Ask the Author: Adriano Bulla
Answered Questions (9)
Adriano Bulla
'Queer Poems' came about a bit by chance. I need to go back to poetry every now and then; to start with, because poetry requires very intense and extremely original use of language, it's the best training ground for any other form of writing, but it's also a bit like going back home for me.
The first poems were inspired by paintings, for example 'Shadow Whisper' and Kamille Freske's monotype. Originally, I wanted to write a series of poems all inspired by paintings with a very talented young poetess, Annie Hayter, but she's very busy at the moment, so, we'll do it later.
One day, Robert Dunbar asked me what I was doing with my time, and told him I was pottering with poetry, and started reading his novel, Willy, at the same time. As I was reading his novel, the idea of symmetrical realities came to me, and the pottering started becoming more like gardening with a design...
The first poems were inspired by paintings, for example 'Shadow Whisper' and Kamille Freske's monotype. Originally, I wanted to write a series of poems all inspired by paintings with a very talented young poetess, Annie Hayter, but she's very busy at the moment, so, we'll do it later.
One day, Robert Dunbar asked me what I was doing with my time, and told him I was pottering with poetry, and started reading his novel, Willy, at the same time. As I was reading his novel, the idea of symmetrical realities came to me, and the pottering started becoming more like gardening with a design...
Adriano Bulla
Hello, thanks for the question. I read the same comment too. Interesting, isn't it, how tagging can hide books from readers... The Road to London was called 'out' when she was voted Book of the Month on Modern Good Reads; I hadn't thought about it before, but I am grateful to Kenneth Fore for no I acting her and all the readers who voted and then discussed the novel at such length.
I had not thought about it before that, but readers who I would call not-necessarily-concerned-with-LGBT-issues started reading her and they got the ball rolling. I am also grateful, on this, to Roger Hardy, who, in his literary blog, said that the novel 'is as gay as the Bible is to Jews', meaning that she has a gay protagonist but is not just interesting to gay readers.
Most of the novels I read are straight; thinking about it from a gay man's point of view, we grow up reading 'straight' novels at school. I don't find the sexuality of the protagonists an impediment, or an obstacle to enjoying the novel. Humans can empathise, and that means share emotions with people in a different situation from their own. I also believe that the great majority of readers don't care if a character is straight or LGBT. Why should they? Most of Human experience has universal qualities, and Literature needs, in my opinion, to present an idiosyncratic story but discuss universal themes: the search for happiness, love and freedom, self-discovery, soul-searching, the struggle to be an individual in a society where peer pressure and group mentality are rife, all themes in the novel, are universal.
I am not finding it hard to discuss with 'the two groups' as you call them. I have noticed quite a few reviews don't even mention the Boy's sexuality. Most people are just open minded; I've found that this is true in real life too: if you just present your sexuality as a 'fact of life', rather than an ideological and political issue, most people just accept you for who you are and don't make an issue of it. I think that is true of The Road to London.
What I found difficult was how to talk about the novel on Twitter, where hashtags and branding are the essence of small messages... I ended up writing 'with LGBT theme, if it matters'... More as a little 'warning' than a tag... And to ask readers if it really mattered to them when they read a book if the characters are LGBT or not. We need to move towards real integration, and that only happens if the word LGBT is not charged with exclusive (meaning excluding) connotations, but taken inclusively. Do I read texts about women? Of course, and quite a few of my favourite novels are about women, so, the problem is artificially constructed by a twisted and I believe a bit morbid market, rather than a real one...
I had not thought about it before that, but readers who I would call not-necessarily-concerned-with-LGBT-issues started reading her and they got the ball rolling. I am also grateful, on this, to Roger Hardy, who, in his literary blog, said that the novel 'is as gay as the Bible is to Jews', meaning that she has a gay protagonist but is not just interesting to gay readers.
Most of the novels I read are straight; thinking about it from a gay man's point of view, we grow up reading 'straight' novels at school. I don't find the sexuality of the protagonists an impediment, or an obstacle to enjoying the novel. Humans can empathise, and that means share emotions with people in a different situation from their own. I also believe that the great majority of readers don't care if a character is straight or LGBT. Why should they? Most of Human experience has universal qualities, and Literature needs, in my opinion, to present an idiosyncratic story but discuss universal themes: the search for happiness, love and freedom, self-discovery, soul-searching, the struggle to be an individual in a society where peer pressure and group mentality are rife, all themes in the novel, are universal.
I am not finding it hard to discuss with 'the two groups' as you call them. I have noticed quite a few reviews don't even mention the Boy's sexuality. Most people are just open minded; I've found that this is true in real life too: if you just present your sexuality as a 'fact of life', rather than an ideological and political issue, most people just accept you for who you are and don't make an issue of it. I think that is true of The Road to London.
What I found difficult was how to talk about the novel on Twitter, where hashtags and branding are the essence of small messages... I ended up writing 'with LGBT theme, if it matters'... More as a little 'warning' than a tag... And to ask readers if it really mattered to them when they read a book if the characters are LGBT or not. We need to move towards real integration, and that only happens if the word LGBT is not charged with exclusive (meaning excluding) connotations, but taken inclusively. Do I read texts about women? Of course, and quite a few of my favourite novels are about women, so, the problem is artificially constructed by a twisted and I believe a bit morbid market, rather than a real one...
Adriano Bulla
Hello Sheila. Yes, it's been a very long time since we last chatted online. Were you down in Brighton? I need to get the video of that recital... You could have introduced yourself though... Instead you must have put a bug on me... I am planning a live performance, but it's not scheduled yet. I can tell it may be called 'Dreams of London' and there will be performances from The Road to London, Queer Poems and Ybo'.
Thanks for asking. I hope all is well with your busy life.
Thanks for asking. I hope all is well with your busy life.
Adriano Bulla
I'm working with other writers, I'm collecting and collating poems, short stories and scripts for an anthology whose copyrights will all go to Water.org, a charity that provides clean water to people who, in a world that calls itself civilised, still don't have access to it. I think it will be called 'Words for Water'.
Adriano Bulla
Thanks, Jeremy,
What a difficult question... Let's say that I am by nature a poet. This said, although the two forms of Art are different, I feel there is osmosis between poetry and prose.
My style...thanks again, first. I don't know if there is a 'secret'. I think it's mainly a matter of open-mindedness not just when it comes to themes, but style as well, and my experience as a poet has influenced my style as a novelist as well.
When you write poetry (and I know mine is pretty extreme in terms of style), you tend to go slowly; the sound, the imagery, even the smell of every word and combination of words is so important that even a comma can make a huge difference (in fact, one of my flickers is in two versions, the difference being just a comma), and I think I've applied what I learnt by writing very intense shorter texts, poems, to my prose, even if, of course, in prose you may want to be more explicit, less hermetic, more accessible. There's also, I think, the idea of never refraining: if a swear word is needed, I never thought twice about using it; if a complex metaphor is needed, the same applies. Here, the word 'needed' is maybe the core of the style of The Road to London... There are many principles one applies when writing a text, but two basic principles of The Road to London are that for a word to be there, there had to be a necessity; more a process of boiling down the stock to the juices than diluting it to increase the word count (very counter productive, in financial terms, trust me). The second principle was accessibility and enjoyability: I knew I would write a novel that came, oddly enough, and I say this because in many ways they are opposites, was at risk of becoming very complex, so, the idea was to keep its simplicity, for the sake of readability, and add meanings, references etc by layering them into the words rather than by inserting them within the written text. The two principles balance each other out, I feel, producing a main story which one can read just by following the words, and then producing a 'second-take-effect' where readers can choose (but don't have to) read The Road to London at different levels.
As to the 'drive', again, it comes from poetry, and the trick is simple: rhythm. Rhythm is at the heart of poetry: there is no poetry without music. The Road to London was mainly not exactly written, but 'orchestrated' a bit like an opera, where the rhythm of each passage is a priority of the composition, not a random consequence.
What a difficult question... Let's say that I am by nature a poet. This said, although the two forms of Art are different, I feel there is osmosis between poetry and prose.
My style...thanks again, first. I don't know if there is a 'secret'. I think it's mainly a matter of open-mindedness not just when it comes to themes, but style as well, and my experience as a poet has influenced my style as a novelist as well.
When you write poetry (and I know mine is pretty extreme in terms of style), you tend to go slowly; the sound, the imagery, even the smell of every word and combination of words is so important that even a comma can make a huge difference (in fact, one of my flickers is in two versions, the difference being just a comma), and I think I've applied what I learnt by writing very intense shorter texts, poems, to my prose, even if, of course, in prose you may want to be more explicit, less hermetic, more accessible. There's also, I think, the idea of never refraining: if a swear word is needed, I never thought twice about using it; if a complex metaphor is needed, the same applies. Here, the word 'needed' is maybe the core of the style of The Road to London... There are many principles one applies when writing a text, but two basic principles of The Road to London are that for a word to be there, there had to be a necessity; more a process of boiling down the stock to the juices than diluting it to increase the word count (very counter productive, in financial terms, trust me). The second principle was accessibility and enjoyability: I knew I would write a novel that came, oddly enough, and I say this because in many ways they are opposites, was at risk of becoming very complex, so, the idea was to keep its simplicity, for the sake of readability, and add meanings, references etc by layering them into the words rather than by inserting them within the written text. The two principles balance each other out, I feel, producing a main story which one can read just by following the words, and then producing a 'second-take-effect' where readers can choose (but don't have to) read The Road to London at different levels.
As to the 'drive', again, it comes from poetry, and the trick is simple: rhythm. Rhythm is at the heart of poetry: there is no poetry without music. The Road to London was mainly not exactly written, but 'orchestrated' a bit like an opera, where the rhythm of each passage is a priority of the composition, not a random consequence.
Adriano Bulla
The best thing is seeing your children grow, become independent, and fly the nest...other people call them their books, but I swear they are like children for me, and I believe from many other writers. Maybe because I will never have a child of my own (and no child deserves such a deranged parent as myself, so, it all adds up), or maybe because writing is a creative process, I very much feel like writing a poem, a story, a novel (I haven't tried a play yet) is a bit like giving birth...from conception, the moment you feel the spark of life cross your heart and shine like a new, independent thought or emotion inside of you, to the painful (and never one hundred percent certain of success) and long period of gestation, when you feed your child inside of you, knowing it is growing, feeding off your experience, your skills, but also your love, to the moment it takes it's first breath, that is possibly the most incredible part of the life of a writer...
Adriano Bulla
Write from your heart. It's true, writing is a craft, and the heart is not enough to write, but put your skills, your craftsmanship, your experience to the service of what your heart tells you to do. Don't worry about pleasing 'target readers' (I loathe the term anyway: readers are not targets), that's a load of rubbish, no one is the same, and if we really were a set of boxes with tags on them, I'm quite sure I would indignantly complain to the Demiurge... The pleasure you'll get in finding other hearts who beat alongside yours is the deepest reward you can ever hope for, even if it means risking not 'pleasing' whatever is in those ridiculously artificial boxes that marketing has so ungallantly imposed upon the world, and it is a universe of infinite dimensions, of Literature. Be courageous, and it takes courage to write something original. Especially nowadays, when, apologies, I have to say this, so many write to 'please the market', Literature, yes, a living entity, with a soul of her own, if I may dare to speak for her, is crying out, shouting out, tearing her pearly hair for original, creative, innovative, personal, and, yes, truly felt words... Give her a hand, we are in this 'business' for Her, at Her service, and we should never sell Her out to the slave auction that is...you guessed, an artificial market. We are Artists, not salespeople. Let us write because we need to, because we have to, and because we owe it to Literature, culture and Mankind. Ours is a service, not a 'business'.
Adriano Bulla
I don't deal with it at all. In my case, it's just waiting and hoping for inspiration. I never, ever set out with a plan and start to write something from a conscious start point; the inspiration always has to come subconsciously, hit me like a wave that warps perception, and force me to write. I'm not a willing writer... I am compelled to write when I do, otherwise, I lay dormant in wait. It's a state of mine, but it has also become a principle of my writing: I will not force a single phrase out of myself as a 'professional writer'; if words come, I'll be honoured to offer my services, if not, I am not going to write for any other reason apart from that expressive urge that has driven me so far. That is, in no small measure, due to the fact that I am at heart a poet, a craftsman too, but at poet by principle and by nature. Art cannot be motivated by anything apart form Art's sake, by which I mean that it is Art that leads and commands, and I could never, for who I am, use Art to put forward an agenda, a plan, an idea I have per-determined. This said, I do have a vague plan of where I would like to go, but that, for me, is more a prayer to the Muse than a plan... When I am ready to express something through my experience, then that something will want to express itself through me. I cannot see any other way round for myself. It's more a matter of being 'normally blocked' and then 'flushed into creative action against my will' in my case. It's very visceral and primordial, but I'll stick by what I mean as a writer and what I feel I must do. I am a servant of Calliope, not a user of her gifts.
Adriano Bulla
Hello Robert,
I'm 'pottering' at the moment, mainly in the garden of poetry. I've sort of felt the need to go back to my roots as a poet, where I learn a lot about playing with words and senses. If the Muse wishes so, then my experience can be 'recycled' later in prose. I was originally writing a series of poems inspired by paintings, and taking the road shown by Eliot in his 'Preludes', but it's turning out to be a series of queer poems dealing with human rights mainly, and this might as well be the title of the series, if it ever becomes one.
I'm 'pottering' at the moment, mainly in the garden of poetry. I've sort of felt the need to go back to my roots as a poet, where I learn a lot about playing with words and senses. If the Muse wishes so, then my experience can be 'recycled' later in prose. I was originally writing a series of poems inspired by paintings, and taking the road shown by Eliot in his 'Preludes', but it's turning out to be a series of queer poems dealing with human rights mainly, and this might as well be the title of the series, if it ever becomes one.
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