When I was in film school, we would get movie directors and writers come to our class and show us their latest film releases. While it was fun seeing the movies, the post-movie discussions were usually as dull as hell. Students would ask the filmmakers stupid questions, and the professionals would respond with self-important answers.
Q: “What were your artistic influences in the cinematography of Police Academy 7?”
A: “I’ve always been a big fan of Godard… blah blah blah…”
I was recently interviewed for a new website called The Blog Reader. Luckily, most of the conversation didn’t make it on the site, because I would have probably come off as a pretentious blowhard myself. It wasn’t all my fault. The interviewer, a pleasant woman named Jessica, asked me those questions that I hated in film school.
Q: “In that post where you mentioned Emily Dickinson, were you trying to show the dichotomy between 19th Century Literature and modern technologically-produced writing?”
A: “You mean the one where I f***ed Emily Dickinson and then she started to stalk me?”
At first I giggled at her academic questions to me, but soon I became like a druggie on crack. Someone was taking me seriously! Yes, I did read Emily Dickinson in college! Yes, I do see blogging as a literary experience. Yes! Yes! Yes!!
To Jessica, I wasn’t just a trained monkey, entertaining women in the hope of getting some photos sent to me of their tits. To Jessica, I was an ARTISTE! I even discussed my talking Penis as a literary device.
“I’ve always been a big fan of Kafka,” I said.
What could be more ego-gratifying? Here I was, a former English major, talking about my literary influences. And now I was talking to some intellectual woman about how my own c**k was a piece of literary history, like Don Quixote, Jane Eyre, and Holden Caulfield.
Of course, I’ve now gained some experience on giving interviews. You need to be wary of blabbing about everything. You’re never sure how the interviewer is going to portray you. That is why Tom Cruise interviews with his Public Relations person at his side.
After Sophia read the interview, she called me, not very happy. It seems as if I was quoted as saying “Sophia HELPS edit SOME of the posts” when in reality — she edits ALL of my posts and very often makes them much funnier. But I’m sure you can all understand how I made that simple slip of the tongue.
Now I’m waiting for someone to comment on this quote:
“You’re seeing a high school kid, [for example], writing for the first time,†he said. “I mean, when was the last time before blogging that people wrote anything? Now people are writing all the time. I think it’s great. There are some blogs that are far and away better quality than others. Some of them, my best friends online, may not have the best written blogs, but they have a lot of heart to them.â€
After reading this, Sophia said, “You realize you just said that some of you best online friends have shitty blogs, don’t you?”
Interview on The Blog Reader (the interviewer was Jessica Strul, and she was actually a terrific interviewer! She had a great sense of humor and I enjoyed talking with her).
A Year Ago in Citizen of the Month: Stretching the Juice
