T Fleischmann's first book, Syzygy, Beauty, is out from Sarabande this month. They live in rural Tennessee and help edit nonfiction at DIAGRAM.
An excerpt from Syzygy, Beauty appears in Issue Thirty-Two of The Collagist.
Here, T Fleischmann answers questions "in the form of excerpts"--with further excerpts from Syzygy, Beauty. Enjoy!
What is writing like?
A friend of mine tells me she has a glass curse, that it came after she lit religious candles she knew nothing about. The glass that held the wax cracked, and then all her glass kept breaking, falling or being taken, suddenly, by a thin and crooked line.
What isn’t writing like?
“What I mean,” you try to clarify, “is that I don’t think this is about me at all.”
When you do it, why?
Eight letters, the 1991 Pet Shop Boys single that quotes Othello.
When you don’t, why?
I once dated a bartender. A weekend routine, shots and hands and barely knowing each other. One morning, stoned and watching Man Vs. Wild, he said “I love you” and so I had to break up with him.