#Scurf185: Conversation with Joseph Schreiber

The editor, reviewer and blogger talks to me about his reading habits, key influences and on being the new Essays editor at Minor Literature[s]

Jul 05, 2024

Joseph Schreiber is a writer and photographer based in Calgary, Canada. His reviews and essays have been published on a variety of literary sites and publications including Numéro Cinq, Minor Literature[s], 3:AM and RIC Journal. He maintains the literary blog, roughghosts, and was the Criticism and Nonfiction Editor at 3:AM Magazine.

You can find Joseph on X, Bluesky and read his blog here: Roughghosts.

Recently your blog completed ten years of existence. That’s a remarkable milestone to have achieved. How would you say your writing practice has evolved over these ten years? How did keeping this blog help?

To be honest, I started the blog on a whim, at a moment when I was quite manic and heading for a spectacular breakdown. I thought I might use it as a little writing space, but I had no plans. Then when everything fell apart and I found myself without a job, without adequate mental health support, and so many things I needed to address, I started to write. Most of my early posts were angry missives about workplace stigma against and mental health and my own state of despair. So my first community online was a mental health one. Many of those posts I have since made private. Books started to creep in over time.

My first bookish community back when I was still working was The Guardian. I took part in monthly reading groups and a weekly chat. That’s where I learned to start articulating my responses to the books I read (I don’t have an academic background in literature), and for a while this world and blogging overlapped. When I realized I wanted to write about books primarily, I started to develop a more formal style and began to meet other book bloggers. I then agreed to sit on a shadow jury for what was still called the International Foreign Fiction Prize and that’s when I entered the Twitter sphere and became more serious about my hobby. That very soon led to an invitation to write a review for Numéro Cinq, a (now defunct) journal I idolized and that led to a few years of pitching reviews for publication, writing personal essays, and eventually editing.

Looking back, it happened fast, but I had always done a lot of writing in my volunteer and paid work (newsletters, annual reports, advocacy letters, etc.) because it came naturally and no one else was going to do it. Now I was finally doing “creative” writing as a form of self expression.

What made you choose the title “rough ghosts” for your blog?

Prior to the First World War, a number of sandstone quarries operated along the escarpment that I live above, and the remains of the mining operations and the small settlement that housed the stonemasons who worked at a nearby brick factory can still be found today. At one time, years ago, I sketched a few notes for a possible story about the years of mining and brick manufacturing in this area, or rather, about the rough ghosts that abandoned communities harbour. In searching for a possible name for my blog I happened upon a notebook in which I’d sketched out my idea. I especially liked how roughghosts looked as a single word, but either way, the title has come to symbolize so much that has happened in my life before and since starting this little site.

A lot of your writing on the blog appears to shift between memoir, fiction, criticism, and philosophy. How does your writing engage with these different forms?

If you’re talking about my own writing (as opposed to the kinds of books I write about), there is no fiction. Because I have no education in literature, I do not see myself as a critic in any formal sense, but I do have strong feelings about what I believe a critical review should look like—few if any personal anecdotes “I” statements, only as much detail about content as needed to give a sense of the work or serve as an opening into reading the text, consideration of what makes the work interesting. Also, no spoilers and I never reveal what I personally think is going on if there is any intentional obscurity in the text. I think a review should be well written, enjoyable to read, and give the reader an idea if it might (or might not) be a book for them. Personally, I rarely write about books I strongly dislike—if it’s a book I didn’t get on with what can I say?—but I do tend to share a few honest thoughts on Goodreads.

For myself, writing about books is creative writing. I spend about 6–8 hours or more on each review, typically over several days. I sometimes research a little context or background. And I often try to echo the energy or mood of the text when I write about it. These are things that come from my experience writing for Numéro Cinq. The editor, Douglas Glover, sent me a set of guidelines when I joined the masthead there that have become a bible for me in the formal reviews I’ve written for journals, as an editor, and when I’ve been invited to speak about reviewing and editing (something that seems to happen every time I visit India). For my blog I am somewhat less strict with myself, I allow myself to bend or play with rules, but I still take it very seriously.

Occasionally, I write little essay/memoir pieces. A kind of thinking out loud. I keep them quite limited. These have included short travel pieces, thoughts about my cardiac arrest, my parents’ deaths, and my gender identity. Sometimes I just need to write my way through a bit of a low space, but my boundaries are always very high. In a world that seems to be increasingly intolerant there are many things I don’t like to talk about too much anymore. Enough that it has sort of put my own memoir project on indefinite hold.

Through your blog and also most of your photographs, you seem to present the present moment in the modern age as a site of profound contradictions and paradoxes, both at the personal and public level. Could you talk about these tensions?

If that comes through in my blog, I’m surprised. As I’ve just indicated, I find myself more cautious about what I say, in person and online. I feel more and more vulnerable, and I don’t think I’m alone in that. I have always tended to be somewhat oblique in what I chose to say or share, implying and opening up ideas in way that does not exactly hide what I think, but avoids being preachy or too revealing (I hope).

On a personal level, I live in the most conservative, right wing, and increasingly authoritarian province in Canada. The levels of racism, sexism, homophobia/transphobia, conspiracy theory, and disrespect for any kind of accepted or expert advice is frightening, so I think I would say that one must balance the public and the personal when the repercussions are real—or, perhaps, chose one’s battles carefully. That is what I try to do.

In what ways do you think reading widely shapes our understanding of the modern experience?

I think reading international literature (in translation or otherwise) is the best way to understand realities apart from the one you live in—whether it’s a different culture, social class, era of history, and so on. But, at the same time, if one is an open (or distractable) reader, there is the opportunity to find oneself falling down rabbit holes and seeking to learn more about places, people or subjects you might never have stumbled on. Reading can open a continually expanding universe if you let it.

Of course, even if someone always wants to have a reliable, familiar experience within a preferred genre, so be it. I think it’s good to see people reading no matter what they read because it engages the imagination in a way other entertainment mediums don’t.

Can you describe your ideal reading experience (when, where, what, how)? Or where you’re writing from now?

Not sure I have one. I tend to wake late and stay up into the early hours of the morning and I have a hard time relaxing enough to focus on reading or writing until evening. So, I do read or work in my room much of the time where it’s quieter and the light is better.

Mind you, I never go anywhere without a book in case I might have to wait!

You go on long walks during the debilitating Canadian winter and also in good weather. Could you say a little bit about the role that this walking plays in your work?

First of all, we don’t have many really cold days and this is a dry climate, so humidity is generally low and that makes a difference, hot or cold. Walking doesn’t play any particular role in my work, other than as stress release. I was diagnosed with some marginal bone loss just before the pandemic and at that point my casual walking became daily walks or runs. I live above this amazing forest and have a wealth of options for short or longer walks. I occasionally listen to the radio or podcasts when I’m out or, if really stressed, music, but most of the time I just let my mind wander and listen to the birds.

Do you have any key influences or texts that you return to?

Michel Leiris is probably the only one. I first read him nine years ago or so, when I was still imagining I might write a memoirish work. He pioneered a distinctive form of autobiographical writing that went on to influence other well-known writers of memoir or auto-fiction, most of whom I don’t like. He was not only a fascinating man, he wrote honestly about the question of what one can really say about one’s self—and what one should refrain from saying about others.

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How do you adjust with social media and do you think it has a role to play in your writing?

I had no real involvement on social media until I started blogging. I was in my mid-fifties by then and I’m so glad it did not exist when my kids were growing up. But since then, Twitter (or X) has made all the difference for me. It has connected me to other readers, reviewers, translators, and publishers. It has opened up opportunities to write, edit and travel. I am less engaged with Facebook and Instagram, keeping accounts there primarily to maintain contact with folks who are not anywhere else (and some family). I mostly post the odd picture on those sites. Bluesky is kind of isolated but I should try to be more active there. I don’t know how some people seem to clone themselves to have presence everywhere!

Twitter still has quite a viable literary community even if it can get a little snobbish at times. It drives traffic to my blog and it leads to an unfortunate number of impulse book purchases! However, I also value it politically, internationally and locally, because for all it’s faults, one can find information that mainstream media will not (or cannot) report, and one can connect with like-minded people. I mean, it works that way on both sides of the spectrum, but that’s where following, liking and blocking comes into play. Last, but not least, I love seeing beautiful scenery and all those feelgood videos with dancing parrots or acts of kindness and I don’t care if they are staged or not.

How was it working as an editor with the 3:AM Magazine? Any writers you absolutely loved working with and publishing?

When I started at 3:AM there was a large team and I worked closely with a friend. Then everything fell apart and I stayed on. But I ended up on my own and I wasn’t very disciplined at saying no. I did meet some amazing writers, and I did enjoy taking on a few challenging pieces that needed a lot of work. I’ve worked with many writers who have gone on to publish books or collect an impressive array of bylines and I’m proud and happy for each one. However, when the pandemic hit, everyone was suddenly at home writing pandemic essays and I was inundated with a daily volume of submissions that was insane. Add to that some medication changes that year and I burned out. So, for a long time I retreated to my blog to recover and figure out where I want to go, if anywhere, from here.

You’ve been vocal about your struggle with mental illness. Do you think your writing and reading practices help you in some way with that?

I have been open about having a mood disorder, but I actually don’t talk about it too much. It’s a very difficult thing to talk about. The most honest piece I have ever written was published in an anthology called Trauma and I am not entirely comfortable with it being out there.

As for my illness itself, I am fortunate to be stable now though I worry about long-term support. There’s also a lot of grief and loss associated with living with a disability and I’m not sure I will ever sort it out, or if I want to write about all I’ve been through.

What’s in the offing for you?

I've accepted an offer to join Minor Literature[s] as Essays Editor starting soon. I'm really excited about returning to editing; I think I was beginning to lose some of my personal confidence or a sense that I was contributing to a literary conversation in a meaningful way. I have gotten away from any writing of my own beyond my blog of late and I expect that the opportunity to engage with other writers and their work, as well as having the support of a real team of great writers at the journal itself, is what I need at this time.

As an essays or nonfiction editor, what is it that you're looking for in a piece of writing? What makes for good creative nonfiction writing? Any writers you've worked with earlier whose work you admire?

It's easier to tell you what I don't like. I dislike the term "Creative Nonfiction." I have always taken great care when preparing written material whether it has been legal advocacy letters for clients, scientific technical information for general audiences, newsletters for individuals with cognitive impairments or whatever—a measure of creativity is always involved in good writing.

Essay is my preferred term, thinking of course, of a literary essay, and for Minor Lits, as for 3:AM, I am always looking for something interesting, something different—in subject, approach, voice. I've read lots of well composed essays that, if I ask myself “could this run anywhere?” and the answer is “yes” it might as well run anywhere else. When I read a submission and there is something in it that I want, that I think belongs in the publication I am editing for, I get excited. I want it, even if it might take a little work with the author to get it into shape.

When it comes to writers I've worked with, I remember some of my favourite essays, some of the most rewarding editing experiences and, unfortunately, some of the worst as well. I wouldn't want to single anyone out and in some cases I don't necessarily remember names. But it has been nice to see some people, like yourself, go on to publish in interesting venues or even publish books. I always feel proud of the successes of writers I've worked with; I don't get jealous. I often think that the best part of editing is that I get to work with words and language, and sometimes really help pull a great idea together, but I don't have to do the really hard work of coming up with all the words myself!

Who is your favourite author(s) and why do you admire them?

Aside from Michel Leiris, there are some writers and poets I really like but it’s always shifting. I am often more influenced by translators whose instincts I trust to lead me to interesting work, or publishers I especially like. And, of course, there are always review copies coming in though I try to limit what I agree to consider. I think there are probably more authors I think I should read one of these days and certainly no shortage of books on my shelves or in piles on the floor, so it doesn’t leave much room to compulsively read or return to books I have already read.

What are you currently reading?

I just finished I Saw Ramallah by the late Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti. It’s a memoir originally published in 1998 that is incredibly timely. I have always read a lot of Palestinian writing, but it is more pressing than ever now. I’m also getting into a lot of Hungarian literature lately for some reason, so I’ve been reading a short story collection by Zsolt Láng called The Birth of Emma K. Then, I have a few books to read for review—that is something that directs a lot of my reading choices, but it often leads me to books/authors I might not have found on my own.

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