Crystal Gibbins returns to FTRS

Hey! The Final Thursday Reading Series is one week early this month due to Halloween. Mark your calendar for Thursday, October 24 with featured reading Crystal Gibbins. Gibbins is the founding editor of Split Rock Review, author of the poetry collection Now/Here, and co-editor of the recent collection, Waters Deep: A Great Lakes Poetry Anthology. She also writes and illustrates Up North, a comic blog about her travels and life in the Northwoods. She last read at the Final Thursday Reading Series in October 2017.

What was the initial impetus that led to creating Waters Deep: A Great Lakes Poetry Anthology? I understand it is part of a new series?

In 2016, I moved from the North Shore to the South Shore of Lake Superior near Bayfield, WI, a place of great beauty and severe weather, but also a region that shows environmental degradation caused by humans and invasive species. I began having conversations with the Split Rock Review editorial team about creating and publishing an anthology. Since many of us currently live in or are from the Great Lakes Basin, we wanted the anthology to focus on the diversity, culture, history, ecology, and importance of preserving this region.

      In early 2018, I wrote and submitted an Arts Initiative Grant project proposal to the Chequamegon Bay Arts Council (CBAC) to help fund a portion of Waters Deep. Fortunately, CBAC accepted the proposal and we got to work on the anthology project right away since it needed to be completed and published by the end of 2018. It is my hope that Split Rock Press (an imprint of Split Rock Review) will continue to publish volumes of Waters Deep every two to three years. The next call for submissions for the second installment of Waters Deep will be in 2020.

Has the anthology received any notable responses so far? It seems like it could help readers see and value the region they live in in new ways.

I was so thrilled to learn that Waters Deep was nominated for the 2018 Northeastern Minnesota Book Award for poetry and Raymond Byrnes’s lovely poem “Personal Effects” was featured in The Writer’s Almanac this past July. Having the book nominated and the poem reprinted on TWA certainly helped create a larger readership for all the poets in the anthology.

       I also received several thoughtful and positive emails from folks. They really enjoyed the variety of poetry styles and voices from a diverse group of poets living in North America—many of which are new and emerging writers. I think the poets in the anthology provide a deeper appreciation and understanding—environmentally, culturally, historically—of this vast and vital region. I can guarantee that you will be seeing a lot more work from these writers in the near future.

What are you working on these days in your own poetry or other writing? Will you be sharing your own poetry during your Final Thursday reading? I hope so, as I found Now/Here one of the most beautiful collections I’ve read recently, and especially enjoyed hearing it read aloud.

Thank you so much for your incredibly kind words about my first full-length poetry collection! I’m thrilled that you also enjoyed my previous reading in the fall of 2017. Thank you for saying that! I can be extremely introverted at times, so knowing that I connected with the audience really means a lot to me.

       Right now, I’m working on my second poetry collection, Re: Wild, which focuses on environmental issues and concerns. The poems in this new collection are more ecocentric and experimental than the poems in Now/Here. In a way, Re: Wild acts as a reply to and reconciliation with the wilderness. I’ve had a little bit of luck publishing these new poems, such as  “Rescue,” in journals and magazines. I do plan on sharing a few of them at the reading on Thursday night. I’m also working on a comic blog series, Up North, about my travels, musings, and life in the Northwoods. I’ve always loved to draw, paint, and read comics and graphic narratives, so creating pieces for this new comic blog is another outlet for me to tell a story. My hope is to one day publish these comics in book form.

You also do a lot of editing. Are there any other projects are you involved with right now?

Yes, thank you so much for asking! I’m also editing a new environmental poetry anthology titled Rewilding: Poems for the Environment, which will be published by Flexible Press in 2020. The anthology will be approximately 250 pages in length and feature poems that address the current state of the environment in varied, thematic, and innovative ways. What’s really great about this project is that all proceeds from the book will be donated to Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness, a nonprofit environmental organization based in Minnesota. The anthology is coming together nicely. Ted Kooser, Joy Harjo, Camille Dungy, Louise Glück, Sharon Olds, Karen Solie, Fleda Brown, and Ada Limón are just some of the poets that will be included in Rewilding. We have some real star power, but we are still accepting poetry submissions for consideration until December 31st via Submittable.
       We’re also seeking submissions for Issue 14 (Spring 2020) of Split Rock Review and poetry chapbook manuscripts for the Split Rock Poetry Chapbook Series (published under the imprint Split Rock Press) until November 30, so the SRR editorial team and I have been pretty busy reading submissions and getting ready for the next installment of the journal, poetry chapbooks, and the Rewilding anthology. It’s a real exciting time for us!

-- Interview conducted by Anne Myles

Jo Knowles and the Reasons for Writing

Jo Knowles is an award-winning writer of young adult fiction whose novels include Still a Work in Progress, See You at Harry’s, and her most recent book, Where the Heart Is, which was named a 2019 Barnes & Noble Best New Book for Readers and a Top Ten Summer Reading Choice by Horn Book Magazine. Knowles teaches literature and writing at the Mountainview MFA program through Southern New Hampshire University. Her Final Thursday Reading Series appearance on September 26 is made possible by the generosity of Ila Hemm. 

What drives/motivates you to write on the topics you do? And why did you choose to focus on the ages you write for?

Jo Knowles: My writing has always been about shedding light on things kids experience that people often want to avoid talking about, or simply seem to lack the tools or motivation to. As a kid who experienced a lot of similar things, I know how lonely it is to walk through life feeling like you're the only one who certain things have happened to. Books help readers feel less alone. Not only that, they show kids ways to navigate tough times, and give them hope.

Some people (usually adults) argue that students don't need to read about emotionally painful issues-- or that issues like suicide shouldn't receive attention. Or they argue that "older" students can handle them but not middle grade readers. What's your response to that? Basically, why tackle the tough issues with younger readers?

JK: Because tragedies happen to kids of all ages--they don't wait for kids to be old enough to handle them. We can't protect children from experiencing pain, but I do think stories help prepare and guide them. I'd rather my child's first experience with heartache happen in the safety of a book, so that sometime in the future, when they experience their own personal pain, they'll remember how a beloved character handled and survived it. Offering books to kids that deal with painful issues with sensitivity and care can help them find their way through their own personal challenges, as well as help them understand what other people might be going through, which helps them develop empathy and understanding.

Can you share a bit about your writing process for your most recent book? (Or any of your books, really . . .) What led you to want to write it?

JK:Where The Heart Is has been something I wanted to write for a long time but didn't really have the courage. Much of it is about my own life, and my experience losing our home to foreclosure when I was a teenager. It was a painful time, not just for me but for my family. When writing about personal experiences, there are lots of other people and feelings to consider. But as I began to explore the character and her family and story, I realized everything I wanted to share about that time came from a place of love, and that if I stayed true to that, my family would feel it as well.

What are you most hoping readers gain from reading your books?

JK: I think the same thing I got from my favorite books when I was a kid: a greater sense of the world, and what other people go through. A sense that they aren't alone, and that they can survive.

— interview conducted by Sheila Benson