New on WNW: Three Questions and a Quote with Pulitzer Prize Winner Mitchell S. Jackson

Author Mitchell S. Jackson

I’m thrilled to feature novelist and Pulitzer-Prize-winning nonfiction writer Mitchell S. Jackson in the newest WritingtheNorthwest.com post. Mitchell is one of the most exciting writers to come out of the NW in recent years.

Read his answers to “Three Questions and a Quote” here.

Playwright Terrence McNally: What We Lose When the Coronavirus Kills the Elders Among Us

Playwright Terrence McNally
(image from TheGuardian.com)

Three days ago, the playwright Terrence McNally died at 81, a victim of the coronavirus. He had COPD and had lost part of both lungs to lung cancer, so he was one of the most vulnerable among us to this awful pandemic. He was also one of the most brilliant, creative, and loving men in our world.

I didn’t know McNally personally except that I once did a long, lovely interview with him over lunch at Portland’s Heathman Hotel. This was in the early 2000’s when I was writing regularly about theater for the Oregonian, including interviewing any playwright who came through town: Lanford Wilson, Romulus Linney, John Guare, Tracy Letts.

Wilson and Linney (who had been my professor for a class on playwriting at Columbia University in the 1990’s) were both warm and generous to me, but McNally was even more so. I had writing assignments to justify all of the other interviews, but not the one with him. Even so, he sat and answered all of my questions, treating me as a peer rather than just another interviewer.

Over time, I have watched many of McNally’s shows on the stage or on film. He had broad range and a big heart. But I didn’t know just how wide-ranging his work was, or how big his heart, until I watched the 2019 PBS American Masters program on him last night.

If you want proof that the jerks who say we should choose the stock market over the lives of older people as this pandemic continues to spread are sick and twisted, watch this program. You’ll find a link to it here.

What life and wisdom and love left the world with this man. How many others with these attributes we need so desperately right now are we willing to lose?

Podcast Interview: Talking about Memoir, Biography and the Craft of Nonfiction

A few weeks ago, I stopped by Jennifer Lauck’s Blackbird Studio to talk to her class about memoir, biography and writing in general.  She recorded the session and it’s available free on her website.  Have a listen.

Jennifer is the author of the bestselling memoir Blackbird and three other books.  You’ll find more about her and her books on her Amazon author’s page.

If you live in the Portland area, check out Jennifer’s classes for writers.

On the Radio: The True Spirit of Poet and Mystic Robert Lax

The information below is from New Dimensions Radio, which will broadcast this one-hour interview over its affiliated stations in the U.S. and other countries in mid-February.  To see if the program will be on your local station, check the list on the New Dimensions website.  If not, you can buy the download now for $1.99 or downloaded it free from the website between Feb. 17 and Mar. 1.  This is the most in-depth interview I’ve done yet on Robert Lax.

The True Spirit Of Poet And Mystic Robert Lax with Michael N. McGregor

$1.99

Product: MP3 Download
Program Number: 3566
Host: Phil Cousineau
Interview Date: 11/19/2015
Length: 1 Hour

MP3 Download

Robert Lax is one of the great experimental poets of the 20th century, a daring and original avant-garde writer who was sought out as a sage and a mentor. He was a circus performer, a clown and a juggler, and well known for being a close friend of Thomas Merton. McGregor knew and loved this man and wrote a biography to make this remarkable man’s life and works better known to more people. He says of Lax, “Robert Lax was the most significant person I’d ever met…I felt his life was unusual and fascinating and it was a good opportunity to explore someone so unique and special in both a spiritual and artistic way.” As Lax searched for a vocation he decided that perhaps a person following a religion of love ought to be a prophet of love. Lax had the courage to go his own way and did not follow any shortcuts in his pursuit of truth and God. McGregor interprets Lax’s philosophy of life as one in which “love goes in all directions. It takes you deeper into yourself and it takes you into other people’s lives and into your interactions with them. He felt that life is meant to be a unity and all things in harmony. That didn’t mean just all people in harmony, that meant our interior in harmony with our exterior, our sleeping and dreaming in harmony with our waking consciousness, all things coming together in that way.” (hosted by Phil Cousineau)

Bio

Michael N. McGregor is a Professor of English and Creative Writing at Portland State University. He has lectured at universities, conferences, and community events on both Robert Lax and Thomas Merton, and is a member of Biographers International Organization and the International Thomas Merton Society.

Michael N. McGregor is the author of:

To learn more about the work of Michael McGregor go to www.michaelnmcgregor.com.

Topics Explored in This Dialogue

  • Why Michael McGregor pursued the life and work of Robert Lax
  • What made Robert Lax such an unusual man
  • How Robert Lax used to enjoy going to jazz clubs with Thomas Merton
  • How as a boy Robert Lax was influenced by the circus. His father would take him to the train tracks and he would watch the circus being unloaded.
  • How Robert Lax felt the Cristiani family demonstrate, by their circus performances, how to be closer to God
  • How a break down precipitated Lax into a more authentic life
  • What is the value of slowing down
  • Who is Thomas Merton and how did he and Lax collaborate
  • How Lax lived a life untethered to things

Free MP3 of Phil Cousineau Interviewing Me About the Life and Meaning of Robert Lax

The shorter of my two interviews about Robert Lax with Phil Cousineau for New Dimensions Radio, part if its New Dimensions Cafe (or in this case, Taverna), is now available as a FREE MP3. To access it, go to newdimensions.org. You have to fill out a form but the download is free. The interview is 15 minutes long.  (The second, hour-long interview will be released in early 2016.)

Phil Cousineau is an award-winning writer and filmmaker, teacher and editor, lecturer and travel leader, storyteller and TV / radio host. His fascination with the art, literature, and history of culture has taken him from Michigan to Marrakesh, Iceland to the Amazon, in a worldwide search for what the ancients called the “soul of the world.” With more than 30 books and 15 scriptwriting credits to his name, the “omnipresent influence of myth in modern life” is a thread that runs through all of his work. His books include Stoking the Creative Fires, Once and Future Myths, The Art of Pilgrimage, The Hero’s Journey, Wordcatcher, The Painted Word and Burning the Midnight Oil.

From the New Dimensions website:

“New Dimensions Foundation and New Dimensions Radio conducts and disseminates conversations that expand the possibilities, both personal and cultural, towards a world that works for everyone.

For over 4 decades New Dimensions has been gleaning experience and inspiration from some of the world’s most innovative, enlightened, and trustworthy wisdom leaders as it sows the seeds of encouragement and confidence that, together, we can meet the challenges of the 21st Century. New Dimensions inspires its listeners to tap into their own innate wisdom and genius. Tuning into these deep dialogues changes lives for the better.”

Peace Is a Good Thing to Seek: An Interview for Bearings Online

The following interview appeared on Bearings Online, run by the Collegeville Institute at St. John’s University in MN, where I work as a writing coach each summer.  The interviewer, poet Betsy Johnson-Miller, has published two books of poetry: Rain When You Want Rain, and Fierce This Falling.

Peace Is a Good Thing to Seek: The Uncommon Life of Robert Lax

An Interview with Michael N. McGregor

Michael N. McGregor, author and professor of creative writing in the Department of English at Portland State University, published a biography in September 2015 titled Pure Act: The Uncommon Life of Robert Lax. The book chronicles Lax’s life and his career as a poet. It also explores some of the important relationships Lax had—with God, with Thomas Merton, with a family of circus performers, and with McGregor himself. 

McGregor has been associated with the Collegeville Institute since 2009. He spent a semester in residence in the fall of 2011, and has taught several writing workshops over the years. Betsy Johnson-Miller spoke with Michael about his book when he was in Collegeville for a three-day author residency.

You wrote this book, Pure Act: The Uncommon Life of Robert Lax, at least in part, as a result of meeting Robert Lax. Would you have written this biography if you hadn’t met Lax in person?

It was the presence of the man and getting to know him that intrigued me. I wanted to uncover more of the details of his life. I never expected to write a biography, and I’m not sure I would have written this if I’d just encountered his writing or even things about him.

Could you give us a sense of his presence?

To be in his presence was to feel loved, delighted, and completely accepted.

In the book, I talk about how he described Thomas Merton with only one word: liveliness. And that’s what I would say about Lax as well. When I met him, he was 69, and that’s an age when many people do not have a lot of liveliness left. But he was delightfully lively. He was, in many ways, childlike, and to be in his presence was to feel loved, delighted, and completely accepted.

Is it what he said? Or how he looked at the world?

Lax was lively in his manner and how he treated people. He would often say, “Yes, yes,” or “Good, good.” Those were his favorite phrases, and he was always encouraging people to say what they had to say, to express themselves, or in my case, to write things down. He would often break our conversations and say, “Write that down, write that down.” Sometimes, when he felt someone especially needed encouragement, he would say, “Well, that reminds me of Merton.” He may have meant it, but he also may have been thinking, “This person needs encouragement, so let me compare you to this friend of mine who is amazing.”

Lax had a deep and abiding friendship with Thomas Merton that impacted both of their lives. Merton became a monk, whereas Lax did not. Would you say they both led holy lives?

When we talk about a holy person, we are in danger of over-spiritualizing. We start to think of someone as not meant for this world. That is not the case with Lax. He was fully alive as a human being. He was of this world, but at the same time, he was fully attending to the living God, and he was fully alive as a human being to the people around him, and to himself. Merton and Lax were very different people personality-wise. They had different gifts, different ways they were tuned. But they both had a thirst for God that was their primary characteristic.

How would Lax describe the act of writing?

Lax would not have separated writing from living. He was always trying to get at what his soul was saying to itself. He believed that “down there” was where God speaks to us, from inside of us, at our deepest core. So, writing was a sacred act, but so was living. For Lax, every breath was a holy thing.

Should we consider Lax an exemplar? In other words, should we as people or as writers try to live like he lived?

Lax would never have said, “Live like me.” In fact, if you started to suggest you were going to emulate him, it would have made him very nervous. Except he did want people to emulate him in this way—to love, to be as close to pure love as you could be. It wasn’t important for him what your circumstances were or what you pursued, as long as you pursued it out of love.

There’s a story in the book about a young man going fishing. Lax believed if that man wants to go fishing instead of caring for his grandmother, if he’s not caring for her out of love, then it’s better for him to go fishing. Because he should do what he does out of love. That was how Lax saw life.

One of his most important characteristics—embracing poverty—unleashed a great deal of energy and time in his life. He might talk to you about it, but he wouldn’t say, “You have to do this—live this same way.” Some people called him a guru. I don’t. Gurus tend to give you ways to live and are much more prescriptive about that, and he was never prescriptive. For Lax, what was important was to put ourselves in a place where grace can flow, because once we do that, then things start happening. He also believed very strongly that everybody desires God, and the more we can recognize and act on that desire, the more things will take care of themselves.

As a writer yourself, how did Lax’s thoughts on writing influence you?

What Lax said was that you should write what you want to write and then try to say it as well as you can.

The most important thing that he unlocked for me as a writer was the idea that I should write about the things that are mine to write about and that I care about. As a young writer, it’s easy to get all these ideas, or think “I want to be in this magazine, so I should write this.” What Lax said was that you should write what you want to write and then try to say it as well as you can. More importantly, he believed you should write for yourself first and only, really. He said that if an editor gets to see that writing, he should consider himself lucky.

It’s a very different way than we are taught to think about writing. We’re taught to think that we’ve got to do these things to get people to print our work. Lax believed strongly that as a writer, if that’s the thing you are called to do, then your job is to write what you are interested in as well as you can and try to get closer and closer to a kind of truth in that. If that happens, then the publication part will take care of itself.

Many writers are known for their edgy lives, whether in terms of sexual behavior or alcoholism or drugs. Lax falls at the opposite end of the spectrum. What do you make of that dynamic, both in terms of Lax himself, and of writers and writing in general?

Some people look at the lifestyles of legends like Fitzgerald and Hemingway and think, “Oh, that’s how you become a good writer,” rather than thinking “these good writers did stupid things that eventually impaired their writing instead of enhancing it.”

The best example of this from Lax’s life is the difference between him and Jack Kerouac. They were friends right around the time On the Road came out. This was a high point of Kerouac’s life as a writer in many ways, and there was this moment when Kerouac was going to follow Lax to live in a spiritual community outside of Paris. Lax went first, but Kerouac never joined him. He wrote Lax a letter that basically said, “Bob, I’m not coming. That’s the kind of thing I need to get away from,” and he turned to Buddhism instead. Even more than that—and Kerouac’s honest about it in the letter—he turned to women and drink, and the life destroyed him. And the same thing happened to others—like Dylan Thomas—who were in Lax’s life as well.

Lax said that the best gift you can give to other people is to take care of yourself.

Over time, Lax developed this sense that we need to take care of ourselves, and that doing so allows us to do our best for other people, for our writing, for whatever. Late in life he said that the best gift you can give to other people is to take care of yourself, even physically. Some writers think that they have to be where the buzz is, that they have to be in there, moving and doing things. Lax felt that the buzz he was interested in was inside himself.

Is there a moment with Lax that has stayed with you?

One such moment is when he signed one of his books and gave it to me. Inside it read, “There’s not much difference between us.” Another was toward the end of his life when he told me, “I had a dream last night that you said to me, ‘Peace is a good thing to seek, and love does conquer all.’” The second one in particular felt like a charge to me in a way. I don’t think he meant it that way. I think it was more of a hopeful thought, a hopeful dream for him, but I certainly go back to it and think, “Yes, I want to be that person and always doing that.”

Creating Beauty with Words: An Interview for the University of Portland

Here’s an interview with some of my thoughts on writing, reading and Pure Act, conducted by Jackie Ott, a young writer at the University of Portland.  It was originally posted on the UP English department’s blog.  At the end you’ll find some advice for aspiring writers.

An Interview with Michael McGregor

by Jackie Ott

On October 6, the University Book Store will be flooded with the wisdom of Robert Lax and the beauty of Michael McGregor’s words. McGregor’s reading is sponsored by our very own English department and the Garaventa Center, and he will read from his new book Pure Act: The Uncommon Life of Robert Lax, a biography about the inspirational, spiritual poet who influenced many, including McGregor himself. I had a chance to interview McGregor about his passion for the work of Lax and his own career as a writer. Here’s what he had to say:

For someone who may not have heard of Robert Lax, what would you say is the draw of Lax as a poet? What made you want to write a book on his life?

Lax was an incredibly inventive poet whose work makes you more aware of life’s moments and their transcendent possibilities.  My fascination with him goes far beyond his poetry, however.  When Lax was young, he had a deep influence on the spiritual development of his close friend Thomas Merton. When he was older—after working for the New Yorker, reviewing films for Time, writing scripts in Hollywood and even traveling with a circus—he settled among poor fishermen and sponge divers in Greece because he wanted to learn their wisdom.

I wrote about him because I knew him for 15 years and he was the most remarkable and loving man I ever met.

What is your writing process? 

When writing nonfiction, I like to gather as much information as I can and then live with it for a while before starting to write, to know it as intimately as possible, to digest it fully, so the writing feels as if it’s coming from a place of true understanding.  I like to write in the morning, before the day’s events crowd my thoughts.  I’m a slow, multi-draft writer.  I read things over many times, often out loud to hear the rhythms of the words and sentences.

What kind of research did you do in the writing of your new book?

I did extensive research over many years for this book.  I spent hours upon hours in Lax’s archives at Columbia University and St. Bonaventure University, reading through journals and letters, watching films, going through pictures, and even checking postmarks on cancelled stamps to see where he was on what date.  In addition, I interviewed his family and friends, visited the many places he lived (Marseilles, the French Alps, the Greek islands of Kalymnos and Patmos, etc.), and read countless books on the times in which he lived, the subjects that influenced him (poetry, jazz, meditative writers), and his friends (Merton, Jack Kerouac, William Maxwell, Ad Reinhardt, Mark Van Doren and more).

What works of literature have been formative for you as a writer? What are you reading right now?

Instead of individual works, let me give you authors.  There are too many to count, but here are a few: Tolstoy taught me how to evoke a feeling of lived life, Hemingway taught me how to be clear and give flow to my sentences, Kundera taught me how to write ideas into stories, Homer taught me how to write with action, Conrad taught me how to think about narration and multiple viewpoints rendered from a single perspective, A. J. A. Symons taught me how to turn a biography into a quest for identity, Baldwin taught me to prioritize humanity in everything I write, Borges taught me how to use repetition and invention, Hugo taught me how to reach for deeper emotions, the great Hebrew and early Christian writers taught me how to address spiritual matters in a variety of ways, Camus taught me how to focus on the beauty of existence, and Lax himself taught me how to write with economy and clarity.  Of them all, Baldwin, especially in his nonfiction, has been my best teacher.

Right now I’m reading a book about the relationship between Baldwin’s prose and the various musical styles that have come out of the African American experience: blues, jazz, gospel, spirituals, etc.

Although Pure Act is your first book, you have an impressive number of works published in various styles from poetry to journalism. Out of all the types of writing you do, do you have a favorite and if so why?

I can’t say I favor one over another, but I love storytelling, working with ideas, and creating beauty with words.  So fiction, I suppose…or maybe literary nonfiction…or possibly poetry….

Do you have any advice for aspiring writers? 

Write as much as you can, every day, and don’t quit.  Study those who’ve done it well.  Slow down enough to really see life and hear language.  Be thankful for each moment and always, in every moment, be fully human–alive, compassionate and filled with joy.