|
Emma: Thank you Gregory for taking part in this interview! In your poetry collections, This Paper Boat and Under Glass (which are both excellent!), you make use of different threads and storylines. In This Paper Boat, you weave together your family history, pieces of Robin Hyde’s life, as well as pieces from your own life. While in Under Glass, you present two journeys alongside each other, one being an abstract journey, while the other is more physical. What was your process in writing these different threads—did you write them separately and then assemble them together, or was it more of an enmeshed process? Gregory: Yes, having different threads/strands/layers/planes is very important to me. For TPB, the respective threads were distinct lines of inquiry. They were written separately. Each strand had a different emotional register, and a different kind of “permission”. Each was a different lens or prism to look through. As you mentioned, each also focused on different historical periods and individuals. In terms of the actual process, I had written each thread as though they were distinct series of poems. I recall writing about 20 (maybe??) little poems or “modules” or “cells” for each thread. In UG, the two planes were not as easily distinguishable in terms of time/history or people. They were different attempts at writing/representing/embodying a psyche. Even the more “concrete” or “physical” journey is ultimately still an abstract plane littered with dead, empty, and unravelling symbols. The other, more “lyrical” strand toyed with a direct address. In that mode I was interested in the gentler, more intimate tones of letter-writing, plain speech, whispering. These are all different kinds of worldbuilding, each with their own constraints. In each I implicitly ask the question, “How do I write, given these constraints? What is possible under these conditions that would not be possible under others?” For both books, I wrote some of the parts/strands first, then played with how they fit together as a whole. Once the “whole” started to emerge, it then, in turn, also necessitated some changes, the discarding of some parts and the writing of new ones. There were some interesting feedback loops created! Emma: In a traditional poetry book, each poem is presented as a separate piece that stands independently. I love how the poems in your collections work differently—they all flow and link together to contribute to an overarching narrative. What appeals to you about this kind of format? Gregory: I enjoy letting the gaps between things become potential spaces of play and meaning, of possible interconnection. Parataxis, on various levels, is a very important mechanic to me. I sometimes see the books as lego sets in which the parts can be recombined and reconfigured endlessly by the reader. Or, at least, that’s how I like to see them! I like the idea that the sum total of possibilities in these books far exceeds my authorial control, my own imagination. It is also a way to allow (necessitate?) every reader to participate in a fresh re/construction on each reading. The idea of a poetry book being simply a collection of standalone pieces is very unexciting to me, and I also find it somewhat philosophically offensive, lol. Reading is a dynamic, constructive process, in which the reader, in my opinion, is an active participant, manipulator, and co-constructor of meaning. In a sense, reading is also a form of writing. I want the structure of the works to encourage this activity and play. Readers are not just passive, empty containers waiting to be filled with information. Reading is an interactive process in which things are transformed, gained, and lost. On an even more abstract and ambitious note, it is perhaps an attempt at embodying various processes of the mind, which has to deal with the heterogeneity and diversity of things and events in the world. How does one make it all make sense? Emma: You’re also a web developer, and you recently released the second version of your text manipulator, glass.leaves (https://leaves.glass). What prompted you to create glass.leaves? Gregory: Early in my writing life, I was intrigued by various surrealist and proceduralist practices involving found texts and the manipulations of texts. Often these methods involved manipulating physical texts, cutting them up, recombining them, erasing parts, burning them, etc. In other words, I was compelled by the generative power of these processes and the role they might play in the larger creative process. Once I learnt some programming, moving into manipulating digital texts via computers and natural language processing felt more or less predetermined for me! Emma: I’ve found that using glass.leaves to rearrange text is a great way to uncover new and unexpected images that may be hiding in a piece. What is your favourite procedure or procedure stack to use in glass.leaves? How has glass.leaves opened up your own writing? And what do you think this kind of experimentation brings to the process of writing poetry? Gregory: I think the Markov chain generator is the easiest method of getting some interesting noise. Recently I’ve been using glass.leaves more on the analytical side in order to better appreciate the mechanics of a particular author’s style, for example, isolating all their noun phrase constructions, their descriptors, their verbs, to get some insights. Back on the generative side of things, I also enjoy the procedures that involve either randomising the positions of all the nouns or verbs, or swapping them between texts. I think the fun thing about glass.leaves for me is that every text seems to demand different kinds of manipulations. Different texts have different tendencies and therefore require different methods to tease those tendencies out. There are many productive aspects to these ways of thinking about text and writing. It can potentially help demystify and deconstruct texts. It also helps encourage writing as a form of play and experimentation, not just conscious design/intent. My hope is that the app can exorcise some of the psychological and cultural baggage entrenched in the mythology of writing, for example, the romanticism of the “creative genius”, for whom writing is some kind of divinatory, oracular process. I want to show that writing is also a mechanical, combinatorial set of skills that can be honed, and that that fact should not take away from its magic and power. I believe that writing is for everyone, and that it need not be an opaque activity that only a privileged few get to participate in. Emma: Finally, what are you currently working on, and what would you like to create in the future? Gregory: I am slowly putting things together. It’s been a few years since the publication of Under Glass, and I have written stuff here and there. I need to start running through it all with thread and some scissors. Gregory Kan is a poet and programmer based in Wellington. His poetry books, This Paper Boat and Under Glass, were published by Auckland University Press.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
