I picked up the collection, Insurrections, by Rion Amilcar Scott, not long after it came out, ordering it direct from the University Press of Kentucky. The couple of stories I’ve had a chance to read so far were fantastic.
EWN: Your short story collection, Insurrections: Stories 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?
Rion: “Juba” was published in New Madrid’s “Dynamics of Poverty and Wealth” issue in 2010. I remember feeling as if these stories would never get published, but in that year I published “202 Checkmates” in Fiction International and “Party Animal” in Confrontation. Everything felt so scattered back then. I couldn’t imagine that these stories would come together to talk to each other in Insurrections or that anyone would want to publish a collection I wrote. That was about the time I started to think about the shape of a potential collection I was calling then, People in Motion.
EWN: How did the publication of this particular collection come about? Were you solicited by the publisher, win a contest, agent submission, etc.?
Rion: I saw a solicitation for a new series at University Press of Kentucky on twitter. The call read like it was crafted to describe what I was trying to do. “The University Press of Kentucky seeks manuscripts of contemporary poetry and fiction that exhibit a profound attention to language, strong imagination, formal inventiveness, and awareness of one’s literary roots.” All those things are very important to me and are things I try to keep in mind when I’m writing. Still, I expected to be rejected because rejection is just a way of life when you’re a writer.
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 …?
Rion: I go back and forth with this. I think of myself as a novelist, which is funny since I’ve never completed a successful one and I’m always writing stories. I guess the reason is I spend a lot of time daydreaming about the novels I’m planning. Daydreaming is writing, right? Stories are everything. Novels are everything.
EWN: Where do short stories fit within your life as a reader?
Rion: Everyday I’m reading a story just as I read at least a poem a day.
EWN: How will you be celebrating National Short Story Month this May?
Rion: I just finished, Dana Diehl’s Our Dream’s Might Align. There’s a story in there, “To Date a Time Traveler,” that’s an absolute masterpiece. I’m also reading, Tim Jones-Yelvington’s, This is a Dance Movie! and Ken Liu’s, The Paper Menagerie. Other than that I’m trying to finish a story I was foolish enough to think I finished nine years ago.
EWN: Thank you very much for your time!
Rion Amilcar Scott’s work has been published in journals such as The Kenyon Review, Crab Orchard Review, PANK, The Rumpus, Fiction International, The Washington City Paper, The Toast, Akashic Books, Melville House and Confrontation, among others. A story of his earned a place on the Wigleaf Top 50 (very short) Fictions of 2016 and 2013 lists, and one of his essays was listed as a notable in Best American Essays 2015. He was raised in Silver Spring, Maryland and earned an MFA from George Mason University where he won both the Mary Roberts Rinehart award and a Completion Fellowship. He is a Kimbilio fellow. His short story collection, Insurrections (University Press of Kentucky) was published in August 2016 and was chosen for The Rumpus's Book Club. Wolf Tickets is forthcoming from Tiny Hardcore Press. Presently, he teaches English at Bowie State University.
Find him on twitter: @ReeAmilcarScott
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