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Critique: What do you write?
Where has your work appeared?
Maney: The French poet Paul Valery said that a poem
is never finished, but abandoned, and with this in mind
I’m trying to reach the right moment of abandonment
with a novel I’ve been working on for years. It’s
called Killing Time and focuses on a woman in her
thirties—a failed academic—who becomes an antiques
dealer, has an affair with a sleazy auctioneer, and is subsequently
framed for his murder. Coincidentally, I’m an academic
and an antiques dealer, but the similarities end there.
I am especially interested in the world of fakes, which
I suppose is not remarkable considering I’m a fiction
writer. But I’ve known a few fakers and makers of “antiques”
whose work has fooled many, including themselves. One such
faker told me that what he makes is “as good as the
real thing” if no one can detect its true age. He really
believes that what he builds from scratch is an antique,
and he goes to amazing lengths to achieve this illusion.
I love and fear such people, because they present such rich
dramatic possibilities. They are what Killing Time
is made of.
My fiction has appeared
in many magazines, including Troika, Western Humanites
Review, American Fiction, Quarterly West,
Confrontation, and The Bridge. I’ve
had articles in the AWP Chronicle and other academic
journals, and I’ve helped edit several anthologies
of fiction, including Sudden Fiction, Sudden Fiction
International, The Best of the West, and most
recently with Tom Hazuka, A Celestial Omnibus: Short
Fiction on Faith.
Critique: Where can
readers obtain your books?
Maney: Sudden Fiction and Sudden Fiction
International have become standard textbooks for creative
writing classes and can be purchased nearly anywhere. A
Celestial Omnibus: Short Fiction on Faith is also selling
well and can be found in most well-stocked bookstores. Amazon.com
carries everything, of course, but I would suggest buying
from bookstores if possible just to give the smaller, independent
retailers a boost. Some of the nicest and most intelligent
people I know have worked in places like Prairie Lights
in Iowa City and The King’s English in Salt Lake City,
where you can order everything I’ve ever worked on.
Critique: Do you have a
website?
Maney: I’m a Luddite at heart. It was not too
long ago that I stopped using fountain pens to write stories
with, and I abandoned them only because they kept leaking
in my shirts and it was getting expensive. The poet Larry
Levis, who I knew at the University of Utah, used to write
only with vintage fountain pens, and I sold him several
of mine. He was a really sweet guy, and a wonderful writer.
He used to carefully examine the pens I brought him, hold
them in his hand to check their balance, and then gently
apply the gold nib to a piece of paper, writing any words
that happened to come out. He would buy the pen or refuse
it, depending on whether there were “poems inside.”
So no, I don’t have a website. But if having one would
make me a better writer, then sign me up.
Critique: What are some
of your other interests?
Maney: I’ve always been interested in just about
everything that no one else cared about. Talk about lonely.
When I was a kid I loved to listen to old people, because
they had lost the fear of being boring. And since everyone’s
favorite subject is themselves, I heard great stories from
grandparents, elderly strangers of all kinds, mentally retarded
people, and other outcasts. The source of so much writing
is loneliness, I think—the desire to connect to others,
to the self , to make sense of so many years and experiences,
to make the self less strange and uncomfortable in the world.
So I guess you could say that listening and being listened
to are my main interests. Combine this with nosiness and
a passion for trying to understand all points of view, and
you can imagine what kind of kid I was: someone who hid
behind doors to hear his parents argue, who loved being
anonymous, who thought he was invisible. Secrets were my
food. Clubs and organizations that require participation
always freaked me out. I love history, old letters, old
houses, old photographs, and old cars. I collect antique
clocks and watches. For me, they are time machines whose
fuel is the imagination.
Critique: Do you write full-time?
Maney: In a sense, yes, because whenever I'm not
writing, I’m thinking about writing. It’s not
the same, of course. How many times have I written something
in my head and failed to write it down? This can be a real
problem. It’s like telling a story you’re working
on to a friend, and in doing so, the tension that created
the story is released. It’s like blowing up a big balloon:
once you let it go and it flies crazily through the air,
there’s not much left. Nobody’s interested in
a flaccid balloon. It’s better to let it go on paper,
where it can fly again and keep flying.
Critique: What do you read
for pleasure?
Maney: Everything. I can’t control myself. I
become desperate if there’s nothing to read. I have
great sympathy for people who read cereal boxes and milk
cartons. This is why grafitti exists. If there was good
reading material in restrooms across the United States,
there would be no grafitti to speak of. Words fill the vacuum.
Words fill the God-sized hole. You know you’re in a
good place if when you use a stranger’s bathroom you
find it filled with books, newspapers, and magazines. I
know some people for whom the bathroom is also the library.
Don’t ask what the connection is. But if you write,
chances are that you will be an omniverous reader of poetry,
fiction, and a lot of non-fiction. People who are afraid
that reading other writers’ work will somehow pollute
or take over their own writing are just talking to themselves,
and their writing will show it. For me, all good writing
gives pleasure. As a writer of fiction, I believe that reading
poetry has strengthened my understanding of what language
can accomplish. I wish that poets felt the same about reading
fiction, but most I’ve known don’t.
Critique: Who are your biggest
influences? Which authors do you avoid?
Maney: There are so many wonderful writers, far too
many to mention. When I was a kid, I loved Bernard Malamud,
Flannery O’Connor, and John Cheever. I loved the Russians:
Turgenev, Tolstoy, Babel, and Chekhov. Especially Chekhov.
I loved Joyce’s Dubliners (I memorized the last
paragraphs of “Araby” and “The Dead”).
I read everything by Tillie Olsen, Grace Paley, Isaac Bashevis
Singer, and J.P. Donleavy. Ralph Ellison and Malcolm X blew
me away. So did Melville. Guy de Maupassant, D.H. Lawrence,
Somerset Maugham, Graham Greene, and Alberto Moravia filled
the gaps. God, was I happy. These were such happy years
that I almost didn’t realize that I was a dopey, blue-collar,
useless, dreamy kid who had no money and no real prospects.
At the University of Iowa in the late 70s I discovered Ray
Carver, James Baldwin, and Richard Yates. A few years later
I met Richard Ford and thought Rock Springs was one
of the best collections of stories I’d ever read. I
bought James Salter’s A Sport and a Past-time
in a used book store and then read everything of his. I
was like a maggot out to devour all of literature. I read
Hemingway, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Porter, and Steinbeck.
I read Hesse, Mann, Kafka, and Calvino. I thought Nathaniel
West’s Miss Lonelyhearts and Day of the Locust
were a hoot. I plowed through Virginia Woolf. I gobbled
up anthologies of all kinds. I read Vonnegut, Borges, Nabokov,
and Solzhenitsyn. What a feast!
The writers I read
now are Allan Gurganus, Ian Jack, John Updike, Andre Dubus,
Anne Lamott, and anyone else who makes my heart beat faster
and puts my mind in a dangerous and exciting place.
I avoid the phonies:
the narcissists, the humorless, leaden, ham-handed careerists,
and all others who kill joy.
Critique: What drove you
to writing?
Maney: It seemed to me that the conversation begun
by the writers above was so vital that I wanted to join
in. I wanted to do my part. I liked editing anthologies,
writing stories, and buying books. I liked the way writing
focused my mind and my life. I enjoyed the warmth of the
banquet hall and the crumbs that dropped from the table.
I wanted somehow to avoid missing the “feast of life”
(Joyce, “A Painful Case”). I liked the party.
I knew I would never work for a corporation or be a member
of a moneyed club. I felt much more comfortable around outcasts
and misfits and jaded observers. Writing creates a daily
opportunity for the discovery of some small particle of
truth that will, I hope, add up to something. If life is
just a dream, then I plan to make it a good one, because
working for others has been mostly a nightmare.
Critique: What person in
your academic career was most important in the development
of your prose?
Maney: In many ways, the writers I’ve mentioned
have been my teachers. I remember when I was a student at
the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, I asked Vance
Bourjaily what I should do to learn how to write. What he
said was so obvious and plain that it struck me as disappointing.
He told me to read. Read everything, he said. The good,
the bad, the middling. Then think about who I liked best,
and write for that writer. Vance was no fool, but I was
there when his former students sent him their novels to
read, and he fed them to the fire in the big fireplace in
his converted schoolhouse on the hill. “Dolce far Niente”
was the carved inscription on the stone mantlepiece: “Sweet
it is to do nothing.” So I guess I’ve had many
teachers in the writers I admired, but I expect nothing
from them. I asked Richard Ford once what he thought of
a teacher who claimed that characters in fiction should
not be thought of as human beings, but as theoretical functions.
This, by the way, was a teacher who had been deeply influenced
by French critical theory. “That’s a fool talking,”
said Ford. And I watched James Salter take a character of
mine out of a story, stand up, and imitate a Russian accent.
Salter became this character and acted out the dialogue.
This was to show me where I’d missed some good dramatic
opportunities. And I saw Helen Yglesias teach with genuine
kindness in workshop after workshop. She was someone who
convinced me that compassion has its own intelligence.
Critique: If you could change
one thing about your past in writing, what would it be?
Maney: I would not waste time at schools where books
are “texts” and writers are irrelevant and talking
about one’s characters as people is called “baby
criticism.”
Critique: What compelled
you to submit your work for the first time?
Maney: Most if not all writers reach a point where
they’re curious about their chances. Sometimes it’s
a teacher who makes the recommendation. Sometimes it’s
a friend. With me, I waited until I thought I was ready
to face the long onslaught of rejections. I waited until
the time when I thought a story was good enough for me to
dismiss the first, second, and third rejection and still
have the faith to send it out again. Or the will to revise.
That’s how it was the first time, and that’s how
it still is. The first time I sent out a story was in 1981;
my first publication was in 1989.
Critique: How do you handle
rejection?
Maney: It used to be that really good editors commented
on rejected stories. Now very few will, or can, take the
time to write anything critical. So if you want useful,
critical commentary, join a workshop. Unless you’ve
been an editor, you have no idea how many manuscripts come
into a magazine every day, and how few good readers there
are to handle such a volume. Most of the “little”
magazines are edited by students or writers who are very
pressed for time. Hardly anybody gets paid. So if I get
a form rejection from an editor, I don’t take it personally.
Written comments from editors are a kind of gold coin. Even
negative comments are good. If someone is taking the time
to write anything to you, then you should continue
sending work to that editor. All attention is good, whether
the comments are positive or negative. The first story I
sent to The New Yorker was terrible, and the editor,
Linda Asher, wrote back to say that the manuscript was cleanly
typed and had nice margins. That’s pretty much the
pits, but I used it to build up to some really helpful rejection
letters from her later on. Unfortunately, Linda left the
job or I’d be sending her work today. She was a great
reader.
Critique: What has been
your proudest moment in publishing?
Maney: Getting anything published is always
a great feeling. It does validate all the effort. I’m
pleased to see the galleys for an article, story, or poem.
But probably the most wonderful moment of all is when you
get the call from someone who says that he or she wants
to publish your book. The closest I’ve come is when
Susan Wurst at Beacon Press in Boston called to say that
the senior editors had agreed to move on a proposal Tom
Hazuka and I had submitted for an anthology. The pay seemed
substantial and we were thrilled to be given the chance
to put out an anthology of fiction with our names on the
cover. Tom and I had worked together in the past, but we
were only associate or assistant editors. This time the
book was ours. The second best moment is when you receive
the book itself and can see for the first time what all
the work looks like. For me, this was a very good moment,
because I didn’t see anything that displeased me.
Critique: What do you do
when you can’t write another word?
Maney: All writers have to deal with this. It’s
as simple as this: writing happens when you sit in a chair
and start typing. Gibberish is fine so long as you keep
the irrigation ditches open. Sooner or later it rains. I
believe in forcing myself to sit down and type whether I’m
tired, hungry, despondent, or out of my head. Something
always comes out, even if it’s pure crap. Then something
better comes along, sooner or later (sometimes days or weeks
later), but the fingers and mind are being exercised, and
that’s important. I certainly do know that if I stop
writing, it takes a long and often fruitless time before
anything good comes out again. So if I can shorten the wait
by going through the motions, then that’s obviously
better. Writing is work—often very hard work, and there’s
no way around it. Whenever you hear of someone who sits
down and writes a whole story that’s good the first
time, then it’s either a lie, or the writer thought
about that story for a long time and wrote it in his or
her head before committing it to paper. Or it may be that
the person wrote every day, keeping the irrigation ditches
of their imaginations open, and it rained a torrent. I find
that reading high-quality work can also stimulate the imagination—so
long as I continue to sit down and write.
Critique: How do you get
and record ideas?
Maney: Everyone knows: write it down. Whatever occurs
to you as being interesting—dreams, random bits of
juicy overheard conversation, dialogue that you write in
your head, a nice description—all should be written
down immediately. Like dreams, conversation fades quickly.
I always keep a pad of paper around. I used to carry a notebook,
but the little ones always fall apart quickly. While driving
I’ll sometimes get an idea and write it down on my
hand. A small pad of paper can be attached to the dashboard,
but I’ve actually had it fall off and get in the way
of the accelerator and brake pedals. So when I don’t
want to forget something, I pull over to save at least three
important things: my life, the lives of others on the road,
and the life of that good idea.
Critique: What have been
your best/worst experiences in publishing?
Maney: The best experiences have to do with getting
published: working with smart editors, participating in
the community of writers, being part of the world of art
and ideas. That said, sometimes the worst experiences also
have to do with being published. Sometimes editors sit on
manuscripts and take a long time to produce their magazines.
Sometimes screwy mistakes are made by the printer. Occasionally
someone will congratulate you on having a story accepted,
and that’s the last you hear from that person or magazine.
This has happened to me twice. But probably the most frustrating
experience I’ve had is when I’ve sent work to
magazines, never to hear from them again. Nothing, despite
the S.A.S.E. The worst way to treat any writer is to pretend
he or she doesn’t exist, and whether this is a so-called
“friend” who never comments on a story you’ve
shared, or a magazine that doesn’t bother to return
your manusript with a rejection slip, the result is painful
and frustrating. Obviously, if your follow-up note after
a reasonable amount of time (six months to a year) fails
to get an explanation, then don’t send that magazine
anything again. I’ve had the silent treatment a few
times from e-text and hard text magazines. The good news
is that even if you circulate your work a lot, this will
happen only rarely. And if it does, it won’t matter
because there are other magazines where your stories still
have a chance.
Critique: What do you think
of e-publishing? Where is it headed? What, if anything,
can be changed or improved?
Maney: E-publishing offers a number of advantages to
both writers and editors. First, it avoids the hassles and
expenses of commercial printers and the postal service,
where costs are high and rising. Second, an editor with
computer training can format the entire magazine and see
it whole. E-mailing galley proofs to contributors is also
simple and fast. Financing web space has to be cheaper than
producing, publishing, and distributing a hard-text magazine.
There is, however, some prejudice against e-publishing,
and this usually comes from people who complain that they
want something to hold in their hands and put on the shelf.
Of course, e-magazines can be downloaded and printed, but
these people hold that this isn’t the same thing. They
want a bound magazine.
To me, as a writer,
e-publishing is much more convenient than traditional publishing.
I save money, because I don’t have to deal with postage
or an SASE. Editors often respond much more quickly than
do their counterparts at traditional magazines. Lastly,
correcting galleys is much more convenient. I think that
the more authors submit their work to e-magazines, the more
obvious it will be to everyone that this is a wonderful
way to publish. Even to Luddites like me. 
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