This concludes our first month of Poets of the Week! Thanks for sticking with me in this series. In case you missed it, you can read Week 1 here, Week 2 here and Week 3 here.
This week, I had the extreme pleasure of interviewing two great poets: Dan Simpson, former Canterbury Poet Laureate and lover of all things nerdy, and Zeke Russell, a member of this year's Boston Poetry Slam's National Slam Team. Our conversations included being stranded on an island, what they do in their spare time and which superhero they would choose to be.
Q: What style of poetry do you most enjoy? Reading? Writing?
Dan Simpson: I like reading stuff that slightly breaks my brain – a bit jarring, irregular, weirdly laid out. You also can’t beat a really well written funny poem – both on the page and in performance! I don’t have a favorite spoken style, and I sometimes find it hard to enjoy spoken word in an unadulterated way – I’m always thinking about the mechanics and processes behind the writing and performance of it. One of the sad things about being a poet yourself! But when I hear something and I feel like ‘I have NO idea how you even thought of that’ I’m blown away.
Zeke Russell: I enjoy poetry that’s dynamic with good clean images, that is tidy and efficient. I specifically enjoy the work of Joshua Bennett, Ross Gay and Jan Beatty. I strive for that kind of elegance in my own work. Ultimately though, I’m a storyteller, my work is pure narrative.
Q: If you were stranded on an island and you had to recite a poem to get off the island, what poem would you recite?
Dan Simpson: I have two go-to poems as a set opener / closer: my piece about the orange ghost from Pac-Man, and a love poem made up entirely of math and science terms. Both are seared along the neurons of my brain, and people tend to like them! Check out my poem, Applied Mathematics!
Zeke Russell: Probably "The Second Coming" or possibly Kerouac’s “Running Through Chinese Poet Song.” They both have some big booming macho moments and they’re just pretty out loud.
Q: Do you get nervous before performing? Why or why not?
Dan Simpson: At poetry / spoken word nights, not so much: the audience knows what to expect and I’ve been doing this long enough to know that it’ll all be ok. But when I’m a bit out of place – a comedy gig, doing walkabout poetry at a wedding, at a conference – then definitely. In those situations, when an audience doesn’t quite know what to expect, I feel you have to work extra hard and be at your very best to get them on-side – and the potential to fail is much higher. So: more nerves!
Zeke Russell: I always get nervous. I like to think it’s because I care, because I want each performance to be the best. It might be that I’m just a kind of vain person, like I just want to be good every time. Performance is different every time and that’s why I love it.
Q: Looking back, what was the distinct moment that caused you to want to write and perform poetry?
Dan Simpson: Not specifically poetry, but the moment I know I wanted to write and perform was when I joined in with a drama event put on by the Drama Society at Kent Uni. We devised a stupid sketch and made people laugh, and that was an incredible feeling. The next three years I wrote plays and comedy skits, but once I graduated it was hard to get a mass of people together to do that sort of thing. So, poetry initially became a really accessible way of doing material – write a thing, go to an open mic, perform the thing, good feelings.
Zeke Russell: It’s hard to pick just one moment. I grew up in a community of artists and there were plenty of great writers around me as a kid. My father was a poet and a playwright and a contemporary of the Beats. I think if there was a moment for me it was when I had just returned to writing and I was at an open mic and saw Sam Teitel perform, and I thought, “That, I want to do that.”
Q: What is your favorite activity to do in your free time?
Dan Simpson: Play board games. Not like Monopoly or Cluedo: I’m into 3 hour strategic epics, intricate card games of bluff and psychological tricks, and throwing around a bunch of dice to betray your friends. Its super social and, with the right group of people, a hilarious way to spend a day. Pair all that with good craft beer and I’m one happy geek.
Zeke Russell: I watch too much television, so that’s what I’m usually doing in my free time. I aspire for my favorite thing to do in my free time to be something more worthwhile like cooking or hiking. I am starting a new podcast with my brother and that’s been exciting to plan.
Q: How do you define ‘slam poetry’?
Dan Simpson: I try not to – I don’t think ‘slam’ is a genre. There are poems that tend to go down better at slams, but they’re just poems. And slams vary so much too – the one I host in Canterbury has a different feel to the one in East London, to the BBC Fringe Slam.
Zeke Russell: I define slam poetry as those poems that take place inside the limits of a poetry slam. Which is to say I think Slam is an event, not a genre. There is a tremendous amount of variation between the poets I know who slam regularly. The difference between scenes is also enormous as well, so I don’t think slam really is a useful term for a genre.
Q: What is your favorite TV show of all time, past or present?
Dan Simpson: Oh man. OH MAN. They just put all of Star Trek on UK Netflix. ALL. OF. IT. Original Series. Next Gen. DS9. Voyager. Goodbye life! Otherwise, something I will watch over and over is Police Squad! – And Angie Tribeca is doing an amazing job of updating the silly Abrahams, Zucker, and Zucker comedy style. House of Cards is ridiculously bingeable. I can’t pick!
Zeke Russell: Without a doubt, the original Twilight Zone. Poets can learn a lot about turns and narrative from the Twilight Zone. I’m also very partial to the short-lived Fox show Brimstone.
Q: If you could be any superhero, who would you be and why?
Dan Simpson: I always liked Gambit as a kid – effortlessly cool and charming, which as a typically awkward adolescent is something that’s usually out of reach! I loved that he used playing cards as weapons.
Zeke Russell: I’d probably be Captain America; I love the fatalism of his story, last of his kind and all that. I also like that if you kind of look closely at the 1940s as a cultural mindset you’ll see that they’re more progressive than we are in the modern world. I like the idea that this man from the antiquated past is possibly more enlightened than us.
Q: Anything you wish to add?
Dan Simpson: If you’re in Edinburgh this August for the Fringe, come see my solo spoken word show Artificial Ineloquence––and if you like the look of these Rewards, help me make it happen on Kickstarter!
Zeke Russell: I’m excited to represent Boston Poetry Slam at the National Poetry Slam. I am super lucky to be part of an amazing team with Simone Beaubien, Neiel Israel, Bobby Crawford and Mckendy Fils-Aimé.
