When I was a sophomore in college, I first encountered Thalia Field’s writing in an anthology called The Next American Essay, edited by John D’Agata. The book consists of lyrical essays, ordered chronologically by author. By the time you’ve spanned Joan Didion to Thalia Field, you don’t realize what genre you’re reading anymore.
After reading Field's piece,“A [therefore] I” (from Point and Line), I wanted more because I hadn’t read anything like it before, and more importantly, I didn’t know how to categorize it. To me, the inability to clearly label it was its prevailing power. When I found her books in stores, they rested on the poetry shelves. Point and Line borders poetry, fiction, theater, and music – art in the truest sense – with narrative, mediation, and even ‘characters.' Her other books, Incarnate: Story Material and ULULU (Clown Shrapnel), offer just as much variety in form and style, and all have one thing in common: Field’s use of unique language and poetic devices, that form genre-busting collections.
In an interview I conducted with Thalia Field, we discussed the issues of genre and the distinctions between poetry, prose, and other literary forms.
EC: I read an interview with John D’agata in which he responded to someone asking him about creative nonfiction—he said he doesn’t like that term, and he’d rather it just be called Art. I’m of the opinion that literature (art) doesn’t have to subscribe to a particular genre in a given body of work. In my writing, I’ve always written some sort of conflation of the “Big 3” genres. My favorite aspect of your art is that I can pick up Point and Line or Incarnate without definitively filing it under one genre; it could be fiction, nonfiction, poetry, theater, auto/biography, whatever. I assume the main reason books, today, are classified into genres is so that when people go to bookstores, it’s easier for them to distinguish and locate certain works. Is this more important to the whole marketing process, or is it humanly intrinsic to want to label something? It’d be nice to see an area of a bookstore sectioned “Undefinable.” But then again, that in and of itself would become a genre. What are your feelings about this, about fusing genres and styles, and letting the reader conclude what “category” of art something is?
TF: I think you've already articulated much of what I think. Genres as defined by bookstores, publishers and marketing departments are for the ease of the marketplace. I think if there were shelves for writing as writers defined it – I would imagine it would all simply be by author. As you said, let the readers worry about distinctions of genre, if they matter. As for me, I write what I feel each piece wants best to be – and during the writing process many different forms will emerge and recede. Often a piece's "final form" is still provisional, as sometimes pieces will find another iteration in performance or another medium. Still, I do write mostly for books, and feel that I do have a large tool box with things from narrative, poetry, theater and nonfiction. Different pieces will use these "textures" in different measures depending on the needs of the piece. That said, I personally think of myself as most interested in questions of story-telling – its possibilities and its pitfalls and obstacles – and so all genres are sort of in service to those questions about how selves create stories and worlds over time – that most interest me at this point.
EC: Paul Valery said, "poetry is an art of Language; certain combinations of words can produce an emotion that others do not produce, and which we shall call 'poetic'." While I agree with this sentiment, I wonder why specifically poetry – and its combination of words – produces the emotional effect that Valery mentions. Why can't other forms or genres produce it? In your collections, despite, or, along with the forms, the words feel poetic. To me, that's where the electricity is.
In "The Compass Room," [from Point and Line] there’s a section where you list things for two pages:
The stomachs of a cow.
The quarters in a dollar.
The stages of life.
The essential humours.
The streets around a block.
The score and seven years ago.
The prophets.
The letters in the name of God. (40)
I think this is the kind of work that winds up coming into question: what is it as far as a type of genre, especially if it were to be removed from the context of the larger piece and viewed on its own? It reminds me of a poem in Charles Bernstein's Girly Man, where he lists fragments and images for several pages, and I can't help but ask, "Why is this poetry?" What makes this (or anything) poetic? What is a poem to you?
TF: I don't ask myself "is this poetry" or "is this fiction," and I agree that the ways languages combine is what makes writing poetic. To this end, not just formal poetry can be poetic, as you say. A story can be poetic if it uses language to abut and collide, to provide that new way of listening or seeing which can be called poetic. In forms such as I'm working with, there are often larger units of collision and juxtaposition – not only words in a line, but also sentences, clusters, pages, paragraphs – and these larger units themselves can behave poetically as well. When a piece is working for me, it fuels itself on its own inner logic – and this logic doesn't start from the "outside in" – so that whether it's ultimately called a poem or something else – is a definition which comes from the reader, or challenges the reader, more than something which initially interested me. The piece that interests me – how does it want to come together – asks how does its particular "poetry" work? And sometimes its poetics has a lot of prose or theater in it, sometimes more language on the line level. But ultimately, form is something which stays as open as possible in my process so that what I feel is the overall poetry of the piece has the widest possible frame to play itself out in. As I mentioned before, I often think of myself as someone primarily interested in the poetry of storytelling, so from the get-go, my projects are hybrids.
EC: Speaking of hybrids, music and film are the two art mediums – two outlets – that led me to poetry. And after reading, studying, and writing, I've gained a much greater appreciation for all aesthetics. The manuscript portion of my thesis is a collection of poems that string together the factual, chronicled murder of a woman, infused with fictional elements such as a protagonist, setting, plot, etc. As I continue writing this, I find myself thinking about poems in scenes within the larger context of the overall story. I'm not limiting myself to this thinking, but it's definitely occurring.
I've heard of bands using cinematic approaches to the creation of an album. For example, in one band, the guitarist writes virtually all of the music for each instrument. The way he composes them is similar to the way some films are made: he gives a band member, for example the bassist, a part to play; the bass player will play it without knowing the context of the part in both the given song and the total album. This is then repeated for each instrument and member. In this way, there's a synergistic process occurring between film and music in the creation of the art.
Since you're interested in performance in various media – theater, opera, music – do you or have you ever written a story in which, during the creation process, you thought of it from another medium’s perspective? If so, what is your approach? Do you find this restrictive, helpful? Or, are there other types of methods you use that combine and/or borrow aspects from other art to compose a story/poem?
TF: I am interested to hear your process and your thoughts regarding the adaptation of ideas from one to another media. My own artistic journey has led me mostly through theater. It is from theater that I've probably taken the most, but whether or not it is apparent in different written pieces depends on a variety of factors. Sometimes I borrow something formal, to make statements about artistic devices and how they structure storytelling. Sometimes I use the "performance" to dynamize a page, work, or to see it as temporal in a way which the page itself works against. There have been a few instances where I've used film as the dominant trope; what comes to mind is the "silent film" section of ULULU, where text is paired with film stills, and the piece, "The Compass Room," in which the whole design is borrowed from an early film-viewer, the zoetrope. The 'editing' of imagery within narrative that is possible in language and film do seem of a piece to me, and I'm sure that influenced some of the ways I think narrative can jump or abut itself on the page.
You mention the musician's use of indeterminate process to create an ensemble in which different parts are like "tracks" laid down independently— much like John Cage and David Tudor's work. I'm very interested in this sort of process, though I have mostly used it in my theater work, and less on the page.
EC: In one of my classes, someone recently mentioned their panic over poetry being a dying art.
We have become a visually oriented society. We have music accompanied by music videos, television & movies, video games, etc. Inundated with these things, it's easy to fear this threat. However, if that's the case, then all literature would be faced with extinction, not just poetry. Maybe this is why painting has persisted for so long and seemingly will continue to do so. It's actually kind of ironic because poetry accomplishes more, visually, than other types of literature. But if it is indeed poetry and poetry only that faces this threat, then it must go beyond visual fascination. If poetry continues to diminish in popularity, is it owed to the "stigma" of the label? I can't help but think that if a person picks up a book, fans through it, and it appears interesting to that person, then he/she would want to invest in it, no matter the style, form, or genre. But if a person picks up the same book that's labeled as poetry, before even fanning through it, the person will already have certain expectations that may influence them to disregard the book without actually giving it a chance.
TF: I think that newer communication or media technology don't particularly threaten older genres. They provide new opportunities to blend the strengths of the older ways of thinking and communicating into new forms. That doesn't mean that the old forms will be forgotten. It's a concern with every age. People thought the piano would ruin the fortepiano. And in some ways it did. But when you hear Mozart on a fortepiano, it's amazing. I think people should make the work they want to make and not worry so much about the commercial end of it. If you want to make poems in books, then do so. If you want to make digital literature, or video poetry, then do so. It should be more about what communicates and expresses the poetry you feel is relevant and the way you feel you can express it.
Those are my thoughts on that. I write for books because that's what comes from me in a genuine way. I would be equally pleased if I wanted to do something more with multimedia, and even though I teach those things, with great enthusiasm, I don't feel at home there myself. But my students, who feel the times in a different way, to them, multimedia can feel equally poetic, and it often is.
Field refuses to be bogged down by genre, as evidenced by her statement, “let the readers worry about distinctions of genre, if they matter. I write what I feel each piece wants best to be – and during the writing process many different forms will emerge and recede.”
Without genre, writers wouldn’t be restrained. They wouldn’t be forced to make explanations, and readers wouldn’t demand this of them. As soon as a reader opens a book that’s sold as nonfiction, the book’s universe must be absolute and true, otherwise the reader feels deceived. This isn’t entirely the reader’s fault; rather it’s the force-feeding of labels, and consequent dominant perception that art must be classified and must therefore remain within its designated class that contributes to these beliefs.
However, I’ve come to realize that on some level, genre is essential, and it exists, as it should. Rather than attempting to incite a literary riot, causing total anarchy, I think it’s more important to search for balance. Instead of trying to separate the characteristics and styles that comprise genre, we should try to embrace them, we should try to accept the fact that sometimes they will be joined as one. Not only should we be okay or merely satisfied with this concept of art as indefinable, but also we should encourage and welcome it.
That's all for now. Till next time... stay thirsty, my friends.
