Interview
PAIN! AGONY! AND UNICORN MEAT!
AN INTERVIEW WITH JOSH DENSLOW
BY Taylor Blum, Chris Comparri, Megan Kiger, & Erin Theresa Walsh
March 2020
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In Josh Denslow’s short story collection, Not Everyone Is Special, readers are introduced to a world that appears familiar, yet is bursting with comedic and fantastical elements which paint the human experience in a new and unique hue. For instance, if you’ve ever wanted to punch someone in the face completely free of consequences, Denslow creates that fantasy for you, (among many others). He forms a “pretty tight bond” with every character he writes, giving them the necessary tools to ultimately unveil his own imagination through the story. Each plot contains thrilling yet relatable situations, which range from mystical and bizarre to emotional and heartbreaking.
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By creating vibrant characters that are shockingly true to life, Denslow is able to naturally and perfectly “by accident” weave humor and magic into his fiction, allowing him to address a multitude of relatable and devastating experiences in a way which has never been done before.
Glassworks Magazine (GM): Your stories often play with readers’ expectations of reality, bringing mystical or unusual elements into an otherwise real world story. From where do you pull inspiration for these nuances?
Josh Denslow (JD): I've always been fascinated by characters who have an innate talent, but choose to spend their time squandering it. What can I say? I love slackers. And it actually wasn't as big of a leap as you would think to start giving my characters superpowers and watching all the ways in which they wasted those too.
Leland Cheuk, the amazing publisher of Not Everyone Is Special, calls my stories “slacker fabulist,” and I love that description. It encapsulates exactly what I'm doing, and even better, now I have a name for it! As for where I draw inspiration, I spent a lot of my childhood reading science fiction and watching tons of movies and that surely rubbed off on me.
GM: In stories like “Not Everyone is Special” and “Blake Bishop Believes in True Love” you create vibrant characters we love to root for—like Cameron, the divorced dad struggling to discover his Power, and Blake, the believer of true love who finds his own form of courage. Do you ever find yourself empathizing with any of your characters?
JD: I relate to and empathize with all my characters. During the process of putting them on paper and letting them move around and get comfortable, we form a pretty tight bond. We trust each other. I let my characters say almost anything they want, and they let me make life really difficult for them. And if all goes well, we'll share a few laughs too.
Plot-wise, I start from scratch and fully imagine situations. But emotion-wise, that hits a little closer to home. To empathize with a person, you have to be willing to look at yourself. I learn a lot about myself and dig into my own emotional depths when I go on a journey with my characters. My main goal is for the characters to feel real. I want their reactions and coping mechanisms to be relatable. I think a big part of that realness is humor; it has the power to carry us through our toughest times. And I have found that it enhances the emotional resonance of the story as well. You feel the heavy parts more if you are invested in the characters, whether or not they are on the right path. A lot of the tension is actually there because, more often than not, they are not on the right path, and may never be. And, of course, that can be funny too.
Josh Denslow (JD): I've always been fascinated by characters who have an innate talent, but choose to spend their time squandering it. What can I say? I love slackers. And it actually wasn't as big of a leap as you would think to start giving my characters superpowers and watching all the ways in which they wasted those too.
Leland Cheuk, the amazing publisher of Not Everyone Is Special, calls my stories “slacker fabulist,” and I love that description. It encapsulates exactly what I'm doing, and even better, now I have a name for it! As for where I draw inspiration, I spent a lot of my childhood reading science fiction and watching tons of movies and that surely rubbed off on me.
GM: In stories like “Not Everyone is Special” and “Blake Bishop Believes in True Love” you create vibrant characters we love to root for—like Cameron, the divorced dad struggling to discover his Power, and Blake, the believer of true love who finds his own form of courage. Do you ever find yourself empathizing with any of your characters?
JD: I relate to and empathize with all my characters. During the process of putting them on paper and letting them move around and get comfortable, we form a pretty tight bond. We trust each other. I let my characters say almost anything they want, and they let me make life really difficult for them. And if all goes well, we'll share a few laughs too.
Plot-wise, I start from scratch and fully imagine situations. But emotion-wise, that hits a little closer to home. To empathize with a person, you have to be willing to look at yourself. I learn a lot about myself and dig into my own emotional depths when I go on a journey with my characters. My main goal is for the characters to feel real. I want their reactions and coping mechanisms to be relatable. I think a big part of that realness is humor; it has the power to carry us through our toughest times. And I have found that it enhances the emotional resonance of the story as well. You feel the heavy parts more if you are invested in the characters, whether or not they are on the right path. A lot of the tension is actually there because, more often than not, they are not on the right path, and may never be. And, of course, that can be funny too.
GM: You often tackle complex and painful issues in your short stories. From being a child of divorce in “Proximity” to the contemplation of suicide in “Mousetrap,” you manage to find a way to inject grounded humor. Was there a particular topic that you found it hard to put a comedic spin on? Have you tried writing in this comedically dark way about moments that happened in your own life?
JD: If I can't put a comedic spin on something, that would mean I haven't discovered the root of the pain yet. I'd have to keep digging. The only bits of my own life that ever really come into a story are usually snippets of dialogue. They might come from conversations I've had, but for the most part, they come from stuff I overhear. I just love listening to people talk. So far, no topic has been off limits. But as a father, there are some things I wouldn't want to experience in my own life.
GM: Comedy writing has been said to be one of the more complicated genres due to its subjective nature. It’s hard to be purposefully humorous. How do you handle this as you are writing? Are you considered someone who is naturally funny in your own life?
JD: I think the best person to ask would be my wife! But in my secret heart, I hope people think I'm funny in real life too. If I ever get to a point where I feel like I'm forcing the humor or I'm struggling to find humor, I put that piece aside and come back. But, I do let the story tell me what it needs, and sometimes, it doesn't need any more humor at all. One notable example in my collection is “Crossing Guard,” which I struggled with for a long time before I realized it wasn't trying to be funny.
JD: If I can't put a comedic spin on something, that would mean I haven't discovered the root of the pain yet. I'd have to keep digging. The only bits of my own life that ever really come into a story are usually snippets of dialogue. They might come from conversations I've had, but for the most part, they come from stuff I overhear. I just love listening to people talk. So far, no topic has been off limits. But as a father, there are some things I wouldn't want to experience in my own life.
GM: Comedy writing has been said to be one of the more complicated genres due to its subjective nature. It’s hard to be purposefully humorous. How do you handle this as you are writing? Are you considered someone who is naturally funny in your own life?
JD: I think the best person to ask would be my wife! But in my secret heart, I hope people think I'm funny in real life too. If I ever get to a point where I feel like I'm forcing the humor or I'm struggling to find humor, I put that piece aside and come back. But, I do let the story tell me what it needs, and sometimes, it doesn't need any more humor at all. One notable example in my collection is “Crossing Guard,” which I struggled with for a long time before I realized it wasn't trying to be funny.
"As for writing, if I try to be funny, it never comes out funny. As I mentioned before, it all comes down to that trust I form with my characters. I give them room to talk and make mistakes, and usually the humor comes out naturally."
GM: You also have a large collection of short stories that have been published online, such as “Where The Magic Is” and “Bingo.” We must ask, why zombies, water sprites, and unicorns? Have mythological creatures played a role in your own outlets of escapism?
JD: Each story features a couple breaking up or coming apart in some way, and in real life, that can feel surreal. Break-ups are really hard because they change your reality. Something that you thought you understood suddenly twists into a new shape. A break-up then becomes a cautionary tale. A myth you tell others. The creatures in this series illuminate the strangeness of the tale, but in a twist, they're typically the only characters that have a grasp on the reality of the situation.
With that being said, it’s funny, but the mythological creatures haven't played much of a role in my life or as outlets of escapism. And that lack of knowledge was really handy when writing this new series of stories, which I hope to publish as a collection one day under the title Magic Can’t Save Us. I only have a cursory idea of what these mythological creatures are all about from popular culture, so I can shape them however I want. But that's why everyone knows these creatures, right? People have been using them to serve their needs for generations.
GM: Speaking of escapism, we know you’re also a musician. Your band, Borrisokane, was actually described as “synth punk gloom wonders.” Does music play a role in your writing process?
JD: The most important role that music plays in my writing is that I find it difficult to write without it. I have tons of writing playlists I've created and some days I will spend a good portion of my allotted writing time trying to find the perfect music. And as a drummer, rhythm is really important to me too. I can't really talk about writing in an academic way, so I focus mostly on the feel and movement of a piece. The flow is what I call it. Most of my rewriting is just getting the flow right. In that regard, it is like working on a song; making the notes line up in the most pleasing way possible.
GM: In “My Particular Tumor,” your character has a likable childlike tone throughout. He uses newly learned vocabulary and explains them to the audience—kind of how children do when they first learn something. What was your intent in writing him this way?
JD: Each story features a couple breaking up or coming apart in some way, and in real life, that can feel surreal. Break-ups are really hard because they change your reality. Something that you thought you understood suddenly twists into a new shape. A break-up then becomes a cautionary tale. A myth you tell others. The creatures in this series illuminate the strangeness of the tale, but in a twist, they're typically the only characters that have a grasp on the reality of the situation.
With that being said, it’s funny, but the mythological creatures haven't played much of a role in my life or as outlets of escapism. And that lack of knowledge was really handy when writing this new series of stories, which I hope to publish as a collection one day under the title Magic Can’t Save Us. I only have a cursory idea of what these mythological creatures are all about from popular culture, so I can shape them however I want. But that's why everyone knows these creatures, right? People have been using them to serve their needs for generations.
GM: Speaking of escapism, we know you’re also a musician. Your band, Borrisokane, was actually described as “synth punk gloom wonders.” Does music play a role in your writing process?
JD: The most important role that music plays in my writing is that I find it difficult to write without it. I have tons of writing playlists I've created and some days I will spend a good portion of my allotted writing time trying to find the perfect music. And as a drummer, rhythm is really important to me too. I can't really talk about writing in an academic way, so I focus mostly on the feel and movement of a piece. The flow is what I call it. Most of my rewriting is just getting the flow right. In that regard, it is like working on a song; making the notes line up in the most pleasing way possible.
GM: In “My Particular Tumor,” your character has a likable childlike tone throughout. He uses newly learned vocabulary and explains them to the audience—kind of how children do when they first learn something. What was your intent in writing him this way?
"Learning is definitely associated with the young, but we can all be better at it. By broadening his vocabulary, he's finding new ways to think about himself and the world around him. Personally, I think it's my saddest story, for what it's worth!" |
JD: I never thought of him as a child necessarily, but that's interesting. I think in life, people get set in their ways and refuse to budge. I view myself as someone who will admit mistakes and make changes to stay on course. My main goal in “My Particular Tumor,” in reference to the character, was to show him as someone that had made a lot of mistakes and then realized it might be time to focus on himself. Learning is definitely associated with the young, but we can all be better at it. By broadening his vocabulary, he's finding new ways to think about himself and the world around him. Personally, I think it's my saddest story, for what it's worth!
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GM: Your use of dialogue and tone are particularly interesting because of their quiet and casual nature. By getting rid of the conventional format, we feel far more connected to the speaker, as if they were telling the story to us. What was your intention when writing this kind of dialogue? Do you often find yourself playing around with conventional expectations?
JD: I don't really talk or think about stories in an academic way. I know what I like, but I can't always explain why. I don't go into my stories expecting to break any conventions at all. The way it usually goes is that I'm told later that I broke a convention, so I'll go on record now as saying it's all accidental. It might sound trite, but I just go where the story goes. I love dialogue, and maybe one convention I break is letting the characters talk a lot more than usual. It's probably why I'm sometimes told that my stories feel cinematic. Perhaps readers can really get behind my characters because they feel as if they have had a conversation with them. Just like in real life, you don't really get a sense of someone until you've met them. My job is to introduce you to the characters. And if I break a few rules, I'm cool with it.
GM: Finally, in your title piece “Not Everyone Is Special” you have created a world of people who have unusual and often mundane superpowers. We’d love to know—what would your superpower be?
JD: I wish I could slow the world down around me.
JD: I don't really talk or think about stories in an academic way. I know what I like, but I can't always explain why. I don't go into my stories expecting to break any conventions at all. The way it usually goes is that I'm told later that I broke a convention, so I'll go on record now as saying it's all accidental. It might sound trite, but I just go where the story goes. I love dialogue, and maybe one convention I break is letting the characters talk a lot more than usual. It's probably why I'm sometimes told that my stories feel cinematic. Perhaps readers can really get behind my characters because they feel as if they have had a conversation with them. Just like in real life, you don't really get a sense of someone until you've met them. My job is to introduce you to the characters. And if I break a few rules, I'm cool with it.
GM: Finally, in your title piece “Not Everyone Is Special” you have created a world of people who have unusual and often mundane superpowers. We’d love to know—what would your superpower be?
JD: I wish I could slow the world down around me.
"Perhaps readers can really get behind my characters because they feel as if they have had a conversation with them. Just like in real life, you don't really get a sense of someone until you've met them. My job is to introduce you to the characters. And if I break a few rules, I'm cool with it."
Read Fiction Editor Chris Comparri's review of Not Everyone is Special
Follow Denslow on Twitter: @joshdenslow
Find out more about Denslow on his website: http://www.joshdenslow.com
Follow Denslow on Twitter: @joshdenslow
Find out more about Denslow on his website: http://www.joshdenslow.com
