indieauthortactics:

For my latest interview I talked with author and poet Mallory Smart. I actually interviewed her a while back but I lost interviews from that page so I thought It’d be good to re-interview her.

1. What can you tell us about your most recent book?

My newest book that’s about to come out on July 2nd is HIPSTER IDIOT. It’s a digital micro-chapbook from Ghost City Press for their summer series. The poems are a chain of 8 hipster-centric love shouts into the void. They center around authenticity, identity, and of course iPhones.

2. What can you tell us about some of your other works?

Last October, right before I went on my most recent mania induced dash across the country I released a book called IM ANTISOCIAL, COFFEE NEVER LIES. It’s a two-part experimental swarm of weird poetry put out through Bottlecap Press (which is an awesome press btw). The book as a whole is a merging of tweets, absurdity, and confessional poems that form a kind of strange narrative about sex and violence.

I had been working this awful stress filled job at a local elementary school and just couldn’t take it anymore, so I quit, using a lame bullshit excuse (I think I even made my boyfriend make the call for me, I’m total trash). So the next day I decided to lay low. I went to Starbucks determined to just shake it off and while I was sitting there some business guy started to hit on me in this really invasive way. Which was weird in itself because I was this hipstery 21-year-old and he was an uptight 40-something business guy in a suit. Usually things like that aren’t such a huge deal to me but it was such an invasion of my personal space and I was annoyed and frustrated with the recent work issues. Me being the antisocial person I am, I refrained from saying anything to the guy (although I really wish I did now) and wrote about it instead.

So that’s what that book is about. It goes back and forth between talking about that specific experience and the discussion of harassment in a broader sense. There are also a lot of political breaks in the poems where I sprinkle in some off brand socialism, which I feel is another wonderful tool to fight the patriarchy.

Before that I had written my first chapbook, Fear Like A Habit, which we’ve spoken about before. I was most recently psyched to see on Goodreads that someone described it as Lynchian haha.

3. Do you feel poetry tends to go unappreciated these days?

I wouldn’t say it’s unappreciated. It has a devoted fan base. It’s just not mainstream. Very little in the world is now and that’s totally cool We have a lot of niche interests that take up the space that the mainstream used to that are made up of more passionate followers rather than people who are just taking a passive interest. Poetry has a very strong and thriving community right now both online and IRL. And the community is always innovating and finding fresh ways to interest new people in it through macros and YouTube.

4. Who are some of your influences in writing?

My weird writing influences include: Tumblr, Reddit, Portlandia, internet poetry, Patti Smith, Netflix & chill, Kathleen Hanna, Miranda July, marxism, all nighters, Walt Whitman, Kristen Stewart, macros, surrealism, lolcat, the entire Beat Generation, Twin Peaks and punk rock.

5. You have your own publishing company in Maudlin House, what’s that like and what can you tell us about it?

Maudlin House is one of the best and ambitious projects I’ve undertaken. When I first started writing I didn’t foresee me starting my own press. But that’s where it’s taken me. Maudlin as an idea and a press is constantly growing and adapting to the literary community that it’s in. We just added two new editors to our staff, Erin Taylor and Rachel Charlene Lewis. We’ve also expanded on the kind of content we have. There are now comics, video posts, columns about violence, reviews, and interviews.

We just released an amazing book of poetry by Trey Pharis called EMOJI DEATH MASK and are working on getting a few other projects off the ground. You can look forward to many awesome Maudlin books to come from authors like Ross McCleary, Beyza Ozer, and Amanda Dissinger.

6. What is a typical writing day for you?

A typical writing day for me used to begin somewhere around midnight and end around 7 am with me doused in coffee like Lorelai Gilmore, but more zombie like and way less cute. But these days I’ve gotten really into being health conscious and mindful. I’ve cut back the coffee splurges, write only during the day, and meditate every morning. I found that being aware of the way my mind works and taking that interest in my health has really helped expand my mental abilities when it comes to writing. I don’t feel as bogged down and I’ve opened up a lot of spaces in my mind for creativity amongst other things.

7. What have your found to be the hardest part about being an author/poet?

Lately it’s the idea that anyone can contact you. I’ve had a lot of weird messages and interactions with people these days. I never really predicted that that would happen and it’s really something I just have to get used to.

8. Where do you get your inspiration to write?

Typically, I’ll have an idea that I just can’t get out of my head, something I want to communicate. So it’s that constant nagging that gets me going.

9. What do you want people to take from reading your books?

That’s such a hard question Especially since a lot of the things I write are so insular in nature. But I guess if I wanted them to take anything it would be the the idea that there is no such thing as normal and that they should live their life according to what’s right for them. I think too many people are trying to live up to somebody else’s standard and that’s just a waste of life.

10. Do you have any planned works for the future?

I just finished writing a poetry collection actually I don’t have any publishers lined up for it yet, but I’m looking :~) As a whole the collection is about stress caving in from inside of you, your whole body disintegrating into stardust, anxiety sweats that fill the warm nights that were wasted on bad pot, guilt, and coping with shame. I know that make its sounds dark, but it actually has a rather light undertone that celebrates being weird and different. The working title is “whiskey down my throat hurting and i feel like holding hands & making out”.

Thanks Mallory! For more on Mallory Smart and her works check out her website @ http://www.mallorysmart.com/