First off, many thanks to Nettie Hartstock for sending us Bill’s book, Everything Hurts. Mr. Scheft was kind enough to answer a few questions and I’m thrilled to be able to post them for you here. Also, thanks to Jodi Chromey. This is the first ever BCB author interview, a sort of “popping the cherry” if you will. Hopefully, we’ll get off our fat asses and do more of this type of thing. We’ll see.

BCB: What authors/books inspired you?

Bill: Let’s do five authors and two books because if I like a writer I usually like everything he does. The authors are Richard Yates, Philip Roth, the Latin poet Catullus, my uncle Herbert Warren Wind and Erica Jong. The two books are The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron and The Doctor Who Made House Calls by Milton Bass.

Yates and Roth are, I hope, my biggest influences, but I don’t think that’s for me to say. I like writing about broken people, most of them Jewish. As craftsmen, they are otherworldly to me. If I am an author, they should be called something else. Catullus taught me the value of word (I majored in Latin at Harvard). My uncle, the legendary New Yorker writer and golf laureate, generously showed me the possibility of the writer’s life in New York. And Erica Jong is that rare combination of prolific, versatile and responsible in her celebrity and impact. (Why no Salinger? I love him, but he stopped giving us his art, so he doesn’t make this list.)

I read The Doctor Who Made House Calls when I was 20 and thought, “wouldn’t it be great to do that?” It was the last time I allowed myself to have that thought for 18 years, until my wife gave me The Artist’s Way. Without that book, a spiritual guide to creativity, I would not be a novelist. Fact.

BCB: What was the biggest challenge in writing Everything Hurts?

Bill: The biggest challenge was weaving the dual notion of physical and psychological pain without being sentimental or self-pitying. And doing all that while getting your laughs. And, as you’ll see by my answer a few questions later, because I was going through much of the same things as the lead character, I had zero idea how it would end.

BCB: Favorite funny book…

Bill: Can you do better than Confederacy of Dunces?

BCB: Are you reading anything now?

Bill: I’m reading two books simultaneously. Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon and (embarassed to admit) Humboldt’s Gift, Saul Bellow’s Pulitzer. They are both in the first person, as is the book I am working on, and I want to get it right.

BCB: Talk a little bit about how this book originated - where within you did it come from?

Bill: Here’s the deal. This book was borne out of personal experience. In December, 2004, out of nowhere, I developed this limp which left me in constant pain. It arose from nothing and never stayed in one place. Doctors were baffled, until I saw a doctor who specialized in psychosomatic pain. He said I fit the profile and if I worked his program (examining my past to find the unconscious rage that was responisble for the pain), it would go away. So, six months into the limp, in an attempt to “art” myself out of the pain, I decided to write a novel about a guy trying to get rid of a psychosomatic limp. Well, two years later, I finish the book. The guy in the novel is better. I’m worse! A year later, ten days after I sell the book, I go to a new doctor, takes one look at my most recent x-ray and says, “You need a hip replacement. You’ll be pain-free.” I got it, I am, and everyone says, “Aren’t you furious you were in such pain for three and a half years?” I tell them all the same thing: If I hadn’t been, I wouldn’t have gotten the book.

BCB: Why did you choose to set Everything Hurts in New York ?

Bill: The two best pieces of advice I got about writing fiction: 1) Make your characters lives complicated. 2) Write what you know. All of my novels are set in New York and Boston, where I have spent 90 percent of my life.

BCB: Let’s say Fahrenheit 451 comes to life, which book would you become in order to save it from annihilation?

Bill: The humble answer is the poems of Catullus, because I think others would take care of the other books I love. The non-humble answer is The Ringer, my first novel and the one with a character based on my uncle Herb, the most influencial man in my life.

BCB: What is one book you haven’t read but want to read before you die?

Bill: Well, I’m reading Humboldt’s Gift now, which is one of them. So, I need to hang in there another week or so. Why do you ask? Did you hear something? Did Dr. Cantor call you? He told me the bloodwork was fine! Okay, a little low in Vitamin D, but come on!

BCB: If you were a bartender, what is the best drink to describe Everything Hurts?

Bill: I was a bartender, and I like the drink Phil refers to when he talks to his brother, who also dealt with chronic pain, and says, “I have some pineapple juice. I could make you a Vicodin colada.” So, vicodin colada.

BCB: My favorite part of the book was Phil and Ellie’s “date”, what is your favorite part?

Bill: I’m glad you liked that part. I liked her in that bridesmaid’s dress and the fact that she was clearly the more comfortable person on the date, which says a lot about Phil. But my favorite part, going away, was a couple of chapters after that. The Marty Fleck Memorial Dinner. There’s an energy that I couldn’t have in the rest of the book because I could never get that many people in a scene at the same time.

Links:
Bill Scheft - www.billscheft.com

Filed under: Fiction, Recommendation, Bill Scheft, Everything Hurts, Minnesota Reads