Banango Lit

I interviewed Chad Redden, author of The Lesson of Furniture (The Red Ceilings Press, 2011) and Thursday (Plain Wrap Press, 2012), Mayor of NAP Mag, my new sensei, and all-around good dude. Here’s what he had to say.

Who are you?

Always the hardest question first. Some dude. Get back to me on that question.
 

How long have you been a writer or person who writes or whatever you’re comfortable calling it? What got you started with writing?

I guess the writer title works. I’m working on being a person first. I know a few writers in person, but I’d rather have conversations with them about people things than writer things. People things are much more interesting and have a stronger influence writing than writer things.

I played around with telling stories when I was like 8. It started with Stephen King’s It, and as I started reading more adult books instead of children’s books, I had the idea that I could write 1000 page books too. So I bought a bunch of notepads and calculated how many pages I needed to fill up per day to create my masterpiece. It was hard. I had a haunted house as a setting and a few characters who I had to kill, revive, and kill again just to keep the story going. I think I filled up one of the notepads. By the end of that notepad I began to write with really large letters to fill up the page. After that experience, I’d write a bit here and there, never really finished anything until I was much older and gave up reminding myself of that early failure, which gave me permission to write again.


How’d you start NAP? Did the idea come to you in a dream while you were napping?

I am a big fan of letting the unconscious mind surface during sleep to solve problems. I don’t remember if I read it or what, but Leonardo DaVinci (and maybe Leonardo DiCaprio too) would meditate on a problem before sleeping. When he woke up the next day he found that his sleeping mind had figured out how to build a helicopter and all sorts of death machines.

I’ve applied the method to tons of issues. Everything becomes clearer after waking. “What should I eat tonight?” NAP WAKE “Fuck yeah, curry sounds good!”

One afternoon I meditated on the issue of me writing in a more serious fashion after a year of casually submitting a few places and not taking things very seriously. This is after 10 years of living life and not writing. I really didn’t know where to submit the crap I was casually writing. I wasn’t really reading anything current or interesting. So I took a nap and after I woke I decided to start NAP and figured the best way to learn to do anything was to jump in. I used to make zines long, long ago and I had a few experiences editing undergraduate publications. I really don’t know why I thought it was a good idea. I’m used to failing so I wasn’t worried that NAP might never get a single submission. I didn’t think I’d be where I am at now. I have discovered many very talented people and very talented publications. I’ve maybe made some virtual friends too that one day might turn into real friends. It’s something to do and feel a little useful in the world.

That might not even answer your question. Easy answer: I have dreamed about a small press publishing empire since birth and wanted to name it Panty Hammer, but I found out some Blues/Rock Band already has a Myspace page under that name. NAP was the second name I came up with.

NAP is undergoing a big ol’ expansion in 2012. Can you talk about that?

The focus of the first year of NAP was simply to get started, make some mistakes, and building up my skill level to deliver a magazine on a regular schedule. Year two takes a lot of the things I’ve already tweaked, and added just a couple of things. The final step of course was to develop a website I wouldn’t hate. I wanted a simple and pleasant experience for the reader. The focus of each page should be the work that is on it, not a crap ton of links and distractions. I almost have it where I want, while keeping the functionality of the site. I will keep uploading things to Issuu and smashwords, so people that like that experience, can keep that experience. I put the pdfs up so if people want to print things out on paper, they can do that too. I’m not interested in audio unless it is a part of a much larger project, which of course there will be a much larger project in the future. Oh, yeah, plus now I have a crew (which obviously you know because you are a part of my crew, DS). I figured a one-man show for a year and a half was about all NAP could last before getting stale. So new editors with their eyes and brains and guts will do a lot to add to the quality and reach of NAP. Plus, there are other things. Sort-of payments to writers, phone calls, more print chaps, more echaps. Now, I’ll have help to execute these things. Oh yeah, and I should probably work on my own writing too.

Who is a writer or writers that you’re kind of excited about these days?

Oh jeez, I can’t keep up at the moment. Many exciting things in the NAP pipeline like e-chaps from Will Henderson, Mark Cunningham, and a team-up between Russ Woods & Brett Elizabeth Jenkins. It’s hard to read submissions and the dozens of posts that hit my feeds every day. Serious radar pings from what I’ve seen lately from Adam J Maynard, Janey Smith, Rose Hunter, and James Tadd Adcox. Plus, whoever is on HOUSEFIRE for the day.


If you weren’t NAPing and writing what would you be doing?

Not napping. I work three part-time jobs right now. Sometimes I go to school. I drive around Indy a lot, but never for fun. I do dad stuff too. I like dad stuff. The only thing I regret that I can’t do in life because of my responsibilities to others in my life is to just walk around and sort of be homeless, but not really be homeless. I would probably have some sort of great magic skills that would impress people into letting me sleep on their couch and use their shower. Or maybe that is my retirement plan, what I will do when I make it to 90 or 100, whenever they let people retire in the future.


Can I see anything you’re working on lately?

I’d be a happier person if I could just download what’s in my head. I’m a mess when it comes to writing. And a turtle. Everything is in notes on notepads that I lose so I buy more notepads, but that’s only when I remember to write things down. Most of my writing happens in my head in conversations with myself. I’ll get an idea or image or something and think about it a few days until it gets to a point that I remember I should record it and then by that time I forget what the idea was.

I started this whatever it is for a micro-chap I’m putting in as a bonus for NAP chapbook orders. It’s about the Wright Brothers and their childhood as hybrid mutant sugar gliders. It might not work out. Or I’ll set it aside for a few years before I finish it.

“Once, in a former life long ago, I was a tree. I saw the predecessors to the earliest flying men, known then as the mid-late falling men, fall from my branches.

When their bones snapped as they hit the ground, I LOLed as much as trees could LOL in that time. LOLed some more when their cries for help attracted the large cat carnivores of the age which then ate the mid-late fallen men that fell from my branches.

Trees LOL all the time. Just listen.”


What did you eat for breakfast this morning?

I eat one meal a day. I try not to eat too early, then I have to be awake and hungry the rest of the day. Unless I go to bed early. Today, I had cigarettes for breakfast.


Boxers or briefs? Summer or winter?

Boxers are my speed. I like lots and lots of heat.

Where do you think the world will be in 2031?

The Chelsea Clinton White House will be okay. Not as entertaining as the Kardashian White House. Everyone will have their own clothing line. Coke and Pepsi will finally go to war. A cat that always remains a kitten will finally be invented. Life in the US will be very much like a medium security prison, so everyone starts calling prison “double prison” and that somehow lowers crime. No one wants to go to double prison.


Read The Lesson of Furniture

Read the latest issue of NAP