Sunday, May 17, 2020

Six Questions interview #20 : Jason Christie


Jason Christie is the author of four books of poetry: Canada Post (Invisible), i-ROBOT (EDGE), Unknown Actor (Insomniac), and Cursed Objects (Coach House Books).

Q: How long have you been in Ottawa, and what first brought you here?

We have lived in Ottawa since 2014. We moved here for work. Initially we thought we would be in Ottawa for one year, but we decided to stay! I spent summers and some Christmases in Carleton Place at my aunt's house when I was young, and always loved getting to explore Ottawa. It's a great place to raise a family.

Q: How did you first get involved in writing, and subsequently, the writing community here?

I know it is a cliché, but I have always been a writer. I wrote comics when I was a kid, then as a teenager I wrote many bad poems long before I’d actually read any poetry other than my own. I started reading poetry at York University, and I got serious about writing after meeting Michael deBeyer and some of the other Writers @ York. From there I branched out and got to know many of the writers in Toronto.

I moved to Calgary, Vancouver, back to Calgary, and then to Ottawa, and along the way got to know many writers across the country. It was a pleasure and a privilege to have been lucky enough to get to know so many people and spend time in so many communities. I am not as involved in the community in Ottawa as I would like to be. I work full time and have young children, which means I’m usually asleep when most readings are just starting! But I’m hoping to make it to more events this year, and I’m getting back into publishing again now that my kids are a little older. Who knows? I might even try to get my backyard reading series going again!
 
Q: How did being in such a community of writers shift your thinking about writing, if at all?

Each of the communities I’ve been lucky to be a part of taught me something different. I think I took for granted the security to take myself seriously in the communities I was in as a young writer, the fearlessness, and the support to find the bravery to try. As I’ve grown as a writer, I have found that I needed that security, comfort, and support less and less. Now that I’m old(er), I feel that I have a chance to provide that space for younger or newer writers and that’s exciting! It might only be attending their readings, and being genuinely excited about what they are doing, liking posts on social media, or sharing their poems with others, all of which is easy because the younger or newer writers I’ve met in Ottawa are fantastic.

Q: What do you see happening here that you don’t see anywhere else? What does Ottawa provide, or allow?

Ottawa and Calgary are similar to me. In both communities I see a broad interest and acceptance of a variety of styles. In Ottawa there seems to be a deeper appreciation of literary history, particularly local literary history, then in any other place I’ve lived. It's fascinating. I learn so much in every conversation that I have here. I am always impressed by the sincerity, honesty, and generosity of the community here. Even though I don't make it to many events, when I am able, people greet me warmly and I'm so grateful for that acceptance. Ottawa also has an incredibly high number of extremely talented writers. So in any room I wander into, I'm always a little star-struck by the talent around me.

Q: Have any of your projects responded directly to your engagements here? How have the city and its community, if at all, changed the way you approached your work?

I roll my daily life into the raw material that becomes my poems, so place is material in that sense. The poems I've been editing lately are all twisted from a long sequence I wrote when we first moved here that has loads of local references.

Q: What are you working on now?

I’m working on being calm, present, being kind, and expressing my support for others more. I want to read more poetry this year. I read a lot already, but I’ve been on a tear with prose for the last couple of years and I’m ready to switch it up.

In terms of writing and publishing, I’m trying to get a wee zine journal called nobody off the ground. I have several manuscripts at various levels of completion. One is a book-length longpoem called Glass Language in which I use a Python script to generate new lines, then edit the whole thing to make it look like it wasn’t randomly generated. The other is a book in which I think through secular exaltation and grace. I’ve understood it as the elevation of ordinary events from their milieu through a purposeful act of attention/devotion, a coming to terms with change and distress. And I’ve also started writing poems about robots again.

No comments: