Interview: Writer Ed Taylor

Ed Taylor is the author of the novel Theo, the poetry pollection Idiogest, and the chapbook The Rubaiyat of Hazmat. His prose and poetry appear in U.S. and U.K. periodicals and anthologies such as Fiction International, The Quarterly, NorthAmerican Review, Southwest Review, Southern Poetry Review, Mississippi Review, St. Petersburg Review, New World Writing, Clackamas Literary Review, and a forthcoming anthology on drought. His short essay on football, "God Bless the Buffalo," appeared in Buffalo's "The Public" Super Bowl Week 2016. He is the recipient of writing fellowships from the Constance Saltonstall Foundation and the Virginia Commission on the Arts.

Ed took the time to talk to BWW.

MCL: Where were you born?

ET: Washington DC

MCL: What is there about Buffalo that keeps you here?

ET: Gravity

MCL:How did writing start for you?

ET: I'm not sure, but I guess like most writers there's a drive to say something, which just doesn't go away, and eventually you either act on it or you don't.

MCL:What was it that influenced you to keep writing?

ET:Probably the first time my stuff was published, in 1989 (yikes--long time ago).

MCL:What is the writing scene in Buffalo like?

ET:I'm not much on the scene, but my lurker kind of experience is that it's collegial and welcoming and there's a wide range of aesthetics but a real interest in both writing as social expression and writing as aesthetic act.

MCL:Any local mentors?

ET:Not really--I'm too old to have a mentor ;-)

MCL:What is the toughest part of writing for you?

ET: Continuous dissatisfaction--which is actually a good thing, the push to make something work, make it not suck, make it really say something (as Chuck D from Public Enemy put it, "it might feel good/it might sound a little somethin/but damn the game/if it ain't sayin nothin."

MCL:What do you enjoy about writing that many writers would disagree with you on?

ET:Revising.

MCL:Please name some of your favorite writers and why?

ET:Some among many: Mark Leyner, just because I'm reading his new book right now, but he's an old favorite.

Lydia Yuknavich, Anton Chekov, Wallace Stevens, Karen Russell--the list could go on much longer.

MCL:Favorite venues around town?

ET: For reading--Rust Belt is great, Talking Leaves--have to champion the indie bookstores.

MCL:What was the most difficult writing project you've worked on and why?

ET:Always the current one--trying to write another novel at the moment and it's kicking my ass.

MCL:If you could have dinner with three writers, in their prime, who would they be?

ET:Captain Beefheart, George Saunders, Karen Russell

MCL:What are some of the questions you'd ask?

ET:I'd just listen.

MCL:Tell us about one project you have a passion for that you haven't done yet?

ET:Current unfinished novel.

MCL:Now it's time to promote yourself. What's coming up for you 2016?

ET:Olympics, Nobel award ceremony--oh wait, I just woke up. I don't know what's going to happen in 2016; I'm waiting to find out.

MCL:Describe your writing style

ET:I write both fiction and poetry and my style varies based on material, from less to more representational, less to more narrative based, and less to more expository, if that makes sense. I am a big believer in the importance of sound in both poetry and prose, so pay attention to that to a greater or lesser degree in everything.

After a few "off the record" conversations I can say Mr. Taylor is a very nice and

all around good guy ... I find it ironic that a guy with so much talent is so normal.

He give hopes to the rest of us.

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