FIGHTIN' WORDS: AN INTERVIEW WITH THOM JONES
Thom Jones writes of war, boxing, sickness and sorrow with a blunt air of familiarity and a cyclone of words. His characters -- much like the author himself, who suffers from epilepsy and diabetes -- have been pummeled by the world, but they refuse to be knocked out. His three short story collection -- The Pugilist at Rest, a National Book Awards finalist; Cold Snap and now SONNY LISTON WAS A FRIEND OF MINE (Little, Brown, $23) -- showcases a supreme writer in the throes of a thinking man's agony.
We spoke with Jones recently about his life, his stories and his passion for words. He will be signing and reading from his new collection at Off Square Books on Monday, January 25, at 5:30 p.m.
DR: Not so long ago you were christened a literary star. What was that like?
Jones: You used to hear these stories, overnight success. Out of nowhere. Who's this guy? Some a*** who lives in Washington. Every time I pick up a magazine the motherf***'s there. Who is he? He's some guy, some janitor or something. Once every five years a new writer will emerge like that. The idea is that it happened overnight. In truth, I paid my dues. It took a long time. I was writing those same stories 20 years ago, but they were just too much in those days. It wasn't until the Baby Boomers became editors that my voice was acceptable.
DR: Did that sudden attention affect your work?
Jones: No, not really. I was just reading a Flannery O'Connor book about writing short stories and novels. Flannery's one of my heroes. She was talking about how you're writing for the good of the piece. You're not writing for glory or fame or any of that. It's a very spiritual thing. You're looking for meaning in your piece. It's a quest, almost for God. She was saying in that form (short story) it's different from the novel, like the 100-yard dash as compared to the marathon. Things have to be a lot more dramatic in a short story, and they have to happen fast, and there's not room to fudge or write a bad line or lose your reader. And when it's all over, the person better go, "That did something for me." That's what Flannery did for me. I thought, yeah, she just expressed what I felt but couldn't articulate.
Jones, James Earl, and Penelope Niven. James Earl Jones: Voices and Silences. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1993. Print.
Literary works are always affected by the times and places in which they are written. Those crafted in Western America often reflect conflicts that occurred between advancing civilization and the free spirited individual. The 1970’s was a particularly popular time for authors to introduce new ideas for living in the modern world. There are few authors who captured the essence and feeling of culture quite like Tom Robbins. Robbins comments on the differences and similarities between Western civilization and Eastern philosophies. His text offers philosophical and cultural meaning that is completely original. Certain beliefs are threaded through out the content of the story. He includes significant content reflecting the laws of physics; how motion and force affect the life process. Through the dialogue and action of his characters, Robbins illustrates how two very different ideals can coexist. Robbins intentions are to expand cultural perspectives and awareness through his novels. His use of metaphors and stylistic diction emphasizes further how thoughtful and awesome his work is. Tom Robbins writing offers an insightful perspective into cultural themes of our modern world.
As every well-read person knows, the background in which you grow up plays a huge role in how you write and your opinions. Fuller grew up with a very strict education, learning multiple classic languages before she was eight years old. Fern grew up with writers all throughout her family and had a traditional education and saw first hand the iniquities of what hard-working had to contend with. Through close analysis of their work, a reader can quickly find the connections between their tone, style, content, and purpose and their history of their lives and their educational upbringing.
The creation of a stressful psychological state of mind is prevalent in the story “The Yellow Wall-Paper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, as well as, Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart”, Ophelia’s struggles in William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”, and the self-inflicted sickness seen in William Blake’s “Mad Song”. All the characters, in these stories and poems, are subjected to external forces that plant the seed of irrationality into their minds; thus, creating an adverse intellectual reaction, that from an outsider’s point of view, could be misconstrued as being in an altered state due to the introduction of a drug, prescribed or otherwise, furthering the percep...
Who is Van Jones? Key Quotes from SOCAP11 | Innov8Social - Exploring Social Innovation. (2011, September 12). Innov8Social - Exploring Social Innovation. Retrieved October 15, 2013, from http://www.innov8social.com/2011/09/who-is-van-jones-key-quotes-from.html
Flannery O’Conner, a woman with lupus and a Southern Gothic novelist, wrote 31 stories all in which each protagonist fights their own battle with the balance between intelligence and faith. The concept is conceptually developed within the two texts Good Country People and The Lame Shall Enter First through the use of character relations and the idea of broken prophets.
From an early age Jones was exposed to religion, specifically the Pentecostal sect of Christianity. With no father figure to look up to he turned to the pastors in his church for a role model. Watching the local pastors speak moved Jones; he id...
Gwendolyn Brooks once said “I felt that I had to write. Even if I had never been published, I knew that I would go on writing, enjoying it, and experiencing the challenge”. For some, writing may not be enjoyable or easy, but for Brooks writing was her life. Gwendolyn Brooks not only won countless awards, but also influenced the lives of several African Americans.
and Other Greats : Lessons from the All-star Writer's Workshop. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006. Print.
"It is one of the blessings of this world that few people see visions and dream dreams" (Hurston). An author, especially during the Harlem Renaissance which immediately followed World War One, is someone who took their dream, acted upon it, and made it into something tangible on paper. An author takes their thoughts and creates something beautifully unique each and every time. Being an author takes a lot of strength in order to find your place in the overpopulated industry of up and coming authors-to-be. In any industry, not just writing, it takes a while to find one's special voice and style. A well respected author of the Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston wrote
When it comes to pregnancy, expectant mothers usually have a lot of questions and concerns. One such concern is alcohol consumption. Some people feel that it is okay while others are against the consumption. However those who drink take a huge risk that can result in what is referred to as Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD). This umbrella term is used to describe the range of damage from alcohol exposure to a fetus. The characteristics, diagnosis, and the mother are all important factors to look at when trying to understand these birth defects.
Multiple studies have found that FAS is the single most common cause of mental retardation that is completely preventable. When alcohol is consumed during pregnancy it acts as a teratogen, which means it is a substance that interferes with growth and development, and is capable of causing birth defects such as hearing loss, vision loss, reduced cognitive ability, and motor skill deficiencies. Flattened mid-face, short nose and a thinner upper lip are also common physical abnormalities (Tangient LLC, 2014). When consumed, alcohol from the mother’s bloodstream crosses easily into the fetal bloodstream. Because of their size, the unborn baby has a lower capability to metabolize the alcohol, thus it remains in its system for a longer period of time and can result in...
In 2004, the term “Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders” was agreed upon by a group of national experts to be used as an umbrella term to encompass all the disorders caused by prenatal alcohol exposure. When signs of brain damage appear following fetal alcohol exposure in the absence of other indications of FAS, the conditio...
Prenatal alcohol exposure has become a serious problem not only in our country, but also all around the world. It is affecting the future generations of this planet and their health. The public needs to be well informed on the effects of prenatal alcohol exposure and how to prevent it from happening. By doing this, it will save our people billions of dollars as a whole and will stop abnormalities in the people. FAS and FASD are malformations that don’t need to happen and can be prevented so easily. If only the people knew the severity of the consequences to their actions.
“How We Wrestle who we are” by Brian Doyle is a vivid short essay about the trials of his son’s heat condition. In the essay Doyle discusses the physical and mental damage not only done too his son but the pain Doyle was left to deal with during the time of destruction. In my essay I will discuss how Doyle’s essay is his indirect interpretation of the heart, how he physically writes about the heart and how he writes so that the story will remind you of a heart.