INTERVIEWER
You’re often linked
with Barth, Pynchon, Vonnegut, and others of that ilk. Does this seem to you
inhuman bondage or is there reason in it?
BATTEN
Wow, am I? I mean, I’ve never heard that before. That’s really
flattering, why would that seem like bondage?
INTERVIEWER
Who are the people
with whom you have close personal links?
BATTEN
Um. My family, I guess. I’m luckY to have a few close friends. I’m
strangely close to the crew at this Starbucks near my house. Um. You mean,
like, literary people?
INTERVIEWER
How do you feel about
literary biography? Do you think your own biography would clarify the stories
and novels?
BATTEN
Sure, sure. I haven’t
written any novels, though. But I’m cool with literary biography. I just read
this biography of Philip Roth, actually, and…
INTERVIEWER
Was your childhood
shaped in any particular way?
BATTEN
…uh, oh. Hm. Yeah, I guess like everyone, you know. You mean, like,
specific things that happened? Well, when I was like 7 we moved from New York
to Virginia, and that was…
INTERVIEWER
Music is one of the
few areas of human activity that escapes distortion in your writing. An odd
comparison: music is for you what animals were for Céline.
BATTEN
I don’t…sorry, these questions are coming fast and furious. Yipes. Um,
I don’t think I’ve really written anything about music, that I can think of. Is
there a story you’re thinking of?
INTERVIEWER
What did you learn
from this, if anything?
BATTEN
Learn from…what? Sorry, did I miss something you said?
INTERVIEWER
You don’t, then,
believe in entropy?
BATTEN
Do I believe in entropy? You mean, like, that everything eventually
falls apart? Is that…sorry, I think I’m having a hard time keeping up with you
here…
INTERVIEWER
Well, you’ve
established yourself as an old fogey.
BATTEN
Shit, man. I don’t know about that, that’s…your questions have been
really disjointed, I don’t…
INTERVIEWER
You have a story
called “Captain Blood.”
BATTEN
Uh. No, no I don’t. Sorry, not sure where you got that. I know that
Barthelme story, I do like that story.
INTERVIEWER
Which reminds me: Some
of your detractors say that you’re merely fashionable.
BATTEN
What? I’m not sure
what that means. Because I like that Barthelme story? I don’t…is Barthelme
really considered fashionable right now?
INTERVIEWER
That you’re a jackdaw,
and your principle of selection is whatever glitters most.
BATTEN
What? No. No, that doesn’t make…whoever said that has a weird idea
about what’s hip. Whoever said that must not have seen how many Lovecraft
collections I have in my house.
INTERVIEWER
What starts your
stories off?
BATTEN
Usually a voice, I guess. I get a line of dialogue stuck in my head
and then another one, and…
INTERVIEWER
You do your homework,
in other words.
BATTEN
Yeah. Um, I’m sorry. You’re really not letting me have that much time
to answer these questions.
INTERVIEWER
What about the woman’s
golden buttocks?
BATTEN
The woman…what? Is there some…I’m not …
INTERVIEWER
What about the woman’s
golden buttocks?
BATTEN
I’m sorry, I’m not sure what
you’re talking about. Is this a specific woman?
INTERVIEWER
What about the woman’s
golden buttocks?
BATTEN
Um. It’s good?
INTERVIEWER
Aldous Huxley argued
that Ophelia could not appear on stage naked. He opposed the necessary
conditions of tragedy to those of comedy, instancing the scene in Tom Jones
in which Sophia Western falls off her horse, baring her comely buttocks to the
admiring lookers-on.
BATTEN
Oh. Okay. Well. I’m not sure I…
INTERVIEWER
Once you’ve written a
story, is there anyone to whom you show it?
BATTEN
Yes! Yes, this question I can answer. Yeah, there are a couple people.
My friend…
INTERVIEWER
An example?
BATTEN
Yeah, I’m trying to tell you, I was going to say that usually the
first person I send something to is my friend….
INTERVIEWER
An example?
BATTEN
Yeah, I’m trying to tell you, I usually send…
INTERVIEWER
An example?
BATTEN
Come on, dude.
INTERVIEWER
What about the woman’s
golden buttocks?
BATTEN
God damn it. Yeah, what about it?
INTERVIEWER
Have you ever been
mugged?
BATTEN
Yes, yeah. I have. Last year I was….
INTERVIEWER
Beckett’s
pronouncements on art imply something curious: that artists who in the past
assumed and sought to convey ultimate truths (as Dante did) were quite right,
but that in our own time these truths don’t exist and therefore the artist must
proceed differently. Do you share that sense?
BATTEN
I don’t…could you just slow down for a second? I’m not sure what
you’re trying to do, but this is very frustrating. Are you trying to…
INTERVIEWER
Why do you live in New
York?
BATTEN
I don’t. Do you…it feels like a lot of these questions are…
INTERVIEWER
What’s the attraction
of the form?
BATTEN
What form? What are you talking about?
INTERVIEWER
What about the woman’s
golden buttocks?
BATTEN
All right.
INTERVIEWER
What’s your greatest
weakness as a writer? Is there any subject you’d like to entertain, but haven’t
yet? You keep up in philosophy and psychology, do you not?
BATTEN
Ok.
INTERVIEWER
Well?
BATTEN
I’m
not…I’m done with this game. That’s like 3 questions at once, and the second I
start to answer you’re just going to…
INTERVIEWER
I’ve always thought of
the moon as female.
BATTEN
Yeah, that’s what I thought. Well, that’s stupid.
INTERVIEWER
Asked what aspect of
his work had been sadly neglected, Albert Camus answered “humor.” What would be
your answer?
BATTEN
Your mother’s golden buttocks.
INTERVIEWER
Hey, fuck you, man.
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