charles Darwin's birth and the 150 anniversary of his book Origin of the Species, the topic is particularly timely."

Gordon's 'Last Words': [The most challenging thing about writing is] "finishing it and letting it go."

Schroeder says, of his identity: I think Alice had it right on this one in her response to the hookah-smoking caterpillar...

[If you don't get the title, please look here.]

Readers, I feel the need to inform you early in this particular post that the focus of the interview (Steven Schroeder, whose name I have look up each time I type it because I've had to correct its spelling about a zillion times) cheated when answering my questions. Really, he did! (I suppose I can let it slide this time though, since he did give me a marvelous and well-thought-out answer.) See for yourselves:

Q: Who is your favorite author and what is it that really strikes you about their work?

A: Hard to limit this to one author...(See, he knows he's cheating even before he begins!) Among poets, I love Wallace Stevens for the philosophical depth and aesthetic beauty of his work...classical Chinese poets like Li Bai and Du Fu for the economy and compression of their work... Sonia Sanchez, Adrienne Rich, Denise Levertov are all high on my list... among contemporary Chinese poets, Li Nan, Li Sen, Hai Nan... Irish poets, including Eamon Grennan and Samuel Beckett (as a playwright, yes, but also as a poet)... Miller Williams and Lucinda Williams are both among my favorites, as is Leonard Cohen... there are some wonderful poets writing in Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico now (including the ones at this conference!)... Jo Carol Pierce, Butch Hancock... I always appreciate the honesty and clarity of what Larry Thomas writes about Texas, and the same is true of Wendy Barker... among novelists, I'm especially taken with A.G. Mojtabai (who taught at Tulsa and lives in Amarillo), Toni Morrison, and Salman Rushdie... and from a generation or two earlier, William Goyen and Flannery O'Connor...

Schroeder writes mainly lyric poetry, and on occasion fiction or narrative poetry-which has characters based on people (including non-human ones) that he knows (who are always made up). He's currently working on a book of philosophy of religion with colleagues in China, Lithuania, and Russia-his piece is on mysticism as a way of knowing. (This isn't surprising if you know that Steven holds graduate degrees from the University of Chicago in philosophy and religious studies.)

Like many writers, Schroeder knew he loved writing at an early age, but the decision to write professionally came much later. His days now consist of: a morning walk, several hours of uninterrupted writing, and other things as required (you know, to pay the bills). "For poetry," he says, "it is as Gwendolyn Brooks said, 'a matter of opening a window-or getting out in the world.'" Describing poetry as "a socially sanctioned form of eavesdropping," he says he thinks all writing involves research-either of the academic (butt-in-library) or the paying attention (butt-in-world) variety. When he's not writing, Schroeder enjoys painting, photography, and walking-and reading and listening to music.

So far, Schroeder's publication list includes six collections of poetry and five books on philosophy and religious studies-along with five more poetry collections (currently making the rounds with publishers) and another philosophy book under contract. Though his cat wishes he'd stop writing (she doesn't fit comfortably under the keyboard...), I hope he continues to write-if for no other reason than to amuse me.

I was going to add a bit here about the book Steven Schroeder would choose if he had only one to read for the rest of this life, but he said he might have to shoot himself if he could only have one-so I didn't push the issue. Certainly don't need that sort of mess on my hands.