An interview with
Glen Armstrong
What is, in your opinion, the best thing (or your favourite thing) that you’ve ever written? Tell us about it.
I like the poems in my book, The New Vaudeville. I can imagine some of them being filmed or performed on a stage.
Who are your favourite writers, and what influences your writing?
Russell Edson and James Tate are perennial favourite rites. French surrealists and American jazz musicians consistently supply new ideas regarding form and breaking from form.
What are your hobbies?
Music. Cartooning.
Describe yourself as if you are a character in one of your own stories / poems:
“He could be a bull or some sort of pill
that never dissolves.
I hold him in my hand
like a piece from a Visible
Man model.”
Tell us something crazy.
I share a birthday with the actresses who played Jessica 6 in Logan’s Run and Ezri Dax on Deep Space Nine. To this day, however, I’ve yet to play a sci-fi heroine who is the current incarnation in a series of similarly named characters. Odd.
What’s the weirdest question you’ve ever been asked in an interview? And what did you answer?
I had an editor ask me once what I’d do with the powers of invisibility, believe it or not. I answered that I’d spy on Tom Waits while he’s making his next album.
What is your writing set-up? (E.g your garden shed, a cafe etc) and are there any things you must have to get the words to flow, e.g a lucky hat or a favourite shirt?
I have a small house in a suburb north of Detroit, Michigan. I wake up, brew one cup of black coffee, and write a poem. It doesn’t have to be a good poem. Once I’ve done that, I can shake off the cobwebs and start critically thinking about other things / writing.
I like the poems in my book, The New Vaudeville. I can imagine some of them being filmed or performed on a stage.
Who are your favourite writers, and what influences your writing?
Russell Edson and James Tate are perennial favourite rites. French surrealists and American jazz musicians consistently supply new ideas regarding form and breaking from form.
What are your hobbies?
Music. Cartooning.
Describe yourself as if you are a character in one of your own stories / poems:
“He could be a bull or some sort of pill
that never dissolves.
I hold him in my hand
like a piece from a Visible
Man model.”
Tell us something crazy.
I share a birthday with the actresses who played Jessica 6 in Logan’s Run and Ezri Dax on Deep Space Nine. To this day, however, I’ve yet to play a sci-fi heroine who is the current incarnation in a series of similarly named characters. Odd.
What’s the weirdest question you’ve ever been asked in an interview? And what did you answer?
I had an editor ask me once what I’d do with the powers of invisibility, believe it or not. I answered that I’d spy on Tom Waits while he’s making his next album.
What is your writing set-up? (E.g your garden shed, a cafe etc) and are there any things you must have to get the words to flow, e.g a lucky hat or a favourite shirt?
I have a small house in a suburb north of Detroit, Michigan. I wake up, brew one cup of black coffee, and write a poem. It doesn’t have to be a good poem. Once I’ve done that, I can shake off the cobwebs and start critically thinking about other things / writing.