Interview with Jane Joritz-Nakagawa
Interview by Margaret Stawowy. Read Margaret's review of Joritz-Nakagawa's Diurnal here.
Margaret Stawowy: Jane, by my reckoning, this is your fourteenth poetic work in ten years! You just can’t seem to stop. Tell us, how do you manage to be so prolific?
Jane Joritz-Nakagawa: Hey, Margaret! In 2017, Theenk Books and I plan to release my ninth full-length book titled <<terrain grammar>>. Some but not all of my chapbooks were integrated into full-length books published subsequently. I also published an e-book that was later incorporated into a longer, revised print book. Thus, it may look like I'm doing more than I am actually doing!
My first book Skin Museum came out in 2006. A lot of the work in my first three books was written well in advance of their actual publication dates, work I had published in journals but hadn’t collected into book form. However, from my fourth book onward, I took about a year-and-a-half to write each book, more or less. There are other poets who write much more quickly than that! Part of the time is, of course, revision time, time to let the work sit so that I can go back to it later and look and make changes. Even the shorter works like chapbooks are drafted somewhat quickly, but then, I possibly spend about a year letting them sit and then going back to revise.
It's true, however, that I don’t suffer from writer's block--if such a thing even exists? Anytime I sit down to write, something comes out. I enjoy writing more than many other activities. Over the years I've developed more confidence in what I'm doing. I keep writing because I enjoy doing so, and oftentimes I feel a strong need to do it.
MS: You successfully find publishers for your work. How do you find and work with publishers?
JJN: I think this is hard for everybody. My first three books were published in Japan or partly in Japan, but since then my publishers have been Australian or American. If you find somebody enthusiastic about your work and enjoy working with them and are lucky enough to do more than one project with them, that's great. Publishers come and go. Some have very specific requirements. For example, some are purely regional though all doors are not closed. There are publishers abroad who like Japan or may think it's cool to work with somebody in Japan, whereas others don't want to work with somebody who is far away or doesn't come tour the book in a predominately English-speaking country or their particular region. But these days, as I said to Sarah Cook in a conversation recently published in The Argotist Online, where you live may matter less and less because poetry books are mostly sold online and advertised via electronic media and so forth.
MS: How did you end up in Japan?
JJN: I moved to Japan in 1989, right after finishing my graduate work in the United States. As I said in my conversation with Sarah, I didn't like my thinking and wanted to change it by living someplace where I'd have to learn to think differently due to the very different culture and language practices. That was the main reason. But I think many factors conspired to bring me here, as I may have commented elsewhere; it was a good time to come because there were many well paying jobs back then before the economic bubble burst. Money was not my main motivation, but it was important for me to get a job because I had school loans. I was also heartbroken over the loss of a loved one back in America. But the over-riding issue for me was connected with an attempt to expand my thinking, intellectually, emotionally, and otherwise. That is something I continue to try to do. I hope to become wiser if I can, to learn as much as I can about myself and the world before I leave this world.
MS: How does your presence in Japan affect your poetry, either content-wise or production-wise, if at all?
JJN: I'm not sure about production, other than the fact that I live here but write in English. I am mostly working with people who are in a different country, that I have never met and possibly will never meet (as far as journal and book publishers), so the work is usually done entirely via email. The influences on my work are both Eastern/Japanese (Japan primarily as far as the East is concerned) and Western because I'm writing in English and because, in addition to Japanese influences, I used to live in the U.S.A. I keep up with news in various countries, and have a reading background in Western (and other) writers that I came here with. But having now lived here a long time and having learned the language and having met people from many different countries, I have a broad focus. A Japan Times poetry critic described one of my books as a mash up of Basho and Berrigan. It's true that the work is quite hybrid in terms of themes, styles, concerns, approach, and so on.
MS: Your poetry is deeply affecting without directly naming an issue, agenda, or any overt story line. How did you develop your writing style and voice?
JJN: That's an interesting question. When I look at my earlier poems, I don't know if they are much different in style from what I do now; on the other hand, my style has definitely been influenced by Japanese art and literature such as the minimalistic style of some of my most recent work being tied to haiku poetics or work based loosely on haibun or work that was directly influenced by certain contemporary free verse Japanese poets, visual artists, and musicians. I think being in Japan may have caused my work to become more stylistically diverse than it might otherwise have been. But perhaps we are born with certain preferences that we realize as writers. I just try to do what I like doing, and my work reflects my concerns at the time of writing. Some of the poems have a more obvious or less abstract theme. For example in my book FLUX one can find references to the Fukushima crisis, the Colorado movie theater shooting, "Lehman shock" (as the financial crisis is called in Japan) and the gendered experiences of a young woman--poems about rape and other kinds of assault etc. But it's true that I like abstract works and maybe a lot of my work could be categorized that way. Many works may arise out of an abstract idea versus a concrete event or out of a metaphor, a metaphoric kind of thought if you will. I think I am weaving together the abstract and the concrete.
Margaret Stawowy: Jane, by my reckoning, this is your fourteenth poetic work in ten years! You just can’t seem to stop. Tell us, how do you manage to be so prolific?
Jane Joritz-Nakagawa: Hey, Margaret! In 2017, Theenk Books and I plan to release my ninth full-length book titled <<terrain grammar>>. Some but not all of my chapbooks were integrated into full-length books published subsequently. I also published an e-book that was later incorporated into a longer, revised print book. Thus, it may look like I'm doing more than I am actually doing!
My first book Skin Museum came out in 2006. A lot of the work in my first three books was written well in advance of their actual publication dates, work I had published in journals but hadn’t collected into book form. However, from my fourth book onward, I took about a year-and-a-half to write each book, more or less. There are other poets who write much more quickly than that! Part of the time is, of course, revision time, time to let the work sit so that I can go back to it later and look and make changes. Even the shorter works like chapbooks are drafted somewhat quickly, but then, I possibly spend about a year letting them sit and then going back to revise.
It's true, however, that I don’t suffer from writer's block--if such a thing even exists? Anytime I sit down to write, something comes out. I enjoy writing more than many other activities. Over the years I've developed more confidence in what I'm doing. I keep writing because I enjoy doing so, and oftentimes I feel a strong need to do it.
MS: You successfully find publishers for your work. How do you find and work with publishers?
JJN: I think this is hard for everybody. My first three books were published in Japan or partly in Japan, but since then my publishers have been Australian or American. If you find somebody enthusiastic about your work and enjoy working with them and are lucky enough to do more than one project with them, that's great. Publishers come and go. Some have very specific requirements. For example, some are purely regional though all doors are not closed. There are publishers abroad who like Japan or may think it's cool to work with somebody in Japan, whereas others don't want to work with somebody who is far away or doesn't come tour the book in a predominately English-speaking country or their particular region. But these days, as I said to Sarah Cook in a conversation recently published in The Argotist Online, where you live may matter less and less because poetry books are mostly sold online and advertised via electronic media and so forth.
MS: How did you end up in Japan?
JJN: I moved to Japan in 1989, right after finishing my graduate work in the United States. As I said in my conversation with Sarah, I didn't like my thinking and wanted to change it by living someplace where I'd have to learn to think differently due to the very different culture and language practices. That was the main reason. But I think many factors conspired to bring me here, as I may have commented elsewhere; it was a good time to come because there were many well paying jobs back then before the economic bubble burst. Money was not my main motivation, but it was important for me to get a job because I had school loans. I was also heartbroken over the loss of a loved one back in America. But the over-riding issue for me was connected with an attempt to expand my thinking, intellectually, emotionally, and otherwise. That is something I continue to try to do. I hope to become wiser if I can, to learn as much as I can about myself and the world before I leave this world.
MS: How does your presence in Japan affect your poetry, either content-wise or production-wise, if at all?
JJN: I'm not sure about production, other than the fact that I live here but write in English. I am mostly working with people who are in a different country, that I have never met and possibly will never meet (as far as journal and book publishers), so the work is usually done entirely via email. The influences on my work are both Eastern/Japanese (Japan primarily as far as the East is concerned) and Western because I'm writing in English and because, in addition to Japanese influences, I used to live in the U.S.A. I keep up with news in various countries, and have a reading background in Western (and other) writers that I came here with. But having now lived here a long time and having learned the language and having met people from many different countries, I have a broad focus. A Japan Times poetry critic described one of my books as a mash up of Basho and Berrigan. It's true that the work is quite hybrid in terms of themes, styles, concerns, approach, and so on.
MS: Your poetry is deeply affecting without directly naming an issue, agenda, or any overt story line. How did you develop your writing style and voice?
JJN: That's an interesting question. When I look at my earlier poems, I don't know if they are much different in style from what I do now; on the other hand, my style has definitely been influenced by Japanese art and literature such as the minimalistic style of some of my most recent work being tied to haiku poetics or work based loosely on haibun or work that was directly influenced by certain contemporary free verse Japanese poets, visual artists, and musicians. I think being in Japan may have caused my work to become more stylistically diverse than it might otherwise have been. But perhaps we are born with certain preferences that we realize as writers. I just try to do what I like doing, and my work reflects my concerns at the time of writing. Some of the poems have a more obvious or less abstract theme. For example in my book FLUX one can find references to the Fukushima crisis, the Colorado movie theater shooting, "Lehman shock" (as the financial crisis is called in Japan) and the gendered experiences of a young woman--poems about rape and other kinds of assault etc. But it's true that I like abstract works and maybe a lot of my work could be categorized that way. Many works may arise out of an abstract idea versus a concrete event or out of a metaphor, a metaphoric kind of thought if you will. I think I am weaving together the abstract and the concrete.
MS: It is obvious when reading your poetry that you are deeply committed to various issues that inform your writing, and the reader can guess what these might be. Is it all right with you that the reader sort of knows, but perhaps doesn’t completely know?
JJN: It's fine and maybe to the good, I think. One poet said that all good poetry, for him, has a sense of mystery. I love that comment. Reginald Shepard said that he was moved, inspired, and influenced by work that he felt he did not necessarily understand. When I read philosophy books I often feel a bit lost but I reread and keep going back to find something. (And by the way, I would call myself a dilettante as far as philosophy, because there are many gaps in my knowledge. I know poetry better than I know anything, though I think there are still things for me to learn, fortunately!) Maybe what a poem is for many of us is a springboard or entryway into our own thoughts and feelings. I love that different people can look at the same poem (or visual artwork or work of modern dance, etc.) and see or discover different things. But often, there will also be similarities. Two poets have reviewed my 2016 chapbook Diurnal thus far (Keri Glastonbury and Eileen Tabios) and there are similarities between the two reviews. Maybe a very quickly understood work could be simplistic. I am not trying to confuse anyone; I am interested in complex ideas that I am often trying to explore in my writing. Others may find things in my work that are there that I don't notice. It is often said that much art arises from our subconscious mind.
MS: You have worked very hard to advance the English-language literary community in Japan. Tell us about some of your efforts to encourage the progress of other writers and the writing scene in general.
JJN: I think in the past I certainly did so. I tried very hard to create events and get groups started, and so forth. A lot of those efforts I ultimately left for other people to continue. As far as currently, my activities are more limited, but I still do what I can, though it goes beyond the English-language community much more than before. From the beginning, I had the idea that I wanted to build a bridge between the expat community and the Japanese literary community (by helping organize multilingual events or events featuring works in translation etc.). But as far as expats, I'd like a supportive community out there for everybody. I still co-organize some events, often smaller ones. Rather than trying to get the largest possible crowd, I now focus on trying to be involved in an event of high quality. Recently, I have returned to university teaching, and in that role I continue to introduce poetry to students, both Japanese-language poetry and other poetry, including poetry in English. Students, unfortunately in my opinion, seem less exposed to poetry, especially contemporary poetry (in their native language) than older generations of Japanese. So that's an area of need that I can help with, and I guess you could say I still try to "inject" poetry wherever I can, whether it be in courses, co-organizing readings, or writing a column about poetry for an expat women's group. People may be afraid of poetry, possibly because they are not familiar with it. Once you help familiarize them they often respond quite positively.
Of course, the expat community also includes fiction writers and essayists. I think I've learned a lot from those writers too, though poetry is my primary genre, and I believe we can happily co-exist together. Women in particular often need more encouragement. The feminist side of my brain particularly wants to help women, though not only women.
MS: What is your earliest poetic memory? And when did you know that poetry was going to be a major direction in your life?
JJN: Wow! I have some memories of reading e. e. cummings' visual experiments and being quite thrilled by those. I think by the time I was in college in the 1980s, I knew that poetry was going to be a major direction in my life. At that time I realized poetry was an obsession --- I was reading a lot of poetry and was eager to read and learn more. I was thinking about poetry all the time or much of the time. I hadn’t been exposed to much poetry earlier in my life.
MS: What is your next project?
JJN: Right now I am working with Theenk Books to finish up an anthology of fifty women migrant poets to be published within this calendar year under the title women : poetry : migration [an anthology]. Once that gets out into the world, I'll return to finalizing my ninth full-length book, <<terrain grammar>>, which is mostly completed. It's only a matter of editing and shaping. Also, there will probably be two e-books coming out, one being a chapbook length e-book and the other will include the work of others that I haven't begun yet, so I won't discuss in any detail now. We'll see how much I can accomplish!
MS: Is there any question that you always wished somebody would ask you? What is that question, and how would you reply?
JJN: What a great question! Margaret, I think many years ago I had hoped somebody would ask me to give an overview of my poetic output, to explain how I see it. But now I don't think I'd be able to answer that question. As my output has become more varied I'd find it hard to attempt to "summarize" it. Maybe it's all becoming fuzzier, more complicated in my mind rather than clearer, though there are certain themes that have obsessed me for a long time. Right now I can't think of any question I' m dying for anybody to ask me. I think it's an honor to be asked any question, and I certainly feel very privileged to have an exchange with you, Margaret! I feel humbled and deeply thankful. I think at this stage of my life I'm more interested in what questions other people have, because that is an important source of learning for me.
Originally from Illinois, Jane Joritz-Nakagawa has resided in Japan for some time. Her ninth poetry book, <<terrain grammar>>, will be published in 2017. An anthology of innovative transcultural poetry, with brief accompanying essays, titled women : poetry : migration [an anthology], which Jane is currently editing, is forthcoming from Theenk Books. Her recent work includes Distant Landscapes (Theenk, 2015) and the chapbook, Diurnal (Grey Book Press, 2016). She can be reached via [email protected].
JJN: It's fine and maybe to the good, I think. One poet said that all good poetry, for him, has a sense of mystery. I love that comment. Reginald Shepard said that he was moved, inspired, and influenced by work that he felt he did not necessarily understand. When I read philosophy books I often feel a bit lost but I reread and keep going back to find something. (And by the way, I would call myself a dilettante as far as philosophy, because there are many gaps in my knowledge. I know poetry better than I know anything, though I think there are still things for me to learn, fortunately!) Maybe what a poem is for many of us is a springboard or entryway into our own thoughts and feelings. I love that different people can look at the same poem (or visual artwork or work of modern dance, etc.) and see or discover different things. But often, there will also be similarities. Two poets have reviewed my 2016 chapbook Diurnal thus far (Keri Glastonbury and Eileen Tabios) and there are similarities between the two reviews. Maybe a very quickly understood work could be simplistic. I am not trying to confuse anyone; I am interested in complex ideas that I am often trying to explore in my writing. Others may find things in my work that are there that I don't notice. It is often said that much art arises from our subconscious mind.
MS: You have worked very hard to advance the English-language literary community in Japan. Tell us about some of your efforts to encourage the progress of other writers and the writing scene in general.
JJN: I think in the past I certainly did so. I tried very hard to create events and get groups started, and so forth. A lot of those efforts I ultimately left for other people to continue. As far as currently, my activities are more limited, but I still do what I can, though it goes beyond the English-language community much more than before. From the beginning, I had the idea that I wanted to build a bridge between the expat community and the Japanese literary community (by helping organize multilingual events or events featuring works in translation etc.). But as far as expats, I'd like a supportive community out there for everybody. I still co-organize some events, often smaller ones. Rather than trying to get the largest possible crowd, I now focus on trying to be involved in an event of high quality. Recently, I have returned to university teaching, and in that role I continue to introduce poetry to students, both Japanese-language poetry and other poetry, including poetry in English. Students, unfortunately in my opinion, seem less exposed to poetry, especially contemporary poetry (in their native language) than older generations of Japanese. So that's an area of need that I can help with, and I guess you could say I still try to "inject" poetry wherever I can, whether it be in courses, co-organizing readings, or writing a column about poetry for an expat women's group. People may be afraid of poetry, possibly because they are not familiar with it. Once you help familiarize them they often respond quite positively.
Of course, the expat community also includes fiction writers and essayists. I think I've learned a lot from those writers too, though poetry is my primary genre, and I believe we can happily co-exist together. Women in particular often need more encouragement. The feminist side of my brain particularly wants to help women, though not only women.
MS: What is your earliest poetic memory? And when did you know that poetry was going to be a major direction in your life?
JJN: Wow! I have some memories of reading e. e. cummings' visual experiments and being quite thrilled by those. I think by the time I was in college in the 1980s, I knew that poetry was going to be a major direction in my life. At that time I realized poetry was an obsession --- I was reading a lot of poetry and was eager to read and learn more. I was thinking about poetry all the time or much of the time. I hadn’t been exposed to much poetry earlier in my life.
MS: What is your next project?
JJN: Right now I am working with Theenk Books to finish up an anthology of fifty women migrant poets to be published within this calendar year under the title women : poetry : migration [an anthology]. Once that gets out into the world, I'll return to finalizing my ninth full-length book, <<terrain grammar>>, which is mostly completed. It's only a matter of editing and shaping. Also, there will probably be two e-books coming out, one being a chapbook length e-book and the other will include the work of others that I haven't begun yet, so I won't discuss in any detail now. We'll see how much I can accomplish!
MS: Is there any question that you always wished somebody would ask you? What is that question, and how would you reply?
JJN: What a great question! Margaret, I think many years ago I had hoped somebody would ask me to give an overview of my poetic output, to explain how I see it. But now I don't think I'd be able to answer that question. As my output has become more varied I'd find it hard to attempt to "summarize" it. Maybe it's all becoming fuzzier, more complicated in my mind rather than clearer, though there are certain themes that have obsessed me for a long time. Right now I can't think of any question I' m dying for anybody to ask me. I think it's an honor to be asked any question, and I certainly feel very privileged to have an exchange with you, Margaret! I feel humbled and deeply thankful. I think at this stage of my life I'm more interested in what questions other people have, because that is an important source of learning for me.
Originally from Illinois, Jane Joritz-Nakagawa has resided in Japan for some time. Her ninth poetry book, <<terrain grammar>>, will be published in 2017. An anthology of innovative transcultural poetry, with brief accompanying essays, titled women : poetry : migration [an anthology], which Jane is currently editing, is forthcoming from Theenk Books. Her recent work includes Distant Landscapes (Theenk, 2015) and the chapbook, Diurnal (Grey Book Press, 2016). She can be reached via [email protected].