H. L. Hix
Read a Q & A Session with H. L. Hix
EP: What is your writing environment like?
HH: My favorite writing spot is at an old, rough table that belongs to my partner, Kate; it’s in the loft area of what was originally a garage in our house.
Tell us about a poem, story, essay you’ve written that has special meaning to you.
I wrote a sonnet sequence called “Material Implication” that is included in Legible Heavens and in First Fire, Then Birds. There’s a lot going on in the poems, I hope, but mostly — speaking of Kate — they are love poems to her, which is why they have special meaning for me.
Who are some of the authors you like to read?
I like poets who push my understanding of what poetry can be and do, so I’ve been interested in “documentary poetry” lately: books such as C. D. Wright’s recent collections and Mark Nowak’s Shut Up, Shut Down. I’ve gotten interested in “systems theory,” so I’ve been reading a couple of books by Niklas Luhmann. I’ve been interested for a long time in philosophy, and recently that interest has focused on Alain Badiou. Next semester I’m teaching a new course (new for me) in African literature, so I’ve been reading some African novels, such as Buchi Emecheta’s The Joys of Motherhood. I’m not sure there’s any pattern behind that random-sounding assortment.
What things do you like to do to get away from pen and paper?
As I write this, I’m sitting on the couch with Kate, in front of the fire, and with a small glass of scotch in reach. That counts as escape, at some level, even though I guess it does mean I’m writing even now. I’ve just pulled out my guitar again after three or four years of literally not touching it. But I LIKE pen and paper, so the truth of the matter is that there’s not a lot I’d rather be doing than writing. I don’t want more hobbies and pastimes. I wish I were away from pen and paper LESS than I am, not more!
What do you hope readers find in your writing?
Poetry can be a mode of heightening and sharpening attention, and I hope my poetry offers such heightening and sharpening to a few readers. I don’t know how reliably one can extend one’s life (I might eat well and exercise daily, and still be killed in a car wreck), but I do believe that one can reliably intensify one’s life, live one’s life richly. Commercial culture has a stake in our living shallow and empty lives (Nike doesn’t want me to think or be fulfilled, but to purchase Nike products); poetry can resist commercial culture, and I hope my poetry offers such resistance.
Anything else you’d like readers to know?
Just that all are welcome in the poems…
H. L. Hix has published an anthology, Wild and Whirling Words: A Poetic Conversation (2004), and six books of poetry and literary criticism with Etruscan, including Shadows of Houses (2005), Chromatic (2006), God Bless: A Political/Poetic Discourse (2007), Legible Heavens (2008), Incident Light (2009), As Easy As Lying: Essays on Poetry (2002), and First Fire, Then Birds (2010). He has one more book forthcoming from Etruscan, Lines of Inquiry (2011). His seven other books include Spirits Hovering Over the Ashes: Legacies of Postmodern Theory (State University of New York Press, 1995) and translations of Estonian and Lithuanian poetry.
In addition to having been a finalist for the National Book Award for Chromatic, his awards include the T. S. Eliot Prize, the Peregrine Smith Award, and fellowships from the NEA, the Kansas Arts Commission, and the Missouri Arts Council. He earned his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Texas at Austin, taught at Kansas City Art Institute, and was an administrator at The Cleveland Institute of Art, before accepting his current position as professor in the Creative Writing MFA at the University of Wyoming. He has been a visiting professor at the University of Texas at Austin and at Shanghai University.
First Fire, Then Birds (Etruscan, 2010) is listed as one of the “17 Most Important Poetry Books of Fall 2010″ in the Huffington Post.
