ECC: You're known as a poet with a commanding stage presence. Did you refine your performance skills in poetry slams? Or are you naturally extroverted? When you're drafting a poem do you keep in mind performance?
BC:I think I am naturally extroverteda, not necessarily a character trait that I’m proud of. I have never been on a slam team; in fact, I was only part of one reading that was officially called a “slam.” It was many years ago at the Green Mill in Chicago. Marc Smith was holding a sonnet slam that night. I didn’t know this when I decided to go to the Green Mill that night, but I just happened to have a sonnet with me, so I decided to read it. Before I knew what was happening, I had won that slam and about $20. But I never slammed again. I have, of course, practiced my performance skills over the years by doing many different kinds of poetry readings in a variety of settings, as well as during the years that I worked with Sonido Ink (quieto), which was a fairly raucous Chicano/a garage rock band. Yet no matter how many performances I do, I still get nervous every time!
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Click on the "interviews" link to read interview. Tip of the hat to Francisco Aragon for asking me to do the interview.
About Me
- Eduardo C. Corral
- Eduardo C. Corral is a CantoMundo fellow. He holds degrees from ASU and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Beloit Poetry Journal, jubilat, New England Review, Ploughshares, Poetry, and Post Road. His work has been honored with a "Discovery"/The Nation award and residencies from The MacDowell Colony and Yaddo. He has served as the Olive B. O'Connor Fellow in Creative Writing at Colgate University and as the Philip Roth Resident in Creative Writing at Bucknell University. He's the interview editor for Boxcar Poetry Review. He won the 2011 Yale Series of Younger Poets competition.
2 comments:
I'll check it out! Thanks.
I'm looking forward to reading this...
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