Helen Phillips' story collection, Some Possible Solutions, follows an award-winning collection of shorts, a novel, and a YA novel. She's taken some time out of her obviously busy (oh yeah, she teaches) schedule to answer some questions!
EWN: Your short story collection, Some Possible Solutions, was published in 2016. What story within the collection had the earliest publication history outside of being in the collection, and what was that history?
Helen Phillips: The first story in Some Possible Solutions that ever appeared in print was “The Joined.” Writing “The Joined” was a watershed moment for me—it was the first time I ever gave myself permission to incorporate numerous disparate elements in one story (the mythology surrounding hermaphrodites; futuristic space travel; young fraught love in a deteriorating American city). I assumed I would need to write a novel in order to explore all of those components, but the idea of writing a novel about it somehow exhausted me, and then one day it occurred to me, ‘Hey, how about instead I just try to fit it all in to a ten-page story?’ It felt outrageous and fun and not-allowed to write that story. “The Joined” ended up being a finalist for The Mississippi Review Prize in 2008, appeared in that issue of The Mississippi Review, and was listed as Recommended Reading by the editors of Best American Fantasy Writing 2008 (Kevin Brockmeier and Matthew Cheney). To get the affirmation from The Mississippi Review and from Kevin Brockmeier, whose work I adore, meant a great deal, because the story felt so risky to me. The world evoked in “The Joined,” and that permission I gave myself to work with alternate worlds and disjointed imagery, set the stage for many of the other stories in Some Possible Solutions.
EWN: How did the publication of this particular collection come about? Were you solicited by the publisher, win a contest, agent submission, etc.?
HP: Some Possible Solutions was acquired by Henry Holt & Co. at the same time they acquired my novel The Beautiful Bureaucrat; my wonderful agent, Faye Bender of The Book Group, facilitated the deal. This was very different from my first publication experience; my collection of short-shorts, And Yet They Were Happy, was published by the indie publisher Leapfrog Press after I submitted it myself to their annual publication prize contest. My manuscript was a finalist for the prize, not the winner, but editor Lisa Graziano reached out to me because she wanted to publish the book anyway. I’ve loved both of my short story collection publication experiences, different though they have been.
EWN: Where do short stories fit within your life as an author? Primary form to work with, or something you write when an idea hits, or …?
HP: At times, yes, a gripping idea hits and I just need to get it out right away, sit down for five hours and bang out a rough draft before the moment passes, even if I won’t reopen the file for six months or a year. At other times, short stories serve as a sort of laboratory for ideas I’m working to develop in a novel. The short story “The Knowers” in Some Possible Solutions was written concurrently with The Beautiful Bureaucrat; though it may not be immediately apparent to an outside observer, “The Knowers” is a sort of microcosm of The Beautiful Bureaucrat.
EWN: Where do short stories fit within your life as a reader?
HP: The short stories I love most are like wise old friends I return to again and again, learning something different each time. Because I teach creative writing, I often check in with my favorite stories every year or so when they appear on my syllabi (my students have a talent for shedding new light on stories I’ve read uncountable times). By the same token, I am always on the lookout for hyper-contemporary works to add to my syllabi, so the joy of discovering a new story that I love is almost always accompanied by the joy of knowing that soon I’ll get to share that story with students and hear their reactions.
EWN: How will you be celebrating National Short Story Month this May?
HP: By teaching some of my all-time favorites, and by reading and responding to my students’ hot-off-the-press stories-in-progress.
EWN: Thank you very much for your time!
HP: Likewise.
Helen Phillips is the author of four books, including, most recently, the short story collection Some Possible Solutions. Her novel The Beautiful Bureaucrat, a New York Times Notable Book of 2015, was a finalist for The Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Award. Her first book, And Yet They Were Happy, was named a Notable Book by The Story Prize. She is the recipient of a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer’s Award and the Italo Calvino Prize, among others. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times and Tin House, and on Selected Shorts. She is an assistant professor at Brooklyn College, and lives in Brooklyn with her husband and children. www.helencphillips.com; @helencphillips
Comments