This week, The
Writers' Lens is giving away a talk of deceit and desperation. A story that is
shadowy, slapstick, and surreal as it follows one man's "ordeal from the
opulence of his Central West End parlor to the dark, grim graveyard in this
fantasy novel by award-winning author Marcel Toussaint.
Marcel Toussaint published his first book in the 90’s, Remember
Me Young, a collection of poems written over his many years. His poems are also
featured in fourteen anthologies, including America at the Millennium. He has
read on various radio and TV stations including National
Public Radio and the Education channel. In
early 2009, Toussaint entered the National Veterans Poetry Awards competition
and won gold medals in the categories of Patriotic, Personal Humorous. His poem
in the Patriotic category is featured in the National Veterans Poetry Anthology.
Toussaint won an award for his two poems entries at the St. Louis Writers Guild Poetry Throwdown at the Focal Point in St. Louis in 2010. He has been a
featured poet at the Observable Readings, at the Missouri of Modern Arts
Museum, Poetry Per Chance at Washington University to name a few events. A
selection of his poems have been published in Korean, in Wilderness January
2011. Toussaint writes in English, French and Spanish and has been translated
to Dutch, German, Catalan, Korean. He has read his poetry in Paris at the Club
des Poetes and in Valencia, Spain 2008. The poet reads his poetry at various
open mikes in the Metropolitan area.
His new
novel Terms of Interment, came out
October 2011.
Poetry of a Lifetime, was published in 2009.
Marcel
Toussaint represented The Saint Louis VA at The National Veterans Creative Arts
Nationals in Fayetteville, Arkansas October 2011 and brought back a National
Gold Medal Poetry. He was selected to perform his entry in costume on stage and
the show was videotaped to be run on PBS in November 2012.
HOW DO YOU WIN A
FREE COPY OF TERMS OF INTERMENT?
To enter the contest, simply leave a comment or question on the Writers'
Lens blog between now (May 21) and midnight May 26, 2012. Please include
your email so we can reach you if you win. The more comments you leave, the
greater your chance of winning the contest. If you refer others to The Writer's Lens who mention your name
in their comments, I'll enter your name again in our random number generator
along with theirs, also increasing your chances at winning! The winner will be
chosen after midnight on Saturday, May 26, and the announcement made on Sunday,
May 27. Good luck and comment often.
An
interview with Marcel Toussaint:
The Writers' Lens: When you are starting to work on a novel,
what do you find brings the story into focus for you? A Character? A setting?
Something else?
Marcel Toussaint: A human interest
will be most motivating. I do observe
all that surrounds me at all times. I try to be very discreet about it. The
smallest spark can become a novel. I often write a novel within a month and a
half. Preparing for eventual publication takes more time than that. So I read
and re-read the manuscript, inventing more scenes and embellishing as I
go. There comes the time when the novel
has to be assumed completed, and there it goes to the editor. I do not follow
what I have been taught! I write in scenes and this allows for the placing of them
where I find them to be best suited. I do not follow an outline from A to
Z. I may have the ending before even
writing the beginning. Many scenes in
between are written as they come up to my mind. Fresh ideas move me
immediately.
WL: What brings your poetry into focus?
MT: Oddly enough, I
often write a title for a poem and then write the poem. Since I write poetic
portraits, anyone who strikes my curiosity by his deportment or conversation is
a very motivating subject for writing. In some instances just an interesting
nature scene or event will wake up my muse and influence me.
WL: What themes in your fiction writing seem to drive you the most? Are
they the same with your poetry?
MT: I get all wrapped up
in unusual characters and I build a story around them. The characters could
develop into a mini story for a poem, a short story, or a novel. It depends on the strength of events that
develop in my mind as the writing progresses. If I see that there are many
meandering possibilities in the process, it becomes a novel.
WL: Do you work on multiple projects at once? If so, how many?
MT: Definitively. I
wrote three novels at the same time when the three ideas came to mind at about
the same time. One of the novels
typically will take up most of my time while the other two give me a change of
pace for my thoughts, away from the primary novel. Ideas cannot be wasted; they must be used
immediately.
WL: How easy was it to take the leap of faith to become a serious writer
and chase this career? What did you find that you had to do to take the step?
MT: Having written and
drawn from the age of twelve, it has been an ongoing passion. I did it at first
for pleasure and curiosity. Then I graduated to get attention and see how
creative my writing could be. Eventually I wanted to collect my poetry and
novels to hopefully display a substantial accomplishment. This progressive
passion took me into many courses in writing to see if I was up with the
changing times. Looking back, my first publication was at the age of twelve
with a series of cards in a fourfold featuring a small drawing on the front
page. U.S. soldiers began to notice my cards as they came to our house for a
family dinner. They initiated me on the
mimeograph processes and facilitated my budding business in buying my cards. The cards were done on a waxed paper and put
into one of those marvelous print repeaters. Business was good at twelve in
Morocco. Many years later, I took a
course about being published at Meramec Junior College here in Saint
Louis. The course was so grand that I
presented my poetry to various anthologies.
After an initial rejection, I ended up in fourteen publications within a
year or so, following the steps I had been taught in the course.
WL: When you plot your novels, from whose point of view do you plot from?
The protagonist’s? The antagonist’s? The narrator’s? Some one else?
MT: I have written five
novels. I would say I have covered all
those bases. It depends on the individual story.
WL: What was your biggest fear when you decided to first be published as a
novelist or a poet? Do you still have
those fears with each new book or are there other fears that come up?
MT: I have been very
fortunate. Editors of university journals, book editors and publishers have all
shown interest in my poetry. I have more fears presenting my work to contests.
Judges have likes and dislikes and are very set in their ways. Many of them feel grandiose at deciding if a
poem will make it to the finish line or not. They favor the style they approve
irrespective of the quality of the poems.
Some of them have so many excuses for eliminating an entry for some
ridiculous detail whether the title is in bold or you used the “old” accepted
way of capitalizing the major letters of the title. One judge just did not
accept poems centered on the page! So eliminating those poems and again keeping
the fee! No contest I have looked into
has ever mentioned such rules! The interesting thing is they keep your entry
fee but trash your poem without reading it! Some contest like obscured poetry! I
wonder what is the use to write something that no one will want to read past a
few verses? My French professors insisted on clear well written verses that, in
those days rhymed, that made sense and were part of a well constructed poem.
WL: What is your writing schedule like?
MT: I write when I feel
like it. This means continuously. Any
idea is immediately put to paper, even while driving. I just make quick notes at stoplights and
during traffic stops, using my steering wheel as a writing desk. This later helps
me recall what is important for a story or a character. I get up in the middle
of the night when an idea dawns and write for hours, before going back to sleep
in the early morning hours.
WL: If you could have coffee (or drink of your choice) with four other
authors from any time period, who would you choose and why?
MT: Verlaine and
Baudelaire, because some of my verses, I am told, trigger their works in the
minds of my readers. Moliere for his comedy and De la Fontaine for his fables
that are mini stories, much like my poems.
WL: How could our readers learn more about you?
MT: To know a writer is
to read his works. Poetry of a Lifetime is an autobiography that my editor,
Linda Dahlheimer, commissioned me to assemble under her watchful eye. She was most interested to find that my
life’s time line was parallel with my poetry time line. She found the poems
that were most conducive to be included in the publication. Her creative
insight is superb. She insisted that a
photo album be included along with some of my quotations. Terms of Internment, also edited by Linda, I
wrote with the collaboration of Cyrus Pars.
Both can be found at www.nacgpress.com. My business card, which I regularly hand out,
includes a QR code that can be scanned to reach the publisher’s site.
Thank you Marcel for your interview.
And thank you for
reading and please visit www.davidalanlucas.com
and www.thewriterslens.com.
You can also follow me on twitter @Owlkenpowriter and the Writer’s Lens
@TheWritersLens. Fiction is the world where the philosopher is the most free in
our society to explore the human condition as he chooses.
Meet award-winning children's author and illustrator Susann Batson from 10 a.m. to noon, Saturday, June 2, at:
Gilly discovers that adventures in the ocean can make a fantail goldfish quite seasick. 
Star friends help Sparkie overcome his fear of the dark by sharing and caring. This book also teaches counting One to Five.
