Author2Author: Tom Payne & Zachary Mason
It’s been a long time since we’ve had an Author2Author conversation on Beatrice, but a few months back, when I received paperback copies of Fame: What the Classics Tell Us About Our Cult of Celebrity and The Lost Books of the Odyssey relatively close to one another, I got to thinking that it would be fun to pair Tom Payne and Zachary Mason up and get them talking about our continuing relationship with the classical world, then see where the philosophical trail led them. (After they’d been talking to each other for a bit, I picked up on an idea that had been mentioned about reality television taking inspiration from mythology, and they ran with that, too!)
Zachary Mason: Your book draws parallels between modern celebrities and the Greek Olympians, twelve powerful gods whose spheres of influence cover more or less all of human experience. If there were twelve celebrity Olympians, who would they be, and what would be their spheres of influence?
Tom Payne: I’ve been reading your book with unpardonable stealth, and am greatly admiring it. I’m glad of your question, too, about modern equivalents to the Olympian gods. It’s really tempting to rattle off some answers (although I’ve been mulling this one over for a while now), but maybe I’ll hold back, (a) to maintain some suspense; (b) because who does what Artemis does?—certainly not Miley Cyrus; but mostly (c) because, now that I’ve been reading your book, I’m wondering if something big lies behind it, and I’d like to ask a question of my own.
About The Lost Books of the Odyssey: it’s splendidly unsettling. Your prose has all the calm and magic of myth, so that I’m seduced into the story-telling, so that your inspired deviations from the turns those myths take can startle the reader into thinking, “Hey, that’s not what happened! This would change western civilisation as we know it!” It makes me wonder how things would be if we had different myths.
Which leads me to my question—one I think would exercise us both. What do you think myth is for?
15 April 2011 | author2author |
Author2Author: Samantha Bruce-Benjamin & Brando Skyhorse
It’s not true that every editor in the publishing industry has a book in them, but it does happen, and this summer we happen to have two fine examples at hand, Brando Skyhorse‘s The Madonnas of Echo Park and Samantha Bruce-Benjamin‘s The Art of Devotion. I invited the two to ask each other about their experiences as they became published authors—they had plenty to say on the subject, so let’s get right to it…
Brando Skyhorse: Being an editor was an invaluable education in making me a better writer. Do you remember a specific instance where a particular edit offered key ideas in how to approach your own writing?
Samantha Bruce-Benjamin: There was an occasion where I found myself having to do what all editors must at one point in their careers: rewrite someone’s novel for them. Initially, I was thrilled to be asked. Then I read it.
If this particular author used the word “cried” once, then it was used 20,000,000 times—every single page of a 560-page manuscript. Also, everyone “turned,” sometimes “crying” and “turning” all at the same time:
“Give me the techno-diffuser zapper,” the bad guy cried, turning.
“No,” Agent X – the good guy – cried, turning back.
“I mean it. Give it to me now,” he cried louder.
“Will not,” Agent X turned, crying louder than him….…You get the picture. I also imagine that you may suspect I am joking. I am not.
5 July 2010 | author2author |
Our Endless and Proper Work is my new book with Belt Publishing about starting (and sticking to) a productive writing practice. 
