Professor Vincent Czyz is a Creative Writing professor at The College of New Jersey. We took the time to ask him some questions about his own writing as well as writing in general.
When did you first start writing seriously?
I started writing seriously just after I got a master’s in comparative literature—so I was 23. In fact, I did not pursue a PhD because I didn’t think I’d be able to devote myself to writing and study for a PhD at the same time. Creative writing courses were not popular at that time, and I didn’t take any until many years later.
Tell a little about your book Christos Mosaic.
The Christos Mosaic is my second book. The first, a collection of short stories, is what I call a café book—it’s not a book you speed through. The most important consideration for me was the voice—the language in which the stories were told. The Christos Mosaic is a highbrow thriller that I like to describe as a theological cold case some two thousand years old. Instead of a dead body, however, the mystery involves the origins of Christianity. Unlike the stories in my collection, which were nonlinear narratives, Mosaic is heavily plotted with a lot of twists and turns.
What are your top 3 pieces of advice for young writers?
My advice to young writers is basically two-fold: 1. Read. 2. Write. I can’t stress either one enough. If you are not reading, you will not write well. Indeed, you are going to write what you read. That is, if you are always reading science fiction, you’re going to wind up writing it. If you are reading spy novels, you are going to attempt a spy novel. But you have to read and read and read. For every novel or short story you attempt, you should read a hundred novels or short stories by other authors. And you have to write—all the time. You are only going to find out whether or not you are a writer by writing. By way of a third piece of advice, I would just say that if you are serious about writing, you have to—as Rilke says—“build your life around that necessity.”
How long have you been teaching at TCNJ?
This is my fourth year at TCNJ.
Where did you get your degree in writing?
I got my MFA at Rutgers-Newark University.
What are some of your favorite topics to write about?
I like to write about myth, religion, art, and dreams. Of course, I also enjoy writing a good, old-fashioned tale about human relationships—love, friendship, family, etc.
Are you friends with other authors, if so, how do they help you to become a better writer?
As is the case with any author, many of my friends are also authors. These friendships are valuable for several reasons. One is that you tend to exchange ideas and philosophies about literature and writing. It’s always important to get different perspectives. Another is that you tend to exchange manuscripts and comment on each other’s work—so it’s like workshop outside the school setting. Also, authors I know introduce me to great writers I might otherwise never have discovered. Finally, no one understands your depressions and anxieties about writing like a fellow author!
Do you try to be more original in your writing or give your readers what they want?
With the exception of The Christos Mosaic, I’m far more interested in originality than in giving readers “what they want.” The way I see it, my first loyalty is to the work itself. I try to “listen” to the story as it were, and see how it wants to be told. As a rule, everything else is secondary.
What is your writing process like?
The writing process for me is essentially accretion. I do not outline stories although I know many authors do. For me, there is some image or voice or scene I can’t get out of my head, and I begin writing. This continues until I discover where the story is going. A good example is a short story I wrote while living in Istanbul. One icy night I saw five or six people standing over a body, covered by a sheet of black plastic, at the foot of Galata Tower. For days after I kept imagining the story behind this body, which eventually became a short story called “The Moon Has Fallen into a Well.” In my story a young man jumps from the tower because he feels unloved—in fact, unlovable. I later discovered it had been a 19-year-old girl who leaped off the tower after a fight with her mother. It was published in 2009 by Shenandoah magazine.
What is the biggest trap for aspiring authors?
One trap for young writers is thinking they are going to be authors without reading! It is extremely unlikely that any writer, no matter how talented, is going to write consistently publishable work without reading what has been written (the classics and contemporary standouts) as well as what is currently being written and reviewed. The other is IMPATIENCE. I am regularly astonished by the young writers who think they are going to publish a critically acclaimed novel by the time they hit 25 or 26. For 99.9% of us, that is a fairy tale. Writing is 10% vision and 90% revision. You need to be willing not only to put in that work but also to allow the writing—and yourself—to mature. A decade may pass before you’ve written anything that really reflects your abilities. Another trap is looking for a topic to write about. This is absolutely backwards. For one thing if you have to look around for something to write about, you should probably consider a journalism major. In my experience, stories come looking for authors to voice them, not the other way around. For another, there are no uninteresting subjects, only uninteresting ways of writing about them. In other words the burden falls to you to express your story in a meaningful way that holds the reader’s attention. The subject doesn’t make the book; the writer makes the subject worthy of a book. Did I mention impatience?