"Eventually, fires go out:" 3 Q's with David Gionfriddo (part two)

In part two of our 3 Q's with The Good Worlds are all Taken author David Gionfriddo, David discusses the breakdown of communication, the concealing of information, and the delicate balance between pathos and comedy.

BtO:  In several of your stories, the theme of communication -- or lack thereof -- comes up. Is that a theme you were playing with intentionally, or is that something that evolved organically?

DG: I think every story, at some level, is about communication and, in particular, the breakdown of communication. Those breakdowns cause the tensions and frictions and conflicts that end up driving most plots; that is, unless your story is set on the Titanic or at the foot of Mt. Vesuvius or somewhere

like that. Some of the themes I seem to use a lot, like religion and art, are about trying to express the inexplicable, so there you have enormous, built-in, insoluble problems of communication. How do I explain the mysteries of creation and existence in a believable way? How do I put my love and hurt into this lyric? Is anyone listening? Can I keep them listening? Being a lawyer and incorporating elements of that…that raises still different issues, because law is about concealing and rationing information. 

In "The Good Worlds Are All Taken," everyone knows how things go wrong, but the company conceals the problem. Casson is put to great lengths to communicate his desires, but the lawyers, in the end, use this to protect the company as much as to give Casson what he wants. The lawyer says as little as is necessary to achieve a result. He asks:What can I withhold? Just like the promoters in “Venus In Rags.” And, of course, the disability play is another kind of problem altogether – what about the questions no one ever even hears? And in the end, it comes down to the simplest problem of all, coming to grips with our feelings about others and the cost of cowardice in expressing those feelings. Maybe I should have called the book Your Call Could Not Be Completed As Dialed. The funny thing is, the story I’m working on now involves future dating – a topic I know you get a kick out of. And that piece, as it’s developing, is all about decoding hidden signals and being confused by the signals we only think we see. More trouble. The story I pulled from the book was about a man whose identity is accidentally erased and who essentially becomes a voiceless non-person.

I think my basic theme in all this is: How does a human being make himself known and understood in the world? Can a person’s essential nature ever be really communicated to others? I would say rarely, and even then, only briefly.  Lots of stories there, struggles and disappointments.

BtO: There's a sort of dissolute pathos in many of your stories, but there's also a dark comedy. How do you walk so beautifully between dark and light? Do you see your work as fundamentally tragic or tragicomic?

DG: You’re hitting me with all the existential artillery. Well, first of all, dissolute people are nearly always the most interesting, aren’t they? And pathos is really the basic quality of life. Nobody beats the house. The truest picture of the way most of us live is dark comedy. Life is the song we sing at the top of our lungs to show the world how happy we are as we circle the Big Drain. Elvis had three of everything and died on the john. There are two basic stories: 1) My character got what he wanted and it killed him; and 2) My character didn’t get what he wanted and it killed him. The really good writers I’ve read understand this at some level and use fiction to come to grips with it. There are victories, sure, but we all play like gambling addicts. We win so that we can put off the moment when we have to give it all back. I think that’s why all the happy-ending stuff I read feels forced and false to me. And then, everything was fine. Right. If you don’t get comfortable with the dark, you’re writing fairy tales. But the light is also important, because that’s life, the stuff we do to push the dark back.

For me, fiction is the funny ghost story that makes us laugh around the campfire and forget the really dangerous stuff out in the woods, where the fire can’t reach. And eventually, fires go out.

BtO: Bonus question--What are you reading right now? Who are you reading right now? Who have been some of your biggest influences?

DG:  I am ashamed to admit how badly-read I am. Always have been. And I’m too honest to do what most people do and fib about my nightstand. Due to my current health situation, I have homecare guys underfoot most of the day, and it’s very hard to get chunks of quiet time. It’s frustrating. On bad days, it can be tough even to handle a book. I have a whole stack of art history books I can’t seem to get to, and I keep running across writers that interest me, but who knows when I’ll be able to devote time and attention to them? I’m going to try to read some Lydia Davis if it kills me.

Influences? None out of the ordinary, I guess. All the usual college syllabus big names, Joyce, O’Connor and the like. Paul Bowles for the architecture of his sentences. Raymond Carver, of course. Rick Moody for his experiments in form. Geek Love by Katherine Dunn. In the speculative fiction column, Philip K. Dick and J.G. Ballard, especially his urban nightmare stuff – High-Rise,Concrete Island and Crash. Iain Banks’ The Wasp Factory. And I’m one of the umpteen million fans who rereads Denis Johnson’s Jesus’ Son for inspiration every so often. And every now and again, there’s the odd dark jewel: Here’s Your Hat, What’s Your Hurry? By Elizabeth McCracken, Alissa Nutting’s Unclean Jobs For Women and Girls, Heather Lewis’ Notice, or The Red Truck by Rudy Wilson, a writer from Iowa who’s a magician with words and really cries out for wider attention. If there’s one writer I’d really point to and say yes, I want to do that, it’s George Saunders. The material in CivilWarLand in Bad Decline and Pastoralia really nails that sense of tragicomedy you describe. “I CAN SPEAK!” from In Persuasion Nation is one of the best stories I can think of. Hilarious and heartbreaking. I hope they legislate us all some 27- or 28-hour days in the near future so I can add to that list.

Thank you so much, David, for stopping by!  We here at BtO wish you continued success in all your pursuits, literary and otherwise.

"Just a guy keeping himself amused:" 3 Q's for Short Fiction writer David Gionfriddo

And now for something completely different . . . 

I am thrilled to introduce to this space short fiction writer David Gionfriddo, whose debut collection The Good Worlds are All Taken is destined to become a cult classic, particularly among his devoted Internet fans. What I like about David's work is that it is reminiscent in some ways of Donald Barthelme's 40 Stories -- it's quirky, theatrical, and has a touch (okay, more than a touch) of the absurd.  David was gracious enough to take a break from his postmodern musings and stop by BtO and answer a few questions for us.

His answers, in fact, are so meaty that it was obvious from question one that this would definitely be a two-part interview.  In this part, David discusses the influence of the theatre upon his work, and in the next one, he will talk about how his stories grapple with the breakdown of communication in the modern world and the walk between dark and light.


BtO: When reading The Good Worlds are All Taken, I noticed, in both format and theme, a great deal of theatricality to your work. Are you influenced at all by the theatre? Do you consciously employ these techniques, or is this just something that has arisen from your subconscious?

DG:  Some of it, like the religious ritual in “Just Punishments” or the minstrelsy in “Who’s Afraid of Tobias Wolff,” was just incidental. The “play,” “Johnny Broken, Julie Gone,” was a little different story. Part of it goes back to the seminar I took with Rick Moody at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown back in 1997. It was called “Forms of Fiction,” and he encouraged us to tell stories in the shape of other types of writing – maybe as assembly instructions for a piece of furniture, or a Last Will and Testament. It was very liberating to think outside familiar story structures.

You’ll notice I said “play,” because it’s not so much a piece of drama as a story in the form of a play. I doubt it could ever be staged as written, and it wasn’t meant to be. What really triggered it, though, was a lecture I watched online by Peter Greenaway on what he termed the “new possibilities” of cinema. He talked about changing the spatial relationship between the audience and the onscreen content, moving the audience around, projecting material on screens that were sized and shaped differently and located in unexpected positions, creating more interplay and interactivity. And he does this all the time in his various installations. It got me thinking, albeit in a very primitive way, about how those ideas could be used to tell my story. It was originally supposed to be two acts, but once all the various voices started emerging and speaking, it became clear that the whole set of interlocking conversations between those different voices, on their fictional “stage,” was the real story. It just seemed that was the logical way to imagine and share that particular tale.

Obviously, I’m not a tenth as clever as Greenaway, but it was fun to have fantasy voices drifting in and out of an imaginary theatre space flooded with images like a Greenaway art installation. I don’t do his techniques justice – not by a long shot – but it was fun to try, and it made sense for the material, so, what the hell?  It was fun to flex those muscles again. Just a guy keeping himself amused.

Tomorrow, I'll post part two of this interview, where David will discuss "all the existential artillery," such as the breakdown of communication and "dissolute pathos," and then you'll really drop into his vortex. :)

On word and up word

Invictus

BY WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY

Out of the night that covers me,

      Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

      For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

      I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

      My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

      Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

      Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

      How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate,

      I am the captain of my soul.

Happy New Year!

A fresh page on the calendar, fresh look on the old blog. Watch this space.

Complicated mommy issues = beefy book club fodder in THE MIDWIFE

My review of Jolina Petersheim's THE MIDWIFE is almost as conflicted as the main character, a gestational surrogate who absconds with the unborn child she's carrying for a wealthy couple.

(Plus a few words about the importance of grammar.)

American Blonde = triumphant return of a terrific character

One of my favorite books so far this year! Girl pilot/spy Velva Jean returns to America and is swept up in LaLa Land politics and intrigue.

If you loved Jennifer Niven's first three Velva Jean Hart books, you won't be disappointed by this witty, well written story set in post-WWII Hollywood. If you haven't read the first three books (I haven't, but I probably will now), you'll have no trouble falling in love with this character and following her continuing adventures.

I thoroughly enjoyed it! 

Join us on Joni's List for intelligent, snark-free reading recommendations!

In its brief existence, the GWTST has enjoyed over 55,500 visitors. (Thank you!) The most popular posts are listed below. From now I'll be blogging at Joni's List. Join us!

 

THE PROMISE = a compelling duet in a rich historical setting

THE PROMISE is set in Galveston circa 1900 and told as an intimate duet, both voices speaking in first person.

Nan, an earthy Texan housekeeper struggles to keep her promise to care for a little boy and his widowed father, Oscar. Catherine, an exile from polite Midwestern society, escapes disgrace by marrying Oscar and struggles to adjust to a drastically different life on the Gulf Coast. A maelstrom of emotion (and other stormy things) ensues.

A beautifully written novel I'm highly recommending for book clubs.

Adventure + Enlightenment = Great Buddha Gym for All Mens and Womens

A terrific travel memoirella. Sallie Tisdale makes her way through the tourist traps and complicated travelocity of India to explore the places where The Buddha lived, taught, and died. Smart, funny, and -- gotta say it -- enlightening.

Too short for book club selection, but perfect for a flight from Chicago to NY, if you can't go to India today.

The Chronicle of Secret Riven = another lyrical journey for Hunger Games fans

Sequels suck. Almost always. This one, happily, does not.

Last year, I was swept away by the lush, imaginative MAPMAKER'S WAR, so I was anxiously awaiting Book 2. It delivers, neatly avoiding that sucking sequel dynamic. Anxiously awaiting Book 3!

Highly recommended for anyone who loved the Hunger Games books.

TEMPLE GROVE: Scott Elliotts compelling prose vividly captures the essence of its wilderness setting

If you loved The Wilding: A Novelby Benjamin Percy, you might be into Temple Grove: A Novelby Scott Elliott, the story of an intense wilderness struggle between a logger with a troubled past and an environmentalist being pursued by the FBI as an ecoterrorist.

Densely written literary fiction that takes patience but is well worth reading. The descriptions are in depth, but the characters and story keep it moving, I promise.

I went from "Do I really want to read this book?" to "I cannot leave this book."

APATHY AND OTHER SMALL VICTORIES by Paul Neilan is only good if you enjoy things like laughter

The only thing Shane cares about is leaving. Usually on a Greyhound bus, right before his life falls apart again. Just like he planned. But this time it's complicated: there's a sadistic corporate climber who thinks she's his girlfriend, a rent-subsidized affair with his landlord's wife, and the bizarrely appealing deaf assistant to Shane's cosmically unstable dentist. When one of the women is murdered, and Shane is the only suspect who doesn't care enough to act like he didn't do it, the question becomes just how he'll clear the good name he never had and doesn't particularly want: his own.

#2MinRevu Transcendent SEAL WOMAN by Solveig Eggerz creates rich emotional history

Highly recommending Seal Woman, a beautifully written novel of love, loss and self-discovery in the shadow of the Holocaust.

Jerusha was proofreading the manuscript for the publisher and said, "Mom, you have to read this book so we can discuss it!" An invitation I could not resist.

Book clubs: There is much to love and discuss in this powerful story (including a surprising storytelling choice toward the end over which Jerusha and I strongly disagreed.)