Banango Lit

Banango is a literary blog that talks about exciting literature. We like to read stuff. We are also Banango Street, a literary journal. You can email us at banangolit (at) gmail (dot) com if you would like to send us stuff to look at, or you can send a link in our Ask box. We will try to look at it but we have learned to avoid making too many promises.

Also, email us if you feel like you would like to be a contributor for Banango. We would like that also.

Banango Writers

Justin Carter
Rachel Hyman
Diana Salier
Matt Margo
Katey Metcalf
Thom James
Jackson Nieuwland

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Banango Interviews: JDA Winslow

JDA Winslow is a writer from England. He tweets here. He blogs here. Justin recently sent him some questions about writing and other things. They also had some IM conversations. Justin has attempted to edit these things together into a coherent conversation with JDA.

Justin Carter: Your web presence, specifically your twitter presence, seems to be fairly large. How do you keep up with this?

JDA Winslow: I suppose just by tweeting a lot in an overly aggressive manner. I wasn’t aware that it was that large. A lot of the time what I’m tweeting is just youtube comments or things similar to that. I went through a phase of tweeting bits of long pieces of writing that I’d done too. I love the stage. I feel shouty on twitter. I USE CAPS A LOT. Initially I only used caps to tweet in. I still go through phases though. I like how pretend twitter is, it’s like playtime for grown ups.

JC: How much does the twitter ‘you’ differ from the irl ‘you’?

JW: IRL I have a face, other than that I don’t know. I’d say I’m more amusing on twitter but I’m not even sure that I’m amusing on twitter. I tend to talk at people rather than with them. Often when I reach a certain stage of drunkenness I just start talking uncontrollably, like cognitive hyperemesis. I think on twitter I’m maybe doing the same thing. Twitter feels like everyone is quite drunk sometimes, everyones having fun, nothing anyone says is going to be taken seriously, no one is really properly listening to anyone else.

JC: How does the ‘shouting’ in ALL CAPS that you do on twitter factor into your ‘online identity’, like is it ‘vital’ to it?

JW: I’m not sure if it is vital, it’s just something I do I suppose. Initially it was just a mistake, it makes it seem a little bit more deranged I suppose which I liked. I think twitter is shouty though, everyone shouts as loud as they can in the hope people will shout something back. I don’t really know what my online identity is. I realised recently I couldn’t be hugged over twitter. That was a big moment for me. I think I use twitter as a rudimentary form of therapy. I think I probably tweeted that.

JC: Your poem “Dear Bebe Zeva” was a big hit on the #poetrybyemilydickinson site. What are your thoughts on that project, and, also, your thoughts on collaboration in general?

JW: The project is good (as really good, to the point where I don’t really feel like offering a critique on it because I don’t think there is anything to critique). I think with “Dear Bebe Zeva” I was interested to see if people would still read a longer poem, I recently posted a 36000 word story on a new tumblr, tagged it with lit and did nothing else. It sank without a trace, which I think is kind of beautiful (tragedy was dope too, in a lyrical way). Collaboration for me though is basically damage limitation. I am a bad writer. Anyone else being involved can only improve things.

I think PBED is good because it is open, probably.

JC: What is something you are interested in?

JW: I know a lot about sea otters.

JC: Tell us about sea otters.

JW: Scientific Name: Enhydra lutris kenyoni

lives almost entirely in the water.

can live up to 25 years

At birth are 10 inches in length.

As a sea otter ages, their hands and necks will lighten until almost white.

850,000 to 1 million hairs per square inch.

sea otters spend much of their time cleaning and grooming

Sea otters are social animals who

Otters have been known to swim on their stomachs while traveling. Sea otters will only eat while they are floating

It is also common for sea otters to wrap themselves in kelp beds when resting or sleeping.

Sea otters have round heads, small eyes, and visible ears.

They must dive, sometimes up to 250 feet.

Sea otters also use “tools” such as a rock

A sea otter becomes sexually mature at 3 to 6 years.

humans, sharks, bears, eagles (on pups), and killer whales

JC: Do you feel like life would be better or worse if you were a sea otter?

JW: If I was a sea otter I wouldn’t be aware of life as a thing- I’d just be focusing on eating/breeding. I think life would be better because I wouldn’t have to consider how good my life was. As soon as you start considering whether you are enjoying something you stop enjoying it. I suppose it would be a sort of cognitive safety net, I like to think that as an otter life would be simpler. I talk about this in both my novellas (I have another one now). I’m aware that the ability to imagine being an otter is probably better than being an otter.

JC: Speaking of your novella, you were tweeting a lot a few months ago about wanting it published. Why should someone reading this publish it?

JW: I’m not sure that they should. Trying to get things published has ruined writing for me in a lot of ways.

JC: Favorite ‘alt-lit’ writers that are not named JDA Winslow?

JW: I’m not very good at favourites but here are some things I’ve enjoyed reading lately:

http://letpeoplepoems.com/2011/12/04/poem-by-mark-stevenson/

http://letpeoplepoems.com/2011/12/18/drunk-epiphany-by-peterbd/

http://letpeoplepoems.com/2011/12/03/its-not-a-problem-though-by-izzy-w/

http://ourpennilesswrite.tumblr.com/post/10170668813/untitled

http://turnyouinsideout.blogspot.com/2011/12/person-i-was-playing-beerpong-with.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOO8CZVtyfI

This list could go on indefinitely, I feel like for everything I choose I’m not choosing something else. I also feel obliged to choose things by people I talk to on the internet, but at the same time the people I talk to tend to be the people whose work I read. I don’t know. I’m really not good at favourites.

JC: In terms of only reading people that you are friends with, do you think this leads to a writing community that is difficult for outsiders to breach? Does it matter if it does?

JW: I think probably it doesn’t create a community that is difficult for outsiders to breach in that it takes very little to be friends with someone on the internet. If someone tweets me and they seem interesting and I tweet them back and they still seem interesting then I’ll probably look at their writing. I think the whole idea of a writing community existing is maybe only as apparent as we want it to be. I don’t really know how much of a part of the “alt lit” (if we’re calling it that) scene I am, not that I don’t want to be part of it but I just think it’s impossible for me to gauge my own position within it. I think its useful maybe to have this idea of a community or group for people outside the group but maybe not once you’re inside? I’m really not sure.

JC: Why do you write?

JW: I don’t know. Here is a song I wrote instead.

A Musical Interlude (best sung in a bath tub)

I want to be a sea otter

So swim with me

I want to be a sea otter

so come and swim with me

Floating on our backs all day

we’ll feel so free

Wrap me up in kelp

so I’m safe at night

Hold my paw at night