This week, four writers whom I tagged for The Next Big Thing
have their interviews up: Becca Barniskis at www.beccabarniskis.com; Christin Lore
Weber at http://christinloreweber.blogspot.com/;
Carla Hagen at http://carlahagen.com/blog/ ; and Sharon Chmielarz guest blogging right here on my site. Please give them all
a read!
Guest Blogger
for The Next Big Thing: Sharon Chmielarz
First of all, many thanks to Kath Jesme for tagging me and
also providing me room to post on her blog. If you haven’t gotten a copy
of her Meridian, your
poetry collection is missing a vital book.
Coming soon in June will be my eighth book of poems, and my
whereabouts manages to remain as obscure as ever. But you can find me at www.sharonchmielarz.com
Where did the idea come from for your latest book?
That would be Love
from the Yellowstone Trail (North
Star Press). Its material stems from my childhood (As if childhood were
an unusual source for writers...) I spent my first eighteen years within sight
of the Missouri River seen from our front porch steps in South Dakota.
Thus rose six poems about the river. The Yellowstone Trail is an old name
for stretches of the current Highway 12 (or 394 if you live in the Twin
Cities). Thus rose the book’s title and a way in and out of the book’s
sections, just as the Trail was a way in and out of my hometown. On the
Missouri’s west side lies the Standing Rock Reservation. You drive across
the “Singing Bridge” and when your wheels hit land again you’re on the rez and
in Mountain Standard time. That was always fun for me as a child: gaining
or losing an hour within a couple of minutes. Thus rose nine poems about
the Hunkpapa and other Lakota/ Dakota who live on Standing Rock and in my
hometown. The book’s last section is about houses, anyone’s houses.
(Are you still with me?)
Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
I’ve never had a book represented by an agency so the
Chmielarzbogian will again do the honors for this one...
Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie
rendition?
...but if Love
from the Yellowstone Trail were
made into a movie or stage play, I’d certainly insist on a professional
agency. And I’d want actors of the same race as those in the poems.
Naturally, the men would all be handsome because I’d be on the set as often as
I could and would engage in a bit of flirting. They, of course, would
play along to a certain point, deferring to my age, friendliness, and the fact
that they have a job based on something I wrote.
How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
Poems in Love
from the Yellowstone Trail have
been languishing in a manila folder or magazine back issues for at least seven
years. I’m happy and grateful to have them collected in one book.
