Maya Dardel

- Sure, whatever you prefer to call it.

The human situation, or the American nightmare

that's become the international nightmare,

or love, or extreme awareness, or,

this interview is live, right?

I'd like to change the subject 45 degrees,

if you don't mind, um, we only have a few more minutes.

Okay, right.

I'd like to start a rumor.

With some luck, a few young writers listen

to this broadcast, and they can spread

the rumor to their friends and enemies.

Mm, now, now don't take this the wrong way.

What I'm about to say is not a cry for help.

It's not in any way connected to, or interested in,

the politics of victimhood, and if anyone receives

it that way, all the worse for him.

What I'd like to say is, I'm going to kill myself.

Please don't interrupt me.

I am going to end the life of Maya Dardel.

My work is in decline.

I, I see no need to birth a few more mediocre books

and then finally in my 70s and 80s squirt

out a few more abortions as embarrassing as,

it's disrespectful to name names.

The point is, euthanasia.

It's the thing to do.

I don't have any family,

so I'm going to need an heir and an executor.

So I'm going to be interviewing youngish writers here,

at my house, in Los Gatos, California,

for this position, starting now.

Right, right and the guy I pick gets

my house and my archives and publishing rights,

all my knickknacks and dishes

and music and books when I'm gone.

Hm.

So anybody talented and capable

can email me by emailing the Ithurburn agency.

My agent's name is Lucas Marcy, Lucas m-a-r-cy.

Mm hmm, yep, Luc's thrilled, death's lucrative.

Um.

Of course I'm serious.

Don't be narrow-minded.

I want young but professional, published writers of poetry,

but I'd consider a poetic novelist or essayist.

Also, also, women need not apply.

Well because I don't like women's writing.

Yes.

No, no.

Dickinson yes, some of it.

No, no.

Wolfe was a man.

No, no, George Elliot was a man.

Yes, no.

Sontag, Sontag was entirely a guy.

I know, I slept with her.

So any of you young men out there,

if you think you're it,

go ahead and look up my agent, yes?

- I can show you my work right now here.

Leave it on the floor.

I probably should've had you email me some

of your work before you drove all the way up here.

- Right, I can, I can send you some from my phone right now.

- Put that back. They disgust me.

Phones?

Other people's phones.

- Right, totally, no, I totally understand that.

They're like, other people's phones.

You know, they touch your ear.

They have like wax on them,

other people's girlfriends' photos on them.

- Tell me with extreme candor what you think of your talent.

- Totally, I can. Talk about that.

Um.

Done.

What?

- No you just, you just have to know.

Know what?

- Do you have a bathroom I could use?

- I don't like other people in my bathroom.

It's cool.

What do you think of me?

- I love your work, I love shadow, twenty-seven fold.

- I meant what do you think of me physically?

- Physically? - Mm.

I'm not really, um.

Be candid, Moses.

Candid?

Very.

I'm not really comfortable.

Who's comfortable?

Just be honest.

- What, do I think you're a good-looking woman?

Yes.

I mean, yeah.

- But uglier than women your age.

I'm a good piece of fruit too long in the fridge.

That's, isn't that, like.

But good-looking enough.

At least as I sit here across from you in what appears

to be some kind of impenetrable Artemis state,

enough that you're probably wondering what

it'd be like to command me, strip me.

Strip you?

Men are this kind of machine.

Women my age have the last outer crust

of our prettiness left, and that can be

combined with haughtiness or real superiority.

Until a young man badly wants to break that outer crust.

He wants to prove this and that

to himself, and the middle-aged woman.

But you see, the woman's unwise if she

allows herself to be stripped.

The thing about Artemis is that,

is that her nakedness in the pool in the woods,

when Actaeon sees her, yes?

Um, yeah.

- Her nakedness is not just a myth

about the virginity of maidens.

It's a myth also about the final,

brittle sex appeal of older women.

If you were to see me naked,

like Actaeon, you would have to die.

You're a mature man, correct?

Yeah.

- You're not one of these immature fumblers,

one of these boys who can't find the clitoris?

- Like a, sorry, a woman's clitoris?

Come here.

Nearly any experience is good for a writer.

The same can't be said for those who don't write.

Yeah I actually brought

my work, I'd like to show you.

Come, sit.

You want me

to sit next to you on the couch?

Here.

Here?

Exactly.

Okay.

Here?

Okay.

Sorry, I'm.

Take off my tights.

You're surprisingly not bad at that.

Thanks.

- Would you like to show me your poems?

But first go clean your face.

Should I just use the sink?

- Mm. - Okay.

- To save us time why don't you just show me what

you're certain is your best work in that binder.

My best?

Mm.

You read it to me.

- Holy shit, um, that's the title.

Holy shit, this Campbell's soup

is tasty, though it, come, though.

Holy shit this Campbell's soup is tasty,

though come to think of it, it tastes like nothing

plus the idea of Warhol with his super creepy friends,

so many more than I have, speaking fondly of the times

they all had doing nothing, doing nothing,

doing nothing, doing nothing, making a Hamlet sandwich

I have to make for myself, because I have no friends.

- I'm adjuncting a composition course

at Hartwick college in the spring.

That's in New York, the Catskills, mm,

I got my MFA last year, from the Iowa writers workshop.

And I'm the editor-in-chief of a small magazine, a Webzine.

I went to Iowa.

Did you?

- Back when everyone smoked cigarettes and nobody got aids.

- Okay, there wouldn't be any kind

of legal complications, would there?

What I mean is, when you, if you select me.

I'll be far away with an alibi.

I don't mean to be rude,

I just think it's best to be up front.

You don't expect me to be here, to help you?

This is not the process.

What?

- The process, it's not the process.

What's the process?

First we talk about your work,

and then I, I was probably...

- well that stuff that I sent you is actually quite old.

I just sent it because it seems

to do well with the editors of magazines.

I'd like to show you what I'm writing currently.

Show me.

It's uh, it's an epic poem.

Or well, considering that idea.

It's uh, well, better to show you.

Cimputer, hmm?

Ever been to the Tate modern in London?

No.

- But you've been to modern art museums.