1. What inspired you to write this book?
Nearly
all of the poems in Exits were written between 2003 and 2021, before the
idea of authoring a book ever came to mind.
About two years ago, I decided to incorporate what I considered to be my
best work into a book tentatively entitled Line Drawings. However, during the process of selecting
poems, I noticed that a substantial number were related to various aspects of human
mortality. This led me to curate a more
concise, themed collection, and Exits was born.
2. What exactly is it about and who
is it written for?
The poems in Exits explore the theme of mortality from a
variety of perspectives — disease and decline, death and remembrance. Many of the metaphors are drawn from nature.
During the writing process, the intended audience was
always me, or to be more precise, the facsimile of me that constantly looks
over my shoulder and critiques every line I draft. The word ecstasy comes to mind. It captures the elation I feel when a line
finally comes together, but it derives from the Greek ek-stasis ― to
stand outside of oneself.
There’s certainly nothing wrong with writing for a
defined audience, or respecting the conventions of a particular genre, or
exploring themes and issues that currently are in the public eye. My approach happens to be different. What matters most to me are the words on the
page, how they sound in air, and meeting the aesthetic standards I set for
myself.
3. What do you hope readers will get out
of reading your book?
I hope that readers
will experience one or more of the following:
1)
enjoyment of the poems
2)
a renewed interest in poetic craft and form,
and
3)
a deepened appreciation of the cycles of life,
the potential for renewal, and how the inevitability of our demise can
paradoxically confer meaning on our lives.
4. How did you decide on your book’s title and
cover design?
An exit is a
departure, an act of leaving. It also
can be a passageway from one place to
Designing the cover posed
an enormous challenge but ultimately was very gratifying. I hope that your readers will draw something
of value from my admittedly lengthy summary of the design process.
The first
step was to select a photo. I knew I
wanted a black-and-white image, so I reviewed hundreds of stock photos filtered
by terms such as “mortality” and “death.”
Most of the options consisted of skulls or illustrations of the grim
reaper, which seemed more appropriate for decorating a Halloween party. However, when I came across this image of a
bare tree against a threatening sky, I immediately gravitated toward its
ambiguity. Is the tree dead, or is it
merely dormant? Do the ominous clouds
portend a storm? I also loved how the
main trunk contrasts with the lightest part of the sky.
The next
step was to crop the photo for a 6" x 9" format, which I did in a way
that preserved the visibility of both trunks but didn’t allow the tips of the
branches to extend to the cover margins.
I then
selected Adobe Caslon Pro as the font for the title. (This is a contemporary version of the font
originally designed by William Caslon, an eighteenth-century English
typographer). Consistent with all of the
headings in the book, the title was rendered in all caps, with the first letter
larger than the rest. Note how the serif
of the uppermost arm of the “E” points directly toward the serif of the
adjacent “X.”
To the
casual observer, all of the letters of the title are white. But that’s an illusion. All are shades of light gray, and each letter
is a different shade. My objective was
to maintain consistent contrast across the title. However, because the clouds become darker
from left to right, the letters of the title had to do the same if they were to
appear similar to an observer.
The letters
of the author’s name also employ a range of light grays in order to achieve the
same effect.
Other
features of the cover that required decision-making included: the position of the title; the font sizes of
the title (66 pt / 46 pt); the position, font style, and font size of the
author name; and the distance between letters.
Regarding the latter, the “X” and the “I” in the title had to be
separated by an additional 2 pt in order to keep their serifs from touching.
5. What advice or words of wisdom do you have
for fellow writers – other than run!?
Write
poems that represent your unique aesthetic sensibilities. Try not to be overly influenced by prevailing
trends or by contemporary poetic styles.
Edit
mercilessly over an extended period.
Satisfying first drafts often begin to show their flaws only after
sufficient time has elapsed to afford an objective assessment.
Begin
your foray into publication by submitting poems to literary journals. This will help you determine which of your
poems resonate with experienced reviewers.
Before each submission, make sure that your poem is a good fit for the
journal.
6. What trends in the book world do you see --
and where do you think the book publishing industry is heading?
It’s no secret that the number of books published per year has
been increasing. With the rise in
popularity of self-publishing and hybrid publishing, I see this upward trend
continuing. The positive consequences
are that more writers have the opportunity to become published authors, and
readers have more reading options than ever before. The downside is that the industry has become
more competitive, which translates to fewer average sales per book.
7. Were there experiences in your
personal life or career that came in handy when writing this book?
I
can think of three experiences that, in the aggregate, almost certainly led to my
focus on human frailty and the prospect of death. First, I was raised without any religious training,
so from a very young age, I was left on my own to ponder the enormity of the
universe, time and eternity, and the meaning of existence. Second, as a physician and neuro-ophthalmologist,
I’ve cared for numerous patients with life-threatening and/or fatal
diseases. And third, since 1999, I’ve
had to deal with the spinal cord variant of multiple sclerosis and the
ramifications of that disease for life expectancy.
8. How would you describe your writing style? Which writers or books is your writing similar
to?
When I look back over my poetry oeuvre, I don’t perceive a
single writing style. On the contrary,
the poems I’ve written run the gamut from received forms to invented forms to
free verse to hybrid variants. Accordingly,
Exits isn’t reminiscent of books written by other poets.
One might reasonably assume that my influences would include
certain historical and contemporary poets, along with their books of
poems. However, upon reflection, I
realize that I’ve always been more interested in great poems than in the poets
who wrote them. Furthermore, only a
limited number of poems comprise my list of “favorites,” and I suspect that
it’s these works that have embedded themselves in my subconscious and constitute
an eclectic influence on my writing:
The Weed Elizabeth
Bishop
The Man-Moth Elizabeth
Bishop
The Second Coming W.
B. Yeats
Design Robert
Frost
Stopping by Woods Robert
Frost
A Patch of Old Snow Robert
Frost
The Road Not Taken Robert
Frost
Hope is the Thing with Feathers Emily Dickinson
I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died Emily Dickinson
I Felt A Funeral in My Brain Emily Dickinson
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird Wallace Stevens
Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock T. S. Eliot
Viking Dublin:
Trial Pieces Seamus
Heaney
The Force That Through the Green Fuse Dylan Thomas
Drives
the Flower
Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night Dylan Thomas
Fern Hill Dylan
Thomas
Nick and the Candlestick Sylvia Plath
The Moon and the Yew Tree Sylvia Plath
The Applicant Sylvia
Plath
Cut Sylvia
Plath
Song Muriel
Rukeyser
Convergence of the Twain Thomas Hardy
The Flea John
Donne
A Valediction Forbidding Mourning John Donne
To His Coy Mistress Andrew
Marvell
You,
Andrew Marvell Archibald
MacLeish
Ars Poetica Archibald
MacLeish
Wish Caitlin
Doyle
Sonnet Nabokov Daniel
Bosch
Whale Bone Steven
Brown
9. What challenges did you overcome in the
writing of this book?
The
first hurdle was completion of the editing process, which I would describe as
merciless. As mentioned above, I’ve
learned from experience that a satisfying first draft almost always begins to
exhibit its flaws after sufficient time has elapsed to afford an objective
assessment. For example, the eight-line
poem “(eclipse)” underwent nineteen revisions over nineteen years. Most of the other poems in Exits were
also revised over intervals of months to years.
The second major challenge ― one I hadn’t expected ―
was the amount of time required to:
select the poems that would be included in the book; determine the order
of poems; select the artwork; design the front and back covers; draft the
“front material” (title page, copyright page, table of contents, and preface);
select the font style and font sizes; and format the book’s interior. Getting to the final product involved twenty-one
print runs over a twelve-month period.
10. If people can buy or read one book this
week or month, why should it be yours?
Exits will resonate with different people in different ways. Some readers will gravitate to the visual
imagery and nature metaphors. Others
will enjoy the wordplay. Still others
will find satisfaction in the resurrection of formal elements. Exits
also speaks to the anxiety and angst of our present time. It may provide some readers with fresh
perspectives on human mortality, the cycles of life, and the possibility of
renewal.
About The Author: Stephen C.
Pollock is a recipient of the Rolfe Humphries Poetry Prize and a former
associate professor at Duke University.
His poems have appeared in a wide variety of literary journals,
including Blue Unicorn, The Road Not Taken, Live Canon Anthology, Pinesong,
Coffin Bell, and Buddhist Poetry Review.
His poetry collection Exits (Windtree Press) received the Gold
Medal for poetry in the Readers’ Favorite 2023 International Book Awards. For more
information, please see: www.exitspoetry.net
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