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Writing and poetry: Harry Calhoun in Conversation
By Trina Allen
Harry Calhoun’s picture could appear beside the dictionary definition for “journeyman.”
Living proof that not all writers have to be famous or stick to one type of writing
to be successful, Calhoun has found frequent editorial favor as a poet since
1980 and was a widely published freelance article and literary essay writer in
the 80s and 90s. In addition, he has edited a poetry magazine and a trade
magazine for the housing industry and placed fiction pieces and poetry in
magazines such as Thunder Sandwich and The
Islander. He has been an award-winning marketing writer for multinational
companies such as GE and IBM for the past twenty years. Here he is interviewed by Trina Allen in his home in
Trina Allen: Your poetry has gotten you the most
recognition in publications. To what do
you attribute your success?
Harry Calhoun: Absolutely no doubt, three words —
three words, short attention span!
That’s why I like my job now.
Marketing writing is a lot like poetry.
It’s frequently very short. It’s
trying to express something in the fewest amounts of words and say it with the
kind of spin that sticks with the person who’s reading it. It certainly isn’t poetry, but it’s the same
mentality, just trying to say things really quickly and crisply. People think that poetry is flowery language
or something that goes on and on, but usually it’s quite the opposite, it’s
succinct and quick... trying to nail it in as few words as possible.
Allen: Was there a writer or poet that you
admired and hoped to emulate in your early writing career?
Calhoun:
Actually, there were several.
When you asked the question I immediately thought of three or four
writers: Dylan Thomas, the Welsh poet, and W. S. Merwin,
an American poet who I really admired. I
definitely was influenced in my poetry by both.
I also thought about Ernest Hemingway because I really like the
conciseness and crispness of his writing — I definitely tried to emulate him
for a while
And then I finally realized there
was one writer that influenced my style more than any other: Harlan Ellison,
best known as a science fiction and fantasy writer. Besides writing entertaining stories, he
would do these really interesting introductions to his stories, and they were
always written so conversationally— this really drew you into them. A lot of times today, even as a marketing writer,
people say that my style is breezy and conversational, and I think I owe a lot
of that style to Harlan Ellison because I was deliberately trying to copy his
style. I liked the way it sounded and
what he was doing.
And Charles Bukowski,
the German poet and fiction writer who adopted LA as his home, definitely
influenced me. I started out reading him
in the 70s and quickly became a fan of his gritty, no-nonsense style, his humor
and his accessibility. In the 80s, I got his contact information from a fellow
fan and began a correspondence with him that lasted from 1983 until just before
his death in 1994. I published his work
in Pig in a Poke, a little poetry magazine that I edited for
most of the 80s and even put out a small pamphlet of his work. He was an inspiration because he was a
well-known writer who still kept in touch with his small-press roots.
Allen: Most of your success has come from
poetry and marketing writing so it’s interesting that you chose a science
fiction writer to emulate.
Calhoun: Yeah ... I read a lot of science
fiction for awhile. A
lot of the science fiction writers like Robert Silverberg, Harlan
Ellison and of course Ray Bradbury are great writers, period, as well as being
great fantasy or science fiction writers. In fact Ray Bradbury is another one
that is definitely had an influence on me.
Allen: Do you still admire Harlan Ellison?
Calhoun: Yes, I still feel a lot of debt to him
because even in my marketing writing I can still say that the way I write is
because I really liked his style and made a conscious effort to emulate
it. Harlan Ellison, for people who
haven’t read him, is still writing today; his heyday was in the mid 70’s. He was pretty much his day’s Stephen
King. People would dis
him because they thought he was just a hack... but he was really a good writer
to me.
Allen: Your background was originally
history. Science fiction can be seen as
a historical account of the future. What
is your take on the historical fiction and science fiction connection? Do you think that your history background
helped you in your nonfiction writing?
Calhoun: Well, I definitely am more of a
science fiction fan than historical fiction fan. But, that’s just a matter of what I happened
to gravitate toward. I think as a child
my mother read a lot of science fiction.
That’s where I started picking it up.
Actually, it’s one of the few good things my mother did for me. I have to give her credit for that.
As far as (my history background) helping
me to write, it really probably hasn’t helped me in my nonfiction writing at
all — or with my fiction writing.
I really got my degree in history
because I found out comparatively late in life... that I wanted to write. And here I was... twenty-eight years old and
still trying to graduate from college.
The quickest way out was to graduate with my history degree. It wasn’t that I really wanted to be a
history major. Ironically, history is
one of my worst categories in trivial pursuit.
Allen: You started a critically acclaimed
magazine in the 80s called Pig in a Poke,
which you published from 1982 to 1989.
What gave you the idea for the magazine and why did you stop production?
Calhoun: It’s interesting. I still see online references occasionally to
Pig in a Poke and other magazines
from around that time. Some of them,
like Thunder Sandwich and Black Bear Review, are still going right now. What gave me the idea for it? At that time I had only been published as a
poet for a couple years. I was working
as a book reviewer, and when I say working I mean I was being paid in copies of
the books I reviewed. I wasn’t making
any money. I was working another job and
trying to find my success as a writer.
There were a lot of small-press
poetry magazines at that time. I really
liked the way their editors did business.
They were usually really fast in replying. They gave advice. They were more conversational in their
letters. It was a kind approach and I
really liked it because as every writer knows those rejection slips can be
impersonal and pretty tough to handle. I
thought I would be good at editing a magazine and I also thought it would
expose me to a lot more poetry, which it did, most of it really bad
poetry. Definitely I got to know a lot
of poets in the scene.
I published Pig in a Poke out of my own pocket for a number of years, which is
why basically I stopped production because it got to be too much of a drain on
my finances. But also its time had
passed with me. I started to work in marketing
and get real-world jobs. I didn’t have
as much time for it as I had before. It
makes me think that possibly I could revive it on the Internet because that’s
more of an immediate medium that printing it myself on paper.
Allen: You recently found copies of some
pamphlets from your Pig in a Poke
series on sale on the Internet. Can you tell me about that?
Calhoun: I found it bizarre that now, sixteen, seventeen years after I put the pamphlets out
I’m finding them on sale on the Internet.
These pamphlets were basically free for postage. I would cram as many in an envelope as I
could and send them out to people to give myself and the
poets exposure. Now there’s
selling for fifteen or sixteen dollars each online. I think that’s kind of funny.
Allen: Do you believe such magazines and
chapbooks are a good way to get work published today?
Calhoun: If your goal is to make money,
they’re a terrible idea. But my goal was
not at all to make money. It was to get
my poetry exposure, to get people to read my stuff and respond to it and tell
me how to improve and to connect to it in some emotional way. In that sense, the little magazines are good
because it is a bit easier to get published in them than the mainstream
magazines. Some of them are of
surprisingly high quality, though.
Usually what you get from them is editors that are quick to respond and
respond with a lot more empathy— they actually will give you advice or tell you
what they like or don’t like about your poetry.
And that’s really valuable, especially for a young writer or someone who
hasn’t done it for that long. Plus,
because they are fast to respond and cheap to produce there was the thrill of
getting to see your work fairly quickly.
It is not quite as immediate as the Internet is today, but you could get
a poem accepted and within a few months you could see it in print. And you got to share your thoughts with
others. It was fun.
Allen: I understand that a reviewer once
surprised you with his take on your poem, “The Day after Christmas.” Can you tell me about that?
Calhoun: Oh yea. It was a really funny moment. I had the poem published in a little
magazine, Taurus, where I was
published pretty frequently when I was starting out. The poem was called “The Day after Christmas,” and I wrote it to compare the feeling
of let down you get after Christmas to the loss of a love relationship — we had
something great, like Christmas, and now you’re gone and it’s all mundane
again. The reviewer said that he liked
the poem, which was cool, but he said it was a scathing indictment of the
commercialism of the Christmas season.
He apparently didn’t get the idea that I was trying to tie it into a
love relationship at all. And it
surprised me, but it also showed me that poems and fiction are open to
interpretation. Just because I wrote it
doesn’t mean that he can’t interpret it the way he wants to. His interpretation is as valid as mine.
Allen:
What gave you the least satisfaction, or was the most frustrating early
in your writing career?
Calhoun:
I’m glad I made the decision to go away from fiction. I started out in
the mid 70s writing it. I read tons of
fiction, of course, but fiction was hard for me and continues to be difficult
for me to this day. I guess my biggest
regret is that I never had a major fiction work published. I had a few short stories published, but it’s
not my strong point. That’s the thing I
regret most and like least about my career.
I have to give myself credit for making the decision to let go of this
and do other things.
Allen: You have over 500 publications in
magazines including Writer's Digest,
Private Clubs, Gargoyle, Mississippi Arts & Letters, and The National Enquirer and
have won awards for your promotional materials including an Addy award for best direct mail. What are your feelings about your success?
Calhoun: It’s kind of like looking at your
resume and saying, “Gee, did I do all that stuff.” You realize that somewhere along the line you
did it, but it almost doesn’t seem real.
I feel some remorse for not having done more, particularly in fiction
and poetry, but I also feel that it’s been a good, full career and I’m
basically at peace with it.
Allen: Would you expand on your greatest
success?
Calhoun: Yeah, actually I’ve bounced around
enough that I’ve had some successes in different areas, which is kind of
neat. I can’t really point at any one
great success. Things that come
immediately to mind were in my most fertile poetic period, which was back in
the late 80s when I had a few chapbooks of my poetry published by small
presses. That was really fulfilling for
me. I was also having a lot of my poems
published in magazines around that time and even after that — and I hosted a poetry reading and music
series with my friend Mark Howell in Key West.
That was a really great time in my life … but so is right now, being a
marketing writer, which is obviously totally out of the publication realm. I’m still finding a lot of happiness doing
that because its nice being at this stage in my career where I feel like I’m
fairly good at what I do.
Allen: Is there any one poem that you
consider your most successful piece?
Calhoun:
Yeah, there’s a poem — ironically, a very short one — called “Leaving.” I always look at that as a success because I
feel like it captured the feeling and the moment concisely and with compact
verbiage.
Allen: Would you like to share any
additional thoughts on the topic of writing?
Calhoun: Writing is writing... (It’s) a tactical thing... that takes passion. Some lucky people start out writing
fiction and can do it— for them the linear path is best. Personally my career has been organic, which
is a good way of saying I’ve been all over the place. I certainly didn’t start out thinking I’d be
writing marketing copy and nobody could have told me I’d enjoy it as much as I
do. I got my first marketing position
because I’d written a lot of freelance articles and parlayed that into
marketing. I wanted to find work in a
more metropolitan area and the owner of a small ad agency in
I’ve had to change gears a lot. I’ve had to say, what are my goals now? Do I want to make some money? How can I make
some money? Do I want to get
published? How can I do that? As much of an emotional thing as writing is,
it’s also a tactical thing. I found
opportunities to parlay one type of writing into another or into the next step
in my career.
I can’t subscribe to the idea that
you’re a sellout if you don’t write fiction or poetry... Writing is just writing. If you’re accomplished at it and you’re good
enough to get paid for it then there’s a certain amount of satisfaction to
that, even if it’s a nine-to-five job like my marketing writing. It’s less bohemian than I though I’d ever be,
having lived for a long time in a classic third-floor “writer’s garret” attic
apartment. But whatever I do, if I don’t
have passion about it then I don’t think I’d want to do it.
Five simple rules for writing
success
Allen: What advice would you give novice
writers regarding a career in writing?
Calhoun: The first prerequisite is to have talent. You have no control over
that. But beyond that, there are several things within your control. Here’s my top five
list for writers, in reverse order David Letterman style:
5. Read voraciously, especially in
the genres you’re most interested in. One thing that amazed me as a poetry editor is that people
who didn’t read poetry would send me poems. It’s like trying to walk before
your legs develop.
4. Remember that it’s all writing. Whether you’re writing a novel or an
e-mail or a poem, it’s all writing and it all helps. Plus, if you’re like me
and a lot of writers I’ve known, the very act of writing feels good — no matter
what kind of writing it is. Writing this
response to your interview question feels good, for example!
3. Work, work, work.
Don’t let anything get in the way of your writing. Make it your job,
even if you’re already working another job to support yourself.
2. Have goals — but don’t be afraid
to change them. Not
everyone’s career is like mine, and some people start out wanting to write
fiction and end up doing just that. But if you find other genres that you’re
good at, don’t be afraid to change your goals. The corollary to this is: Don’t have preconceived notions about
where your writing will take you. I started out trying to write fiction,
took a detour into poetry and then magazine editing and ended up as a marketing
writer. My goal was always to be a successful writer — but the form that
success took changed several times during my career.
1. And my number
one rule for writers: Want it more than you want anything else in the
world. Passion is everything. I’d recommend Ray Bradbury’s Zen and the
Art of Writing for advice about writing for love rather than money. I honestly think that any success I’ve had is
because I wanted to earn the title of writer — wanted to do it for a living —
more than anything. I wanted it more passionately than anyone else I knew.
You’ll notice that I left off two of
the usual tips for writers: Keeping a journal and setting a daily time or page
limit for your writing. That’s because neither one was particularly effective
for me. I think that if I had stuck with
fiction I would find a journal more useful, but as a nonfiction writer and poet
it just got in the way of my “real” writing ... it was more efficient to get my
job done than to bother with a journal.
As for setting a goal to write for
an hour a day or one page a day, I find that having an assignment is more of a
motivator than an artificially set limit.
Don’t have any freelance assignments? Make them up! In my poetry heyday,
I would often set myself the task of completing x number of poems so that I
would be able to submit them to a given magazine. No daily time limit, just the
“assignment” to have the submission ready in a week or two weeks.
Leaving
By Harry Calhoun
It's like a door closing.
I want it to be gentle, noiseless,
Japanese. Reopen it and apologize
to the wood if it slams.
But humidity swells this
beyond what it should be
and the squeak and push
to close it sounds
as if I beg
to be let back in.
Trina Allen's bio:
Trina Allen has an MS Degree in
children’s literature and fourteen years teaching experience in the public
schools of
Her most recent activities include
working on the board of directors of the Carolina
Wren Press and upcoming Editor-In-Chief of The Writer’s Hood Online Magazine.
Her publications include the UNC
Mathematics & Science Education Network Research Journal and Dana
Literary Society Online Magazine.