The Seventh Week clarion west writers workshop • fall 2012 INTERVIEW JT Stewart Tracks Upon the Sweet Flypaper of Life BY NISI SHAWL ’92 Vonda N. McIntyre Deep cuts could have resulted in three nice, The Basic Idea, as Compared neat historical summaries of CW’s creation. to What Actually Happened: But the lighter approach we’ve used instead An Introduction has the advantage of demonstrating the twisty, interactive nature of our organiza- Author Vonda N. tion’s collaborative roots. So here’s more or less McIntyre has won how the exchange of messages went. Marilyn J. Holt both the Nebula and Hugo Awards for August 23 August 24 her fiction, poet JT NS: Vonda, JT, Marilyn, we’re VNM: The message to Marilyn Stewart has a liter- going to publish a sort of bounced. If you can reach her, ary award named round-robin group interview please ask her to go to the website Nisi Shawl after her, and writer featuring you three in the Clarion West and apply to join the list serve. and educator Marilyn J. Holt currently runs newsletter. This is meant to be a discus- an organic farm. All three were involved in sion rather than just me asking questions JTS: Please identify Pearl the Clarion West Writers Workshop’s earliest and just one of you answering. Vonda set for me. I thought this group days, so in anticipation of our upcoming 30th up this list serve so that by replying to one consisted of four people: Nisi, Anniversary Year, I wanted to get them talk- message we’re replying to all, thus making Vonda, Marilyn, JTS. Yet we’ve gotten ing about those times. I asked Vonda, the most it possible for us to see and bounce off of several emails from Pearl. Please explain.... technically-minded of the group, to set up each others’ responses. an email listserv so that we could discuss the VNM: Pearl is Nisi—that just I’m hoping we’ll come to a good stop- topic easily with one another. I came up with happens to be her gmail account ping point 9/11. I’ll then have about a a question to get the conversational ball roll- handle—so she can be subscribed week to edit the discussion for publication. ing, sent it out, and waited for the newsletter with a gmail address and log onto the group With interviews we usually have a 100- article to write itself. web page in her clever plastic gmail disguise. word introduction to the interviewee, and Pioneers are hard to manage, though. They I can take care of that. But I’d like to kick instigate things quite well, but it’s a mistake JTS: OK—that mystery solved! us off with this question: to try to herd them. Ditto original thinkers. Now for another one: have you And poets? Poets will respond to things an You were all three of you involved in ever seen a letter Chip Delany interviewer never realizes she’s said, in ways Clarion West’s coming into existence in wrote—back in the day—about starting that reveal truth’s numberless dimensions. different ways. Will you each talk a bit CW....He mentioned it during a chat dur- about how you were attracted to the idea, ing his last time here. I told him I couldn’t And then these responses need to be edited. what you thought you were doing, and recall ever having seen it.... what you actually did? THE SEVENTH WEEK |SPRING 2012 | PAGE 1 VNM: I don’t remember it, but NS: Typically you would not State College in Clarion, Pennsylvania. if Chip says he wrote it then I have a chance to respond to the Robin, Kate, and Damon were instructors completely believe that he wrote intro, JT, as I write it after—long at all three workshops. Other writers who it. Did he say who he sent it to? (If it’s me after—the interview. taught there included Harlan Ellison™, I’ll be embarrassed that I don’t remember Do not consider word length in your Joanna Russ, James Sallis, Fritz Leiber, it, but I’ll keep an eye out for it.) answers. Just say something. and Samuel R. Delany. Robin’s assistant Respond to the question as soon as you was Glenn Cook. August 25 can. Today would be nice. That may spark I was a student in the 1970 workshop responses from Vonda and/or Marilyn, and in Clarion. My classmates included NS: Marilyn, I sent my first ques- will give me ideas for further qs. Remem- Octavia E. Butler, David Skal, George tion for the round-robin discus- ber, this is a conversation. Alec Effinger, and Robert Thurston. The sion you’ve said you want to be workshop was a peak experience of my part of. This is the discussion that will appear VNM: Sorry, can’t do it today. career and a turning point in my life. in the Clarion West newsletter, celebrating I’m completely beat. The Inter- When Robin told us that he would your early involvement with CW. lake Blockwatch spent the day be moving and changing academic I asked you via Facebook about your repainting our intersection turtle Bubbles. institutions, and that he wouldn’t be preferred email address for this project and If I can move and type tomorrow I’ll do running the workshop anymore, I got this one. I haven’t heard back from you my best. couldn’t bear that it would disappear. since then. I have no other way to reach I got his permission to try to start a you. Please respond so we can get this branch of it in Seattle. James Sallis did thing going. the same on the East Coast, at Tulane University. MJH: I received an email from Clarion West, in Seattle, at the Vonda, but the link to Google University of Washington, ran in 1971, Groups didn’t send me to our 1972, and 1973. Students included JT group. Do I need an invitation to join? NS: That turtle was getting a bit Stewart, F.M. Busby, Glenn Chang, John What is the precise Google Group name? faded. Thanks, Vonda. Maybe Shirley, Lisa Tuttle, David Wise, Russell Please send me the information again. we’ll hear from you or someone L. Bates, and Steve Miller. Instructors else Monday. VNM: Marilyn, your group included Ursula K. Le Guin, Robert invitation is in the mail. I’m giv- Silverberg, Harlan Ellison™, Joanna Russ, ing you a heads-up on it because August 27 Avram Davidson, David G. Hartwell, sometimes group-type email goes straight JTS: “My memory stammers/ George Clayton Johnson, James Sallis, into the junk mail box. You might want but my soul is witness.”— Terry Carr, and Samuel R. Delany. to add it to your list of approved email Denise Levertov After three years I was rather burned out. I spent a while living four addresses. Having a real tough time answering these miles down a logging road, writing I hope your summer is going well and genesis questions. What I wrote yester- Dreamsnake. the vegetables are prospering. day—just in getting started—truly lacks When JT and Marilyn told me that substance. Oy Vez! I realize this CW story MJH: Thank you for your pa- they were going to revive the workshop, = a collective one that belongs to all of us. tience. I am now on this group. I told them I knew a good shrink they Have Mercy! And the beat goes on.... could talk to. They persevered and the NS: JT, it’s not meant to be workshop has been going strong since August 26 hard. Lacking substance is not 1984, in part thanks to the board of an issue. What would you say if directors and the fact that it’s a nonprofit NS: We’re all here! My earlier I asked you that question on the phone? organization now. attempt at a kick-off is repeated Write what you would say. If you would below now that all can read and say something like, “I’m not sure I can do respond. Just reply to this email and every- August 28 that question justice,” write that. thing will be taken care of with coolness. JTS: Vonda—my question deals Thank you, Vonda, for persistence, and VNM: Robin Scott Wilson with the start date: 1984? Do thank you, Marilyn and JT for the same! attended Damon Knight & you mean 1983....I’ll have to (Repeat of four paragraphs sent on August 23.) Kate Wilhelm’s Milford Writers rely on what Marilyn has to say abt our Workshop in the mid-1960s. Milford was conversations w/you. JTS: Yes—indeed—great jump- a peer workshop—only active, published ing off q’s! VNM: I remember the first year SFF writers were invited. Robin realized it Now for my q’s: Suggested of the second incarnation as 1984, could be adapted as a student workshop. word length? Deadline? Also—will we but if it wasn’t and my memory The ClarionW riters Workshop ran for have a chance to respond to our 100 word is wrong, I wouldn’t be that surprised. three years—1968, 1969, 1970—at Clarion intros somewhere down the line.... PAGE 2 | THE SEVENTH WEEK | FALL 2012 MJH: I’ve not had time to answer August 29 [Sidebar #2] this week. I will look at the JTS: “Just the facts, Ma’am.” — question and answer in the next Sgt. Joe Friday, Dragnet CW ’83 cofounders: JTS/Marilyn J.