I had the privilege of interviewing Victoria Chang, a notable poet, author, and editor.
Victoria Chang’s forthcoming book of poems, With My Back to the World will be published in 2024 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux and Corsair Books in the U.K. Her most recent book of poetry, The Trees Witness Everything was published by Copper Canyon Press and Corsair Books in the U.K. in 2022, and was named one of the Best Books of 2022 by the New Yorker and The Guardian.
Her nonfiction book, Dear Memory (Milkweed Editions), was published in 2021 and was named a favorite nonfiction book of 2021 by Electric Literature and Kirkus. OBIT (Copper Canyon Press, 2020), her most recent poetry book, was named a New York Times Notable Book, a Time Must-Read Book, and received the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Poetry, and the PEN/Voelcker Award. It was also longlisted for a National Book Award and named a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Griffin International Poetry Prize. She has also received a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Chowdhury Prize in Literature.
She lives in Los Angeles and is a Faculty member within Antioch’s low-residency MFA Program.
Questions:
1. Can you please share what it was like growing up in West Bloomfield, Michigan and what your family life was like as a child?
I have both good memories and not so great memories of growing up in West Bloomfield, Michigan. I had a lot of fun growing up surrounded by nature, but I found the weather to be a bit cold for me! Also, there weren’t a lot of Chinese/Taiwanese people where we lived and so I felt very isolated.
2. I loved your children’s book Is Mommy?. What was your favorite childhood book?
Nancy Drew and also I loved Trixie Belden books. I liked mysteries. I also loved reading comics–Archie and also Mad Magazine. I liked reading Chinese comics too, Lao Fu Zi.
3. If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?
To think of writing as a practice, a way of life. And that for some of us, writing is just a part of who we are.
4. What made you decide to major in Asian studies at Michigan?
Originally, it was to learn more about my family’s history. Later, I realized perhaps I wasn’t interested in the field as a scholar, but I learned a lot and enjoyed it.
5. Immigrant parents typically want their children to pursue traditional careers such as law or medicine. Were your parents supportive of your writing career?
My parents definitely encouraged me to figure out a way to support myself, especially my mother who was quite the feminist, I think. She often said: “Don’t rely on anyone else. Make your own money.” She also noticed I liked drawing and writing, so I was always (it seemed to me), taking art classes all growing up. Then she noticed I liked writing, so I was encouraged to write. I never thought of pursuing a writing path because I didn’t know one could be a writer. It was only recently, maybe in 2017, when I received the Guggenheim Fellowship, that I decided that maybe I should focus a little more on writing. I’ve always written, but it was never quite a primary focus. I needed a little encouragement.
6. This past Christmas I interviewed my nai nai for my oral history project on my blog to document the lives of impactful women. I thought I knew everything about my nai nai as she is my grandmother, but the interview revealed hidden gems about her life. Your collection of literary letters and mementos in Dear Memory explores these themes of identity, reflection, and self discovery. How do you think putting together this collection has impacted your understanding of your family history?
I think writing Dear Memory made me realize how much I didn’t know and that’s interesting in itself. I became more interested in the unknowable, the unsayable. For me, that’s what writing is.
7. How has being the daughter of immigrant parents impacted your voice as a writer?
I think it’s probably the main reason why I am a writer. I think I was/am a creative person and am interested in a lot of things. But the difficulty of growing up Asian American in the midwest, with immigrant parents, definitely gave me more material to write about and think about.
8. How has your writing empowered you?
When everything else feels out of my control, especially as a BIPOC woman, I think writing makes me feel like I have agency.
9. How does it feel to be a role model for young women?
It feels great! I didn’t have any role models myself so to think of myself as a role model now, is quite moving. Sometimes when I travel, young Asian Americans come up to me and tell me how much it means to them to “see” someone that looks like them in my field/area of interest. Sometimes they cry. I feel very moved by those experiences.
10. What has been your greatest accomplishment?
Hmmm. That’s a hard one. I think maybe a more abstract answer is to stay true to who I am. Both as a person and also as an artist. I’m pretty unconventional in many ways. Most of the time, I feel a bit out of sync with the rest of the world. I think I’ve learned to lean into those differences. To be my different self. To write differently.
11. Last summer I took a course on the decolonization of feminism, and I remember watching Kimberlé Crenshaw’s TED talk on intersectionality. My favourite quote from her talk was, “if we can’t see a problem, we can’t fix a problem,” which I think complements the idea from bell hooks of conversations as a way to spark change. Your poetry in Barbie Chang analyzes themes of being a woman, being Asian, and living in a patriarchal society. How did your experience as a woman of color inform your exploration of feminism?
I’m impressed you’ve engaged with all of this material! I felt all of these things growing up but didn’t have the vocabulary to express my feelings. As I got older and learned more, read more, saw more, talked to other people, I learned to listen to that inner voice and then express myself. For me, it’s been through poetry. So yes, I can’t divorce my own background from my art. It is my art.
12. How do you use your stories to heal and to effect change?
I know that writing is important. I think it can change the world. I know that just being who I am in terms of background and being a writer, makes a difference. When I write, do I think about these things? Probably not, but subconsciously, it’s always in the back of my head. I just wrote a long poem about the expulsion of Chinese people in the town of Eureka. That felt important to me.
13. The indigenous activist Sisa Quispe and aboriginal activist Sasha Sarago both delve into the importance of reconnecting with our heritage in order to love ourselves, and that colonization is the reason why we often try to reject our cultures. Colonization has also caused our Eurocentric standards to deny us to see “the beauty in diversity.” Quispe tells us that we need to all realise that “we all have indigenous roots somewhere” in order to understand that all of us are interconnected. What are some ways we can challenge post-colonial beauty standards?
I love this and I agree with it. Exposure. Persistence. Grit. Speaking up. I refuse to give up. I’ve refused to give up in the face of challenges. When I first started writing poems, no one looked like me, or very few people. I had a lot of doors closed in my face. But I knew that if I just kept on writing and writing in an interesting and different way, maybe eventually people would see the value of our work. I also worked hard to build a community that was diverse. I often say that community is my poetics. I’d like to look back and be proud of the work I did to help diversify literature and the literary world.
14. Who has had the most significant impact on who you are today?
My parents, of course! And also my teachers. I had a few stellar English teachers in my life. Ruth Leinweber at WBHS. And Jim Corcoran at WBHS. Then several more professors at the University of Michigan who introduced me to poetry. Laurence Goldstein was important to me. Lucie Brock-Broido at Harvard. All amazing teachers and amazing people.