Interview I did with Venezuelan newspaper today

1. Your texts tend to be – perhaps ironically – sober, straightforward, precise. Many have said they are minimalist. Does this respond to a time in which we are constantly showered with too much information? Are your texts a way of saying that we need to communicate just enough?

Some of my writing, like Shoplifting from American Apparel, is minimalist and conversational, but I also have writing, like in Taipei, that is florid and in long, complex sentences that I would never say in person. I think both convey, on average, around the same amount of information. Ten short, concrete sentences can convey more than three long, abstract sentences, I think. Books seem to me generally to be good at counteracting having too much information coming at us, since it's hard to multitask reading a book and doing other things.

2. The use of drugs – mainly adderall, xanax and mushrooms – has been very present in your writings, be them fictional or not. Should some drugs be tolerated, even promoted, for certain activities or chores? Are there any drugs we should be particularly concerned with?

I feel open to using any drug, in the same way I feel open to doing anything. I think I'm concerned with being damaged by drugs and getting addicted to drugs in a way that is detrimental to my life. I've been addicted to cannabis for years but I think it's helped my life more than it has harmed my life. I was addicted to Adderall for years and I think it harmed my life more than it helped my life. Generally, it seems that natural drugs are less harmful than synthetic drugs. Synthetic drugs have the additional negative of being made by corporations, who aren't concerned about our well being when inventing new drugs, but are focused on profits, in my view.

 3. As a writer whose texts are usually autobiographical, is there really any sort of writing that is not even minimally autobiographical? Do we all leave stamps of our personalities and traumas in what we communicate, no matter how fantastic? Can we understand a work of art without knowledge of the artist’s experiences?

I would argue that some texts are more autobiographical than others. J.K. Rowling might put some details from her life in her Harry Potter books, but I wouldn't call her writing autobiographical. My definition of "autobiographical writing" is writing that is mostly based on events in one's life. Probably 95% of fiction includes feelings the author has experienced, but I wouldn't call books that just include the author's feelings autobiographical. I like autobiographical writing in part because you can know the artist's experiences and the artist's art in the same book, without having to read a biography of the author. It makes the text more charged and complex to me.

4. To many people around the globe, it might seem normal for a New Yorker to write about existential angst, suicidal thoughts and feelings of hopelessness. After all, the city that never sleeps is the city of the anonymous. Nonetheless, in Caracas, many friends have found the atmosphere of Taipei extremely familiar. Do you believe that your concerns about mental health correspond to the main concerns of today’s youth?

I do, to some degree. I think people over the past 12,000 years have gotten increasingly toxified, physically and mentally, and that it's an exponential rise, with the toxification probably more than doubling in just the past few decades. This causes a lot of dysfunction. My characters have always felt cursed and/or poisoned, and they are, by culture like TV and magazines, and by chemicals like pesticides and bovine growth hormones. This leads to mental health problems.

5. In Latin America, literature and politics tend to go hand in hand. Historically, most of our continent’s most important novelists and poets have also been statesmen. I believe this has not generally been the case in the US – of course there are politicians that write, but your most renowned writers have not been politicians. How much, do you think, should a writer be involved in politics? Are literature and politics poles of the same sphere, or should they be treated as different areas?

I like that in Latin America novelists and poets have been politicians. I'm not sure why that doesn't happen in the U.S. In the U.S., politicians get bought by corporations, and many writers write against corporations. In the U.S., a novelist and a politician seem kind of like opposites. A politician has to lie all the time in ways that simplify reality, while a novelist tries to tell complex truths. I don't think writers should or shouldn't be involved in politics, but that having a range of writers could be good, like some who don't care at all about politics, and some that do. Personally, I've fluctuated through my career in how much I care about politics, and my definition of politics has also changed. In the past few years, I've been more interested in being a "holistic writer" (a term I made up), a writer who doesn't block out any aspect of existence, but tries to integrate it into my books and life.

6. Are there any Latin American authors you could consider among your influences? If so, which ones and why?

Fernando Pessoa, who I know isn't Latin American but who does write in Portuguese, is one of my favorite writers and has influenced me. I've always been attracted to detachment, melancholy, and resignation, and Pessoa seems like a master of those things. He also has a sense of humor while discussing his own detachment and sadness, which I like.

7. You recently created a Patreon “for any nonfiction that would be hard to get published at most places due to the content.” Which type of content do you consider particularly difficult to publish in the US, a country historically known for valuing free speech?

Content going against the government's story of 9/11. Content that suggests ways to make vaccines safer. Content that suggests the CIA and/or other government groups with secret projects are still using false flag operations, psychological operations, and MKULTRA-like experiments on a large scale. Content that suggests there is such a thing as "mainstream media" in which there isn't free speech, but in which certain topics can't be discussed due to pharmaceutical influence through advertising money, Operation Mockingbird-esque CIA intervention, and other reasons.