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Well, I first gothe to the U when I worked for Daily, and the Daily’s publishing process was like any professional newspaper. You were to find articles, and you wrote them and then copy editors went over them and corrected them and cut them. At the Ivory Tower, I mean, It was collaborative so, I guess we up would come with ideas, and, write the pices, or a write piece on spec and then turn it in, and whoever was the editor would decide whether to publish it, and work with you on it, and kinda refine it. I When started woring for the Ivory Tower Garrison Keillor was the editor, and Garrison was a great editor. Particularly, he was the first person Itook ever met who quite
Well, when I fo fir U I worked and the Daily ing process w professional You were to w fi and you wrote copy editors and corrected them. At the Iv mean, It was co so, I guess we with ideas, an pices, or write spec and then and whoever w tor would dec publish it, you on it, and k When I started the Ivory Tow Keillor was t Garrison was Particularly first person Ia took quite ser editing, and every phrase an and look at t of the piece and it work. Um, been time-inte mean, frankly, the Daily whe lished every day which was publi month, heh heh, I’m sure ther line but I thi had enough ma the magazine, magazine thin timedependent paper, so you di report on t the day somet So I don’t fra time hassles. Though inset those days, the magazine was prin shop inmachines, downtown Minneapolis and actually set in what a notype they thethere’d pages in type, and if illustration they had toif make a cut, andlead we’d go down th when they were printing and be final proofreadin change a line of type we found something wrong, so there was a day that quite busy and, you know, stayi that kind thing. Well, your’e right describe The youawareness know, it’s notlive awas book tries toto up with pr gestions onof how to your life, it’s acome book that trie our about what thethat territory like. And t behind the book is that there really islooks a disconnect bet life and a market economy. And you know, they can work t lot of it is disconnected. And just understanding that i lot of creative people who feel kind of aconfuse why move ahead. And I tend not to besides have practical advic theto truth. I mean atpeople the end ofotherwise the booktwo I to have littl typical things that live simp give yourself to your You can get different j not putting pressure onwork. yourdo…umm, writing, if you’re a writer
WHATEVER WE HAVE BEEN GIVEN IS TO BE GIVEN AWAY AGAIN, NOT KEPT.
,ll eW o rg owts Irfi U D hptesh d’t nyal pl gsnai i w s pwe sf wuo eor nYp r a d nfi o y d a meon ha t e voocyp tdnnc ew a.m me eh ht ta T,n ya re ovI l,om c gba Il d l u oows hdtniaw i,p e h etn io rt w tpasn, en hi t n w r e v e ro et di id ce et d lob p wu duno a n o d.ntiikoy Wa etg rn ai ts f oy srio rv rI aG w r o l oost ii rd re aG t a e r rhag P ac wit te svrefi mpkr e o o t s nu ido ti ir doe es ysrleu vnew e d l de nh aa ethsd tna fot t i , em kU am w a nIt is -tu eum mbit l k n a rf r wufpyg lsn iai awD y r e v e e ht o tw w h c i dt en ho sm ih l h o y , h eh r dIus atum sb’ aI w whlgauoenwe oa tga lm a i z htenhitziw od nne ere ed w e s woe npa ou ttyenvo ash h o uotsalysaid et n’ epo pd ah e reny lt h us oo hm Ti e h t a mpeh tw i nor idrpnsia a e n n i M cia tdensa c e r a y sht eto nn ii hel cs eldtnn fa i ai n a s a ooittadratw h a otdh,gt oiu gnc h t n e h ir te nh it rpw e ld aa ne fir n i c oewd el nfu iio lc e,mgons o raw dtunq aoms sa aw w i o y , d iayaettsanla fo d n i k , l l e tr hc gs iW r bbi t f i G ont k n uoy a t to ahct u ciite tsm ceo arp truwooyg h s ’ t i ntiahott
-THE GIFT
works, artistic works which are purely exploratory, purely aesthetic, turn out to have a market value, and that’s wonderful for the artist involved. Somebody like E.L. Doctorow, who is a wonderful author, wrote for many years without significant income from his writing, and then he had a few books that began to sell well. My argument is not opposed to that at all—that’s great. But it’s also fairly rare, and most beginning artists should really be able to think about how they’re going to do their work if it doesn’t happen to intersect with the current moment of people’s interests. IT: How vast is the distinction between the state of the American artist to those living elsewhere in other countries? LH: Well, there’s a lot to say. One thing to say is, when this country was founded, it was deeply anti-aristocratic, and the founders thought of art as belonging to the Catholic church and the aristocracy. And so they de-coupled public life from art because they were opposed to the aristocracy and to a church that had that kind of power. And it took a long time in this country for the very idea of public engagement with art to arrive, and you don’t even get something as simple as the National Endowment for the Arts until 1965, so that’s almost 200 years until after the founding. In Europe, what happened was a long tradition of patronage by the aristocracy, and when the aristocracy gets replaced by representative government, the sense that there should be
patronage is not lost, it’s not severed. So European countries like Holland and England and France have always supported the arts way more than we’ve ever done in this country. And I think the difference is historical. In this country we had a real break, and we had to reinvent what it meant to be patrons in a democracy, whereas in Europe, there wasn’t such a break, and it was easier to make the transition.
LH: Well, we are famously an individualist nation. We love individual freedom and private property. But it does sort of raise the question of, when you create something, how much of it is really your creation, and how much of it is dependent upon your world and the community you were raised in, and so forth. A simple example would be the Ivory Tower. I IT: This is interesting because we’ve been looking at differmean, when I was a student in the 1960s, the work ent things that you’ve said about your new book [described on I did would not have happened if this group of Hyde’s website as an exploration of our “cultural commons, friends had not been there to always be in converthat vast store of unowned ideas, inventions, and works of sation with me and have models of what could be art we have inherited from the past]. In respect to your study done, and there were older poets to whom you could of American individualism, will you describe a little bit more look to see, maybe that’s how I want to live, maybe I how you pose the distinction between selfhood and want to live in a different way. So I was always in the collectivity? community. s ’ y l i a D e h t d n a , y l i a D e h t r o f d e k r o w I U e h t o t o g t s r fi I n e h w , l l e W oe tht erreewvouotYne.wrespraoptsiwdeen ylpaoncoi rp yna ekiolrwsauwoyssdencaor,pseg i h i bn ufi p m ns es he tfo d ln cr ir ts rc ald sh at w tt Iir,wna,edmnaI ,,sraeewdoiT hytriowvIpu e h t tn Aa.mmeehhtt ettus csedunga Ime,hots d e tc do nc a e c e v te a r oo b a Another example is Henry David Thoreau. s a wue r e ve o h w dknraow,ndinati,tniruhtsinlee hm to dondtalurcoeewhptseewhnwo edcieciepd adl eu to iw ri wr rt oi ,e sl el ch it p n o o y h t i w b u p e o d e d inf e r a , i e adt nik In hs W . t i Thoreau is famously an American individual. He tkrnraeot -h w d n i e e t r o f g ro ewi or T n THE PARTS THAT EMBARRASSe--,y lrrrhiooaev tKtGI goes off to be alone at Walden Pond and he writes s awsr oe l d is nd r a n to areoi rt g . YOU THE MOST ARE USUALLYs---a- rrirasaadaawlPewG his books. But if you look at all closely at Thoreau’s - u c,iyl t e eh hr e p t n o s ohtwitueq m THE MOST INTERESTINGrtke-esionvrreoiie ftIls life you see that the community that he lived in was e y o -l ts iu de d a k ono l POETICALLY, ARE USUALLY THEydvd,elgrnunotwieaa e -s na reh p s , k eochnoe t l e t MOST NAKED OF ALL,dtee crneui aatp essential to his work. There were essentially discusctu r t s e dhk n fo a e . klra om w l e w THE RAWEST,,-ottntemnyertUibii sion groups and a thing called the Lyceum, which a m -t ens meu it t I t u b -n knm arf THE GOOFIEST,,e,ym nlvoyaiirea slmDf was a form of town self-education. The people in his g e rie h oc t e w s e hashi l w d , eywao T d THE STRANGEST AND MOST-e-tyhhrcbbteiuuvhotepwpi family were the philanthropists at the college, and he r s e has i l w d , hht neo h m , ECCENTRIC AND AT THE SAMEhmuye rr e’oee vh heIyt had a scholarship. It’s a long, long list of things that , w oun s k e a r saw e k nnaiwihl l t s y a TIME, MOST REPRESENTATIVE,dIeo-- de aatteaudwbmht enabled Thoreau to be the person he was. So at the h gau oin r e l l lgia m f a d h n a MOST UNIVERSAL…THAT WASeh,- eathngiia twzm end of the day my feeling is that all of us are e e gnn iih t z s t o t n erew
SOMETHING I LEARNED FROM KEROUAC, WHICH WAS THAT SPONTANEOUS WRITING COULD BE EMBARRASSING… THE CURE FOR THAT IS TO
eepke mit an id l te d , r snywee t ’e np da ip d u o on s t e ee har tl so ni o tv ra oh p g e l e h t e rau t e m o s y d - dpe nae p h gniht . t k’nnaor f d I oS r m er yl -e sb mae h e h T . smeil t s n gsuoohh i e t , sy ad e h t a g a m e nai w z s tnir p t na inn podM hes nt ir pod a wn o -e ca i st in lw ou pt a n i tdc ensaera y l l da em lla ta ai hl w ep y y e h t ,t st eo nn ie hs c s e g a p e h t ,r ee ph yt t dfaiel dn na i e -e sh ut lli n a sr at w y n o i t a a’eewkamdnaot ,t du ac h d er ho tfeb nwod thgi on g e en ra ew yeghntitn ni er hp w d lagnnfii deabe d ’feoroerhp t , r dn li ul oc a egn ya eh hc t e en wihftiemoespydtnuo ff o g er ce nh ot oshtn ,o gm nora w e ts au hb t yeatdiuqa s sa aw w y ,t wa ol nk puuogyniy ,a dt ns a e dl nl ie kW . tg an hi tht df no a , oh tT thgir er ’c rs ue od y e e b i ,’ st ai k,owoobnk tu fo iy G s t a h t ko o b a tr ot n e m o c o t s e i -n io ti ct as re pgg hu ts iw la pc u s e’ vt ii l ,oetfiwlohruo ny o s tn ai ht otkoob a s e i r r u o ee sr aa ew rt c t u o b a s s e n i r r e t eht y tr ao ha w s k o o l ee hb t ae dd ni A el .p em ki it l kr oe oh bt et ha tht dns is h e aeb si yo lc ls ai ei r t c e n n er va im tae rc ne ef ei wd t a d n a .w yo mn ok noce tn el k , u o y d kro w n a c yg eo hA t a t u b , r e h t e sid e ttcie nf oo c stiot l . n -a rh et dnu t s u j dt nd A t g n i d n a a ottaeprlcehfoa to ss i e v i ln ei ek f oh w er le ph ot el p d e s i w do esufwnoohc tuob fo o r evomdnA ot .dae yh ha w I oa tcitc ta or np e dv na ea t l lh lt eu trt ot e,hetciu vo dh a . ea hh tt tsagni nh at em lay I ipyt eht fo tsil elttil a evah I koob eht fo dne t os terfplegsnriutotyupevtic g e yr l’ lu ao ey r odsnasby l pt mn ie sreefvfiild ootwtse disea bc ,umomYu….okdroe lr pu oo ey p jr yl kl ce uW l .yhlaleaYer]sehro ’n etto rn ’i uoy fi t,eggnin rw ruoy nuow rn ua s , uueaowLy[,en.boeyicatimann,sr’ aih twu,da tiveig ataie yed l a u d i v i d ne ihteveoslg d. niotdrneagpnoyirlvpsiuleotm fkaemrannaeacw m oos ,r mf u n o i t s e u q so sht ecs oui dmla twiohi tu, Bg ee e r c rh ut oydnyalldaleirraorwsifroutot iyrof nsy iihtteimofso ehtcauaemvricwropuhodyd naeho wd ,t fa o m o c e n o p u t n e d n e p e d n , n o i e ht e b d l u ow,se’l0p6m9a1xeehetlpnmiistnAed.uhttsroafossawdnIa nneihwde,sniaaerm eI re. wre uw oo ytyy tr io nv uI m I k r o w e h t neeb ton dah sdneirf fo puorg siht fi deneppah evah ton dluow did
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WRITE THINGS DOWN WHICH YOU WILL NOT PUBLISH AND WHICH YOU WON’T SHOW PEOPLE.
WRITE SECRETLY…SO
YOU CAN ACTUALLY BE FREE TO SAY ANYTHING YOU WANT…YOU REALLY HAVE TO
MAKE A RESOLUTION JUST TO
WRITE FOR YOURSELF…IN
THE SENSE OF
NOT WRITING TO IMPRESS YOURSELF,BUT JUST
WRITING WHAT YOUR SELF IS SAYING. -Allen Ginsberg