En ung manns besettende utsyn på verden fra en fengselscelle der han gjennomgår endeløse målløse tester. Hans eneste kontakt med verden er en telefon som ikke ringer ut men som av og til ringer inn og avbryter den sterile stillheten og hans evige interne dialoger foret av minner fra en barndom i Injury Alaska. Et mentalt landskap tvunget ned i rommet mellom ordene. En meditasjon over isolasjon.

N&D: Hi Robert, first off, tell me a little about your novel Kamby Bolongo Mean River. How did you end up writing the book?

Robert Lopez: Kamby Bolongo Mean River started a short story and stayed that way for about a year. I was intrigued by the narrator's voice and predicament and thought there might be more to the story. I found another ten or so pages to add but had to stop working due to other circumstances. A year or so later I went back into KBMR and the rest of the novel poured out in one summer long breath.


N&D: What was your writing process on the novel? Also compared to your debut novel Part of the world.

RL: Part of the World took years to assemble and I worked on it steadily over that period of time. It's a very intricate book where scenes and language seem to repeat over and over again but always with some element changing the context. It took a long time to figure out how these repetitions should work, how they should be paced, etc. I remember giving myself a quota - 600 words - every day when writing the first draft of POTW. I wanted to push the story forward and get the pages down. This wasn't the case with Kamby. Once I started working on Kamby in earnest the pages poured out. However, I did use older stories that didn't quite work for one reason or another in both novels. I'd rework the voice and situation to fit the novel, of course. I feel like I have a finite number of stories in me, so I try to steal from myself as much as possible. If I went through both Kamby and POTW I'd find snippets of dozens of failed stories.


N&D: I read in an interview that you, as opposed to many writers, was not a big reader as a kid and teenager. So how did you get involved in writing in the first place? When did you know you wanted to be a writer?

RL: I was a communications major in college and as seniors we had a semester-long project as our final assignment - producing our own television show. Constructing the sets, lighting, casting, directing, editing, all the elements that go into television production. I volunteered to write the teleplay. I think I knew I was going to be a writer at that point, even though I'd written nothing and, worse, read nothing at that point. Hearing professional actors perform the lines I'd written was a thrill and I was hooked. That summer I was determined to write a play but wound up writing about 100 horrible poems and three or four horrible stories. I'd finally cracked the books and started reading all kinds of Lit anthologies and was on the path.


N&D: You also you teach a fiction workshop at The New School. We have very few writing classes here in Norway. How do you teach students to write fiction? What is the main advice you give aspiring writers?

RL: Actually I teach fiction at The New School, Pratt Institute and Columbia University. As most writers will tell you, you cannot teach students how to write. All you can do is look at their work and tell them when they're getting it right and when they're not. We try to get students to recognize and avoid cliches and pick out the fresh way to render objects and action. Avoiding explanation is always good, too. And I try to get them to use their own preoccupations, fears, peccadilloes, perversion, as a way of making the work unique or as unique as possible. The most relevant advice is to read great writers. No one can expect to write anything at all without seeing what great writers have done and are doing.


N&D: The narrator of the book  is a very intriguing lonely person with a disturbed consciousness. How did you come into this character?

RL: I always start with language, voice. A line comes to me and if that line is intriguing and has enough going on inside of it a second line is most often borne from it. And from there the next line and so on. So I never think in terms of character - I only concern myself with language and voice. If I can come up with an interesting voice somehow character emerges. And I use what I encourage students to use - myself mostly but also those around me. I take this predilection or that one and maybe amplify it or not depending on what seems appropriate for the voice/character.


N&D: You have probably gotten this question many times, but why didn’t you use any commas in KBMR? I guess its linked to the previous question.

RL: It became clear right away that this narrator’s voice, his manner of speech was not at all measured or ordered. The second sentence — “I will say the hello how are you …” presented itself as one uninterrupted phrase, as opposed to “… the hello, how are you …” There was an urgency to his language, the syntax and diction and lack of punctuation all came together at once. After that there were a number of places where commas would ordinarily go, but it didn’t fit his voice or the tone of the piece.

N&D: You have painted this bleak landscape, exploring madness, abuse and psychological trauma. What is your relationship to violence in literature?

RL: Again, I rarely think in these terms. To me there is no violence, only language. Now, my tastes are such that I usually respond best to the understated. Subtlety works for me in almost every case. While there is no obfuscating in the book and the goings on are dealt with in a frank and honest manner, I don't think the book is graphic at all. I imagine there is some violence in Kamby but it never seems to me like a Tarantino movie. I like it best when violence is left slightly off screen, we know something awful is happening, but we can't quite see it. That seems to me to be the most effective use of anything horrible.


N&D: So you don’t think in terms of subjects, ideas, themes that you want to explore with writing, with your work?

RL: As you might guess the answer to this is no. I only concern myself with language and never think in terms of subjects/ideas/themes. Now, it's no coincidence that certain situations and predicaments keep coming up in the work. It seems that the novels and many of the stories deal with people who find themselves in circumstances beyond their control. They have no idea how they've arrived in this place and are unsure as to how to deal with it. Most of the narrators/characters/voices are confused but this isn't premeditated. I never try to address these issues but in the course of following the voice(s) these concerns seem to come up over and over again. I suppose this says something about me, but I try not to think about it.


N&D: What are the similarities and differences for you as a writer working on a novel or story? How do you know what's a story and what's a novel?

RL: I've written two novels and both started with a single sentence. There was something about those sentences/voices that felt bigger than a short story. It felt like those voices needed more time and space to get their stories told. For me most often the story itself determines its own length. With novels there is room for sideways movement. Pacing becomes an important element when constructing a novel, but pacing isn't really part of a story. The pace of a short story, regardless of length, needs to be breakneck. A story has to open up at the end of it whereas a novel must close. when writing a novel you have to keep the whole in mind and it's a lot to keep in mind. There's no such concern in a story. Past that the similarities are many. You're dealing with language and you're trying to arrest the readers attention and have an effect on them.

 
N&D: In your opinion, who are the most interesting up-and-coming young writers today? 

RL: There are a lot of writers doing very interesting things. Writers who will have books coming out soon and who readers should keep an eye on are Blake Butler, Shane Jones, Joseph Salvatore, Kim Chinquee, Matt Bell, Lindsay Hunter, Molly Gaudry. There are more but that's a good start.

N&D: Finally, what's next for Robert Lopez? What are you currently working on?

RL: The finishing touches on a collection of short stories, Asunder, that will be published by Dzanc Books in Nomber, 2010. Also working on a play I hope to finish at some point.