(Sic) Vice & Verse:
Juliette Torrez Goes Long Distance with Sherman Alexie
Dateline: 8/31/99
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Juliette Torrez, whose PoNewsLetter (Poetry Channel & Information Network) was distributed via About.com Poetry, led off the Summer 99 issue with an interview with National PoBout Champeen Sherman Alexie. Reprinted here with perms. Hie thee to (sic), send 'em poems, bouquets of pesos. You can pick up the mag wherever you find it (in Southern California), or send to:
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Juliette Torrez Goes Long Distance with Sherman Alexie
JT: I wanted to pick up the thread where we left off when I saw you last. We were talking about the attack that Basketball Diaries has been coming under as a result of the rash of high school shootings. I know how significant that book is to you. Are you feeling any danger as a writer?
SA: Feeling the danger as a human being, not just as a writer. The fact is, all this fascist crap is going to come up now out of this. I’m hoping people will forget all this. The way Americans have such short attention spans, I’m hoping that they’re going to forget all this crap that’s going on. Maybe they could ban guns and control guns, maybe they’re going to control art in the same way. It’s funny: for the first time in my life I identify with the NRA. There’s an argument for it. I don’t agree with it, but I understand the argument. I have more empathy now for the argument. The idea that they’re blaming guns for this. It’s the same way that liberals are blaming guns, conservatives are blaming art. And both use the same exact arguments about these tools.
JT: And it’s fascistic.
SA: Yeah, and both sides are doing it, which is scary. And the thing is, it’s so hypocritical. I was watching a CNN Crossfire show. . . no, it was Larry King, and Bill Bennett was on there, mister family value czar. . .
Children’s book writer.
Yeah, a liberal guy and a conservative guy and they kept talking about horrible movies. They were talking about Basketball Diaries and the violence in that, and they kept lauding Saving Private Ryan.
Which is a very violent film.
Which is THE. . . one of the. . . most violent films ever made.
I heard some of the shots they were doing were very similar to the making of Last House on the Left.
Yeah, exactly. (Laughter) It was amazing to me. Those first 25 minutes in the film are the goriest film-making of all time without a doubt. And yet. . . it’s amazing. Bill Clinton in the same speech can go on wondering why this violence happens in Colorado and in the same speech, start talking about collateral violence in Kosovo. (Angrily mimicking) “We didn’t mean to hurt civilians. We didn’t mean to bomb the China Embassy.” (Pause) What it comes down to is that people are not going to accept that this country was founded on extreme violence. This is a country founded on slaughter. Columbine isn’t very far from Sand Creek. It keeps going on and on that way. It was always about slaughtering the different. That’s actually the first amendment in this country: Slaughter anybody who’s different. This is merely an extension of that. Art has nothing to do with it; guns have nothing to do with it. People would be doing it with machetes and knives, if they could.
What were you in the high school structure? You were an athlete, right?
On the rez I was abused. I was picked on and beat up. I was low, low, low, in the structure. But then I left the rez. . . I still lived on the rez; I just went to another high school. I was just a really weird kid. Different. And I got abused. But it’s funny, all of those qualities that made me a geek on the rez -- I was academic, talked a lot, I was ambitious -- all this kind of stuff that made me odd on the rez made me popular at the white school. It was a school of over-achievers. I was a jock but I was also in drama club. I was also in Future Farmers of America, which is the biggest group of geeks on the planet. So, I sort of fit in a lot of different places. . . I was captain of the basketball team, I was prom king. (Laughter)
ON PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY
I think one of the things I really enjoy about you, especially listening to some of your interviews, is your honesty. We were talking about Dan Savage earlier -- he has that too.
He’s great.
You guys say things and a lot of times you say it with humor. Sometimes I have to wonder if you’re getting away with it because people are laughing when you say it. Because a lot of things, if you put a different tone on it. . .
Oh, people would run screaming. It’s also a danger though, with what I do. . . people equate humor with a lack of seriousness. Because I’m funny, people think it’s not insightful or not thought out or that I’m being flippant when I’m very serious about being funny. I’m very careful and I know what I’m saying and the effect I want.
Is that a Hollywood thing that you learned? I learned it while I was there: you can say anything if you say it with a smile. (Laughter)
No, I’ve always been this way. Humor is self-defense on the rez. You make people laugh and you disarm them. You sort of sneak up on them. You can say controversial or rowdy things and they’ll listen or laugh. . . In white culture you’re taught to sit and listen. Incredibly polite. Indians will walk out on me, Black people will walk out on me if I upset them. White people will sit there and simmer. Even if they’re upset or mad, because they’re taught they can’t leave, that’s rude. When I see a white person get up to leave my reading, I’m proud of them. I’m thinking, “You’re breaking away from that horrible politeness your culture has taught you as you’re walking out on me, that’s cool.”
Steve Cannon told me when his first book came out 20 years ago, and it was a very naughty book, that his mother flew up from New Orleans just to slap his face. (Laughter) Do you ever elicit that reaction from your family at all?
Well, there are things I don’t write about. There is personal responsibility in art. I would never write anything that I think would cause my mother to slap me. I think it’s irresponsible. There’s stuff in my life that would make for good art I suppose, but not for me being a good person.
Some people think that art is the utmost and that personal responsibility goes to the side.
I think that’s a white thought.
Disrespect to the family unit?
Well, the idea of the artist as an individual rather than a member of a tribe or a member of a community. I think they playact at it and I think it goes across the board. When I say white, I mean Western civilization. I think most artists, whatever their color, practice the Western civilization idea of the artist: that the artist as the individual is responsible to his or her personal vision. Certainly, yeah. But you have to be a member of a tribe. You have to be a member of a family. You have to be responsible and held accountable.
Is it because you have a family that is so accepting that allows you to feel like that?
I’m lucky then. But I could have written things to offend them. Or I could have published things to offend them. I write it, but just because I’ve written it doesn’t mean it’s for public consumption. The very act of writing in some sense does for me those things we were talking about.
That fulfillment within. . .
Yeah. Publishing it is something else entirely.
ON HOLLYWOOD
Natural Born Killers is a vile piece of evil shit. It is. It’s a vile, vile, exploitative. . . .
It was hard to watch.
It completely and absolutely glamorizes violence. I don’t buy any of that shit Oliver Stone talks about, that he was examining the glamorization of violence. I’m sorry, no. It’s just not true. Did he get sued? No. Is he held responsible for the murders? No. I hear him doing his interviews: he doesn’t even take responsibility for what he’s put into the world.
Do you ever feel you’re in potential danger with a book like Indian Killer?
Oh yeah. But I’m doing it. I won’t let anybody else do it. I’ll direct it.
I didn’t know. That’s what Jim Carroll was talking about -- his problem with the shooting scene in the film of Basketball Diaries.
He wasn’t in charge of it.
That’s what he said: “It was out of my hands.” He said violence is a very rapid thing, it happens suddenly and he wouldn’t have filmed it like that. But he wasn’t disassociating himself from it, he just said that if you read the book, it’s not like that.
It’s not a violent book. Violence happens, but it’s not a violent book. It’s an incredibly Catholic book. It’s an incredibly spiritual religious book. The book reads like the life of a saint.
I haven’t thought of it like that. (Laughs) The life of a saint. . .
Maybe anti-saint would be a better word, but it’s an incredibly spiritual book. It’s about this kid’s spiritual life.
That’s the thing Jim Carroll talked about too: poetry as redemption. He said that didn’t come out in the film at all.
Nothing. He’s getting blamed for inferior art. It’s a bad movie in many ways.
I haven’t seen it. I just read the book.
(Bangs the table) It’s bad art! (Laughter) And people don’t make that distinction. Natural Born Killers is bad art. It fails in its mission. Bad art IS dangerous.
ON LEONARD PELTIER
I read in his book, My Life Is My Sundance, his concept of
“Aboriginal Sin,” which I thought was heavy.
It’s heavy but it’s not true. (Starts laughing) We’ve mythologized that dude beyond all belief. We deified him. There are moments in the book (which I think is a great book, not because of the quality of the writing, because that’s in and out -- there are wonderful passages and then there’s some stereotypical Indian stuff). . . What it is. . . is an amazing personal document. Amazing, where you can see the Leonard Peltier, the ordinary Leonard, struggling through prison and you also see where he believes in the myth of himself. I know what helps him survive in there is to mytholgize himself. He’s a political prisoner, but he’s also an ordinary man caught in extraordinary circumstances. He’s become a metaphor, and the only reason he’s still in prison is because he’s still, a metaphor. His supporters and detractors are both responsible for that. He’s in prison because of the people that support him as well. We need for him to be in prison. We need him to be that symbol. We need him to be that martyr.
Early on he’s talking to the families of the FBI agents who got killed, addressing them directly. . .
That’s the most powerful passage in the book. Talking to them, apologizing, saying “we are not enemies.”
“Our families have already shared the same suffering, I’m already dead and I didn’t do it.” That’s the other thing that kept coming up, “I didn’t do it.” Part of me was wondering if this was something that was going to be used as a way to get him out.
That’s what I said. I want him out and private. I want him to have his life back. But one thing I say about him, his life, his metaphor. . . he was headed to prison when he picked up a gun. When he picked up a weapon. . . picking up a weapon for anybody, for whatever cause you’re picking it up, is a failure of imagination and you’re doomed. I get into big arguments about this. He’s not guilty of the crime he’s in jail for, but he’s guilty of picking up a weapon.
With intent.
With intent. Even if you never pull the trigger.
You must get in some fights about that.
Yeah. Especially with Indians, who are so gun happy.
I don’t know what that means. Is that true?
Yeah. We believe our own press.
(Groans) One of the things I really appreciated in Peltier’s book was “every Indian has their say.” It takes me back to your family never having had issue with your writing and I think, “Cool, that’s nice, every Indian has their say.” I don’t know whether it’s the actual reality or not, but it sounds great. (Laughter)
I like that. That’s the thing people think, that I don’t want him out sometimes when I start arguing, that I want to keep him in there. No. It’s not a simple issue. His imprisonment is not a simple issue. It’s not a white hat/black hat thing. It’s not a good guy/bad guy thing.
One of the other things I wanted to talk about was how the United States practiced genocide all over the place. . .
And Canada.
I’m surprised that there hasn’t been more discussion about it.
Oh, it never will be. That is the Aboriginal Sin of this country.
But we won’t ever talk about it. . .
It will never be a part of the national conversation. To do so would shake the very foundations of the country. To admit responsibility for that -- then they would have to honor the treaties. All this stuff would have to be dealt with. It’s not gonna be. It’s not going to happen. All governments are sociopathic. They’re serial killers, all governments are serial killers and have the methodology of serial killers. Serial killers always think they’re right.
How come you’re not angrier?
Then you die. I don’t believe in people, I guess. That’s what keeps me in check. I don’t get disappointed. I think in the end most people have faith in human beings. I don’t. I don’t. So when people are good, including myself, I’m so surprised and pleased by it that it keeps me going.
That’s very cynical.
I’m Indian. (Laughs) How could you not be cynical? I think it’s optimism that gets you in trouble.
ISSUES OF POWER
Do you feel you’re in a powerful position?
Oh, I’m incredibly privileged.
Are you okay with it?
Oh yeah! (Laughter) Damn right I am. I like money.
Do you ever hear that whispered: ‘sellout’?
Fuck ‘em. I hear it all the time. Fuck ‘em. I was poor. Anybody who would say I’m selling out has never been poor, has never wanted, has never been afraid of not having their next meal. I think it’s only white people who ever use the word ‘sellout’ in that way. Brown people use it for politics or whatever. . . I’m sorry, money doesn’t solve all your problems but it solves most of them.
All I want is to make a living at it.
I’m not interested in creating obscure art. I’m not interested in creating art that people don’t want to see or read or watch. I like to do it. . . I’m not interested in creating a Norman Rockwell painting either, or writing John Grisham books. But it’s somewhere between that and that’s where I’m at. I’m writing and doing and making movies that people want to see in large numbers, in increasingly growing numbers.
It crosses over a lot of demographics.
My audiences is getting browner -- that’s great. And the age group is from kids to old people. That’s great, so I’m obviously doing something right. The Rolling Stones were at one time incredible and they were selling millions of records. And ER, 35 million people watch ER because it’s good. It’s a good show. Not as good anymore, but it has powerful women and powerful black people. Thirty-five million people were not wrong in watching ER.
So. . . you been looking at television lately?
Oh, yeah! (Laughter) Oh yeah, 35 million people watched it in its heyday. Thirty-five million people. And they were dealing with AIDS and sexism and racism. And the great thing: Kerry Weaver who uses a cane -- they never explained.
Yes, they did once.
No, they’ve never explained.
I have to double check that one. I feel like I know that answer.
Right now, women have the best chance at television. Like X Files, and they were talking about Scully. They were saying her competence was such a given that it never has to be explained. And it shouldn’t have to. And yet, even writing movies and working with studios, where I’m trying to have strong female characters. . . I have to explain them to people. Ninety percent of feature films -- bad movies -- could be saved by a simple thing: Give the woman in the movie a little bit of power at a key moment of the film, and it would have been saved.
What, a damsel in distress syndrome, James Bond trophies?
Exactly. I’m not just talking about action adventure movies, I’m talking about independent films too. Don’t think independent films are free of sexism and racism -- that’s not true at all.
PUBLIC V. PRIVATE
My friends are all geeks in one sense or another, no matter what color. In some sense we make our own tribe.
I don’t know if you’ve ever had that conflict whether or not you’re being Indian enough in your writing. I’m feel sometimes like I’m not regarded as a Latino writer because I don’t write about ‘traditional’ things.
Well, I get that. I’m not talking about four directions corn pollen mother earth father sky shit. I’m not talking about that stereotypical crap about being Indian. There’s always a huge distance between public persona and private person. In my art I try to keep that as narrow as possible. I try to write about the kind of Indian I am, the kind of person I am and not the kind of person or Indian I wish I was. I think all too often -- especially Indian writers because that’s what I know -- what they write and who they are are so different, so completely different that it ends up --
(Interrupting) Is it a lie?
Not a lie. . . It’s the difference between writing with imagination about a imaginary world and writing with imagination about a real world. I try to write with imagination about a real world. A world in which I grew up, the world that I live in now. I just get tired of this spiritual talk Indian artists get up there and do. This is going to sound sexist, but especially Indian women. They sort of get into the motherhood thing, and I’m sorry, I’m not a mother, I’m not a woman, I don’t understand it. It IS sacred. There is something sacred about it, but they get up there and do this whole thing, and it looks like shtick, and I have my shtick and my shtick is trying to be honest. And their shtick is pretending that Indians have some sort of spiritual gifts that other people don’t have. We don’t. And Indian women try to pretend that women have some spiritual gifts that men don’t have. And they do, but men also have particular spiritual gifts. I hate the feeling of superiority. I think there are three stages of Indian-ness: The first stage is where you feel inferior because you’re Indian, and most people never leave it. The next stage is feeling superior because you’re Indian and a small percentage of people get into that and most never leave it. At the end, they get on realizing that Indians are just as fucked up as everybody else. No better no worse. I try to be in that stage. I go through all three. At any given point in the day I could be in any of the three, but I try to spend most of my life in the third stage.
For Net links about Sherman Alexie & to buy his books at Borders.com, go to our April 20 feature on his competition with Patricia Smith at the 1st New York Heavyweight Poetry Bout.
For Net links about Juliette Torrez & to buy her books at Borders.com, go to lately i've been dreaming of bridges, the poem we published when she brought her Poetry Channel & Information Network to this site.
