Lily Hoang is the author of Unfinished, The Evolutionary Revolution, Changing (recipient of a 2009 PEN Beyond Margins Award), and Parabola (winner of the 2006 Chiasmus Press Un-Doing the Novel Contest). With Blake Butler, she co-edited the anthology 30 Under 30. She serves as Fiction Editor at Puerto Del Sol, Associate Editor at Starcherone Books, and Editor at Tarpaulin Sky. She teaches in the MFA program at New Mexico State University. She chatted with us about her books and editing the new anthology 30 Under 30, reviewed in our last book list.
Tell me about Evolutionary Revolution. When did you write it? Who did you publish with?
Lily: I wrote it during the summer of 2006, right after I finished grad school. I’d written two manuscripts during my MFA, both of which contained a lot of autobiographical fragments. So I wanted to write something completely fictional. Hence: The Evolutionary Revolution
Did you go into it Walter Moseley style (“this year I write my novel”)?
Lily: ER is a book of fantasy. Told in micro-chapters, it is a story about history and a desire for greatness and the malleability of memory. But it’s all told through these impossible characters: two headed boys, girls with wings that sprout out of their thighs, etc. Not really (re: Walter Mosley). But since graduating, I’ve written a novel every summer. Oh, ER is published with Les Figues Press.
Why did you focus on memory and history?
Lily: Both history and memory are corrupting. I believe that from memory and history comes power, power which may or may not be misused.
When a novelist explores memory and history, does the novelist wield power?
Lily: Sure! Of course! It is my power. It is my whim. It is my desire. You, as the reader, must follow, or, close the fucking book.
Is that power what makes writing fiction so attractive to you?
Lily: That’s a great question. I’ve been thinking about why I started writing (or, what makes writing attractive to me), and I think it goes back to my childhood. I was never big on writing, but I loved to gossip. I loved the power that comes with gossip, which, of course, is a form of storytelling. In fact, gossip probably comes closer to oral narratives than the contemporary novel. Which is to say: yes, I am power-hungry. That is why I write fiction.
The opposite side to saying that the writer has all this power is that their power disappears once the reader picks up the books – suddenly the reader begins ‘living in the text’ and interpreting or understanding in ways that are totally different from what the writer intended… sometimes radically or fundamentally different. To use an awkward musical reference: the band Minor Threat wrote the song ‘Guilty of Being White’ and then against their intentions found out the song was popular with neo-Nazis. That is a stretch…
Lily: Is that the song that goes says something about how it’s hard being male, middle-class, and white?
No, that’s Ben Folds!
Lily: My partner is a huge Ian Mackaye fan.
Isn’t everyone?
Lily: Fuck. You’re right. My partner just corrected me. Damn. I thought I was cool for a minute there.
How have you changed as a fiction writer since writing your first novel? With sports or playing Go or something, one can feel changes in approach, one can feel ‘getting better’. Is that possible with writing?
Lily: Oh, wow! A lot has changed! My first two books: I worked really hard to show how intelligent and “experimental” I could be. Now, I don’t work so hard.
Is your ‘novel every summer’ a conscious plan?
Lily: It didn’t start out that way, but then I wrote a novel two summers in a row. Then, I started to worry that I had to write a novel every summer and if I stopped, I would arbitrarily stop writing too. It is out of fear that I continue to write a novel every summer.
So the motivations for writing are fear and power?
Lily: More fear than power. The power is a nice side-effect. I’m not conscious of the power. I’m conscious of the fear. Back to your question about “getting better” in relation to Go or sports: I wouldn’t say I’ve become a “better writer”. I’ve read more books. I’ve lived more. And mostly, I don’t feel a constant need to impress you – universal you – anymore. Of course, we all like to be liked. So, there’s that.
In light of this power (however great or small), do novelists face an ethical imperative that is different from anyone else? Or is this ethical imperative, if it exists at all, unrelated to power?
Lily: Yes, I believe novelists/writers should adhere to an ethics, but I don’t believe many of them actually do. As writers, we occupy a position of privilege. My books have a politic to them, a conscious politic. I’m not so sure other writers are conscious of their politic, even though by writing and publishing, they (often unwittingly) manifest them.
You and Blake Butler co-edited the upcoming anthology 30 Under 30. Is this a direct response to the New Yorker’s ’20 Under 40′ series? Is the anthology going to be ‘HTML Giant: The Book’?
Lily: Yes, 30 under 30 was a direct response to 20 under 40, but an older list. It was by good fortune that the New Yorker published a new list. No, it’s not an HTML Giant book.
Tell me about your favorite writers featured in it and what it was like to curate an exhibition of your peers.
Lily: It was an incredible experience. Well, first, I’ll tell you how it started.
We want the whole story!
Lily: As I told you, I write in the summers. As summer was rolling around one year, I didn’t have an idea, so I thought I’d edit an anthology. This was before I wrote for HTML Giant, before I wrote for anyone, really. I’d just started editing at Starcherone. Anyways, I thought: how clever would it be if I edited an anthology of 30 under 30? I like young people. They don’t get published enough. So I found Blake on chat and asked if he thought it was a good idea. And then I asked if he wanted to co-edit. And then I asked Starcherone if they’d be interested. They were.
Had you ever met Blake at this point?
Lily: Nope. Blake published one of my eBooks. It was the fastest turnaround time ever. Maybe 15 minutes. For Lamination Colony.
The realities of book creation in our time…
Lily: It is though! Just today, I was chatting with Molly Gaudry and we figured out the plot to our collaborative novel. On chat!
Who were the first writers you thought of when you decided to do the anthology?
Lily: Back then, this must’ve been 2007 or 2008, I didn’t know many young writers. Blake did most of the soliciting. We came up with a list. Maybe ten? Then, we put out an open call. We didn’t take a lot of the things we solicited. Honestly, I can’t even remember who we asked. I really wanted unknown names.
Is it all unpublished work?
Lily: Unpublished when submitted. Since then, most of it has been published elsewhere, which is fine. It’s going to be an incredible anthology.
Do you have any other exciting editing projects coming up? Or new work of your own?
Lily: Well, I edit with Starcherone and Tarpaulin Sky. And I’m going to be guest editing the next issue of Fairy Tale Review. (This is your scoop! It hasn’t been announced yet!). I have a book that just came out, UNFINISHED.. I asked 20 of my favorite writers to send me their trash, stories they can’t or won’t ever finish for whatever reason. I finished them. Published by Jaded Ibis Press
That’s a great idea for a book! Were any of the stories unsalvageable?
Lily: No, no story is ultimately unsalvageable, especially when you get fresh eyes on it. But there were stories that didn’t make it into the book, which is a shame. I ended up cutting stories only because I’m a sucker for patterns. My first book had 21 chapters. So does UNFINISHED.
I think that would be a great literary journal. Pairing writers and having them finish each others unfinished stories.
Lily: I thought about doing an UNFINISHED, Vol.2, but it’s a lot of work And I love writing novels. This is funny, but UNFINISHED actually started because of Blake too. He told me had a novel that he couldn’t finish. Jokingly, I said I’d finish it for him. Obviously, that never happened, but it inspired this.
Is Blake Butler your internet muse?
Lily: Haha. Blake Butler is everyone’s internet muse.
Okay, last question – unless you want to add anything else – what are your favorite small press books of the last couple years?
Lily: I am completely obsessed with Abdelfattah Kilito’s THE CLASH OF IMAGES. I’ve been consistently impressed with every book Action Books has published. Most recently, I’ve been blown away by Raul Zurita’s SONG FOR HIS DISAPPEARED LOVE. Of course, I adore: Dalkey Archive Press, Mud Luscious Press, Coffee House, Dorothy, etc. I could go on. Dzanc.
Thanks Lily!
