Author Interview

Author: Howard Burris 

Who or what inspires you as an author? 

I would say that more than anything, certainly for creative writing it is character. I mean I think when people get too carried away with being too didactic or telling a story explicitly it never works. The only thing that makes any sense to me is when you are making a point. It is revealed and not taught through some sort of an exposition through character. Writing that is didactic doesn't work at all. EVER. And giving speeches isn't really the point. To me it is all about character and personality and plot. Plot has to be there. I get the other elements as well, the tension of the story, foreshadowing, they are all important but it is all worthless without character.

Who or what motivates you as an author?

Well originally it was a very simple thing. I was abut 11 years old. We had a challenge to write something and the subject was really boring and rather ordinary. It was write to write about a TV commercial. I wrote something that I thought was interesting. And the teacher the next day said today we have something special. I looked around the room thinking which one of these other morons wrote something that was interesting. The teacher didn't identify who it was, but started to read my piece. Which was about Juan Valdez who was a fictional character for a brand of coffee. And Juan was supposed to be this happy cappuccino who had this wonderful life, drinking this wonderful coffee in this wonderful place, sold at a wonderful price. Anyways what I wrote about was probably Juan’s life wasn't exactly the same as it was characterized. He probably didn't have a lot of the basic services that we have, like plumbing, education, doctors. Anyways he read that out and I never said anything. I didn't flinch. I was so electrified that some adult thought what I wrote about character was interesting. Since then my whole life I thought well maybe I could convey things in a way that would be interesting to people. And I always still think about that. The recognition is what motivated me. Looking back on the paper I mean it is probably garbage. But for an 11 year old that long ago 50 years ago people didn't really think about stuff like that. A lot of things we do in life have to do with the confidence that we are good at it. 

What author[s] or book[s] influenced you as an author the most?

Certainly as far as any creative writing I have ever done, there is an unknown book that I am sure no one has ever heard of called Garden of the Brave in War. And it is written by a USA ID contractor who was in Iran for 8 years in the 50s or 60s. Guys long dead, anyways he was there under a contract to teach in the central part of the country. It doesn't discuss religion of politics, which everyone thinks they want to read about Iran.  It doesn't touch on any of it ever. What it is based on is character! Basically people he just encounter all around his house. And went in-depth to how these characters act and think. The leopard also had a big impact on me. Which is written about change in Sicily. I guess it highlights even where my own writing has gotten the most traction in my life. Which isn't mainly creative writing, but expository about issues and topics you have to sell as a writer. I had to sell topics to people that would give me a budget to go into the field and take a lot of subject matter experts and you have a theory. Basically what my job was  was to write reports for people that were decision makers and policy makers that saying this is why this idea that has attracted X dollars sometimes in the billions is not going to work and this is why. Anyone can say that, but you have to support it with empirical information. Expository writing is very structured can’t be more than a certain length, all declaratory statements must be supported with proof. It is all very tight. Unlike creative writing where you can make it all up. The author Proost never moved around his entire life, yet came up with all these incredible characters. And that is an incredible gift to come up with characters and determine how they act and who they out of imagination. It moves people. It makes them think, it makes them cry. Like all art if you get a reaction it is art. Not everyone has to like it, very few artists are universally liked. Something that could make one person cry could make another person roll their eyes. Basically your write what you feel and if you are any good at it other people will feel too. Sorry I got off the point but anyways. 

Most often, where, when, and how do you write?

When I am doing creative stuff I have to be away from any association with my day to day life. I have to do something like go off to a public library, find that is quiet and no noise. The association of being at a desk where I pay bills is very destructive to me. I cant think. I will just end up thinking about my bills. I also most likely come up with things I want to write about when I am not focusing to hard on it. Like right now when I am driving I have to pay just enough attention to the road it liberates me from the things I normally obsess about. That is when ideas occur.  

How is technology changing print culture, specifically regarding authors and readers?

Well, I think everyone kind of has a handle on that. I mean the fact that you can write something in Word, format it and send it off to a place that will set it up and print you copies of a book for very little money  democratizes publishing. Which is sort of good. Writing a blog is even cheaper.  The issue is what publishers should be doing is now so expensive with the democratization of publishing. The publishing world is under so much financial pressure that what they end up doing is almost like movie making. They do remakes. The probability of making money is a lot greater.  Technology allows more and more people to become authors and an even bigger audience.  

When you write, who is your intended audience?

Well, I guess it changes because it is a very specific thing in my former life and in what I did. I had a very narrow constituency. I would come up with the ideas, but I would go in there and I would say I think this is a problem and I want to go investigate it. I was like a producer because I couldn’t just go to foreign areas and expect to be taken care of and protected. My assignments had to be approved. It all had to be negotiated so I had to prove that this idea was important and how I was going to prove it. Anyways so if it is approved you get a budget and you go and it wasn't cheap these were like million dollar trips. It’s not just a plane ticket on United. Anyways all those cost boil down to one 40 page report. The important people will probably only read two pages tops. So you take these really complicated high impact issues and you have get it down in the end for the people that make a difference into 2 pages. It has to be unassailable or else they get rid of you. I did that for many years and basically I exhausted all my ideas. I knew as soon as more and more young people came in with awesome ideas that it was time for me to quit and let them use their ideas. 

How is the current technological revolution changing your audience?

I mean things are obviously chaining, but I don't think it is changing the audience very much. For the things that I now want to do (creative writing) what I thought about is a favorite writer of mine and who was political without being political was Twain. Twain is really kind of a progressive guy which everyone knows him for things like Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. But even those books especially Huckleberry Finn was a statement about slavery, but what he did personally said a lot about what he wanted to communicate. He visited Yale once and he met this african american janitor, and he went the dean and was like I would like to pay for his education and they agreed. The guy ended up graduating at the top of his class. Became a famous lawyer that mentored supreme court justices as well. Twains conscious and what he was interested in writing which is normally conveyed through humor is very interesting.  Anyways to answer your question which I obviously have not yet, I think it will broaden and democratize what gets published and who reads it. I mean it just costs so much less. Books alone are so much cheaper and mean in the beginning you had to be a rich guy to get a book. And after the printing press it reached so many more people. And now with the internet and connectivity people anywhere can reach information. There is this program called computers for children and they try to supply every child with even a cheap computer and connectivity because that would supply them with access to an ambulance of material. They might not have seen anything outside of a slum but they would have more access to information than the US government did you know 30-40 years ago. And that is amazing. There is a TED X talk about connectivity my John Pontey and you think about it as terms of publishing beyond the old fashioned use of the word and he explains that. Anyways connectivity and cost is what changes the audience. 

What do you think reading and authorship will look like fifty years from now?

Other than the delivery I think that the access to information is not such a profound thing that it is out there but also in terms in how it can be implored. I think publishing might have been regarded as a push. They would get behind some writer and because it was a certain publisher that imprint meant something to people. So I think what the fundamental shift is, publishing in the grandest since of the word, is not going to be a push it is going to be a pull. You could write something a live in Waxihachie, Texas and have all your pizza delivered to the door and never leave the house, but as long as you were writing about something that was unusual  and interesting the kid in the slum with a solar power computer could reach it. The movement of information is changing enormously because of search and connectivity and that is huge. If there is some big story it is worth passing and learning about how access can change peoples minds if there is connectivity and if people have access to the internet, And what they can pull from the whole world. As long as information is blocked a child across the world can see anything. Anything about news and politics of culture they can pull and learn. The cost of all of this is dropping and it will make it so cheap and easy. Think about your phone has a greater processing power and is cheaper than the processor and computer that aided in the first moon launching. This change effects everyone and the potential is dramatic. Also people that may not have had a voice before will be able to publish and spread information easier through technology and self publishing. There was this 16 year old kid whose uncle was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and you see most of the time when pancreatic cancer is caught it is much too late. Anyways this kid was very upset about it and he started kind of doodling around and doing research on the internet. He found that certain types of cancers begin by producing certain types of proteins so is there a test that can detect the proteins. They said there is a test but it is about $500 and it isn't very accurate and therefore never prescribed as a routine physical. And so he kept working went to different medical schools asking questions and so this kid ended up developing a test that is 90% accurate and costs about 30 cents. It will detect the proteins in your body that are expressed when you have pancreatic cancer. They guy won the GED science prize, the president invited him to the white house and the kid is 16. And so how would that have ever happened without the internet and connectivity and the ability to access all kinds of information? If there is something that is going to change publishing it is going to be this the ability to connect and publish a stagering amount of information. We all think we are aware how vast the internet is and all the information it has to offer and publish but in reality we have no clue!

How did you find a publisher, and how long did that process take?

Well I was originally published by the Department of Defense so I didn't need to find a publisher I just needed to do a good job at my job. Now I am still looking for a publisher for my creative work. Its just a process of sending things out. I have always been told that if I would sit down and write history you would be published again in no time. You know my friends will come up to me saying here are people that have expressed interest in me to write history pieces. But I don't know why it just isn't interesting to me. I like reading it and learning about it, but I don't want to write about it. I have a writer friend who was in college with me his name is Scott Berg. And Scott Berg he had the fire and he has written a bunch of books, the late blockbuster he has written was about Lindberg. And at first when his publisher approached him about it he said why would I write a book about Lindberg? There are probably already 30 books in print about him. And  his publisher said, well, there is an archive of his papers up at Yale. And no one has ever had access to it, and he said well if you get me access to it I will at least think about. Well Scott Berg met with Lindberg’s widow and their daughter who was still alive at the time. She ended up giving him access to the entire thing. Everyone had thought they new everything about Lindberg and he realized we knew nothing about him he had all these parallel lives. He was worshiped after crossing the Atlantic and then he went through very tough times and was hated. Anyways he learned all these things about Lindberg’s life including all about his child’s kidnapping. Anyways so he wrote all of this into this huge book and did fairly well. He is a funny guy though when we were in college he joined this frat not because he wanted to be there but he want to join the same frat as F. Scott Fitzgerald and he just wanted to take that in. Write in the same library the This Side of Paradise was written in. So he had the fire and that is what you need to get published. I will starve to death if it happens thats fine thats the way I can be me. 

How much did your manuscript change during your publisher’s editorial process?

Hugely! There may be people that do things once and it is good enough, but I throw a lot of stuff away even before the publisher’s process. I have to let things sit come back to them and change them. And I can salvage things. But it is highly iterative. 

Do you have a definite and specific organization and structure in mind as you begin writing? If so, how definite and specific is your outline?

Sort of depends on what it is. I guess I will in sort of a fuzzy logic sense. If you are writing things based on your own experiences you kind of just play off of that. I kind of wrote it like a mosaic little bits and pieces and portraits of a story with an overlying theme. And thats what I have done. Everything is edited and principles change depending on the book I mean look at the editing process the Bible has gone trough!

How would you describe your writing process?

Haha totally incoherent. I just go back to the iterative thing. I just get something on the brain and I will write four pages and then leave it then come back and tear it up, It is all over the place.

Do you have any writing habits or rituals that help your wiring process?

Well like I said I need to be away from things, I need to be myself and I need an idea that has inspired me.

Do you write in multiple genres?

Yeah for sure. I guess there are times I simply stick to character plots that are unusual and stressful. I like it to be different and mysterious. When I was 30 I lived over half my life out of the US and but the time I was 60 I had been in one revolution and two wars. And that kind of takes me there. 

What was your first publication, and what do you think of this publication now?

My coffee commercial! I mean okay it wasn't published but it was published to the class and because that was a defining moment to me that is what I consider. I mean no matter what I am going to thing my first pieces of published work or just work in general are trash, but they are big points in my life. I mean I embarrassed by earlier work I was pushed into conformity. I am still very proud though of my work for the DOD.

Besides teaching and authorship, have you had any other jobs in the writing field?

Well, the biggest one is obviously department of defense that talks about programs and budgets and goals and ideas. The problem is when people get a good idea and don't know the details our people began hanging themselves saying things that weren't even close to accurate. This is a cross disciplinary writing effort. In Iraq power is free because most people can’t afford it. And during the time of Sadam there were limitations of who could bring an air conditioner because they were so expensive. And so when he fell we all wanted to just implement a free market which sounds great but know one really understood all the details that would have to change as well like air conditioners. Anyways so the piece I wrote was about this. And how we were trying to build a supply of generators so I had to write that we wont keep up with this supply because of the demand. So it was my job to write about this and see if our money was going to be well spent on these air conditioners and power. Which it definitely was not going to be we needed a solution to slow demand down. And because they don't go out there they wouldn't know so I did it. very similar to being a reporter I would write a story and everyone would hate my guts. But it was good stuff and every time I came back I thought I would get fired and I didn't they loved it. I even got a medal I was shocked!

Best writing advice?

Stop procrastinating.