4
street roots
Aug. 29, 2014
Our long,
hot sum m er
Portland author B en Parzybok’s latest
work, “Sherwood Nation, ” is a science
fiction novel set in a fu tu re blighted by
clim ate change
BY SUE ZALOKAR
STAFF W R IT E R
-
en Parzybok’s first novel, ^Couch”
rose from the primordial sludge of
the slush pile at Small Beer Press in
2008. Next month, Parzybok’s second novel,
“Sherwood Nation” will be released. He will
be reading at. 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept 16
at PoweU’s Books on Burnside.
Parzybok’s creative trajectory seems to
confirm Newton’s first law of motion: an
object in motion tends to stay in motion.
Part of that may be that he and his partner,
writer and Street Books founder Laura
Moulton do a remarkable job at keeping up
with their artistic pursuits as well as two
curious children. The other part? Parzybok
set himself in creative motion years ago and
aside from the distraction of fatherhood,
hasn’t stopped since.
He is keen on thoughtful, artistic
projects, most of which have a socially just
bent. He is the creator of Gumball Poetry, a
now-defunct journal published through
gumball machines. He was a member of the
Black Magic Insurance Agency, a team-
based city-wide treasure hunt, in true James
Bond-esque caper, high-tech mystery style,
Parzybok is?, a self-proclaimed technology
geek with Luddite tendencies'. He is a
developer and runs a
outside society sees them as really
startup called Walker
dangerous, but inside? Half the work they
Tracker, a narrative,
are doing is social logistics: making sure
map-based walking
people have water and that everybody has
challenge for large
power because they’re all stealing power off
groups, including cities,
the grid. It’s really fascinating. So I wanted
universities,
to play with that (idea) a bit.
corporations and large
I also am really interested and fascinated
organizations.
by history. For example, the city of Rome
Whereas Parzybok’s
collapsed in a day. It was besieged, it fell,
first novel, “Couch,”
the city was ransacked. But that empire
explored the seemingly
went through several hundred years of this
mundane task of
sort of slow post-collapse period.
carrying a couch across
I think (the idea for) the drought came
town, his latest novel,
accidentally. I am very interested in
“Sherwood Nation,”
environmental and water issues of course.
examines the function
But it was also a wonderful way to portray
and structure of
how we might manage as a society and how
governments, and in it
we might reform and recombine and create '
he hypothesizes about
new governments in the sort of situation
what might happen if
where the government is gone* We can’t
governments and people
rely on the United States government or
don’t react to our
even state or local. We have to combine to
changing global climate.
build our own city*
The book is a Robin-
Hood like, post-apocalyptic, drought story j |
S.Z.: You recently participated in the %
set in the Portland biosphere.
American Library Associations conference in
■
Ben Parzybok will
be reading at 7:30
p.m., Tuesday,
Sept. 16 at
Powell’s Books on
Burnside.
S u e Z alok ar: What motivated you to write
your second novel, “Sherwood Nation?”
Las Vegas, Nev. One o f the events involved you
and other authors reading from banned books.
(Banned Book Week is Sept 21-27). What book
did you read from?
PH O T O J O D I D A R B Y
language. It’s one of those books that is
crazy that it is banned because it could help
so many people. It’s an incrèdible book.
The incredible dichotomy he pajnts
between living on the-res and trying to fit
in, in the white school where he is actually
having success, but it feels false to him in
some way.
! It should be more read and taught in
school. It’s really so close to the immigrant
experience.
I just read “Cajas de Carton” by Francisco
Jiménez. He’s a brilliant writer. He came I
illegally across the border when he was 3
with his parents. His parents were dirt poor
and they’re giving birth in their shack. And
yet he’s going and actually excelling in
school. His father is sort of super dismissive
of anything he is doing in school and is
pulling him out to do farm labor.
S.Z.: You have an affinity fo r computers
an d technology. Tell u s about that..
B.P.: I suppose there is some irony in j
that. In the world ôf “Sherwobd Nation”
there is essentially no electronic technology
whatsoever. Maybe it was sort of wishful
thinking.
I have a complicated relationship with
technology. I’ve been very addicted to it off
and bn. I’m a programmer for pay and I run
a software startup.
I feel like technology is changing me in
ways that I’m not entirely comfortable with.
The effects of it are the antithesis of
slowing down, or being thoughtful or being a
deep thinker.
B e n Parzybok: There were a lot of little
seeds.
B.P.: I Chose Sherman Alexie’s “The
- I technically started the book in Brazil.
Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time
We had gone there for a family wedding and
Indian.”
it ended up being a rather long stay. We
. were there for six or eight weeks and I was
S.Z.: How can that be banned?
there alone for the last two weeks. I toured
some favelas — very crazy, anarchic,
B.P.: I know. It’s banned all over. I think
enclaves, really. They are sort of their own
1 it’s partially because there are a number of -
S.Z.: You also have a creative, diverse web
nations inside the city.
masturbation scenes in there. You know
presence. B randing oneself as an artist isn ’t
You go in with this impression of what
how lethal that i s ...
easy, but it is important.
(the experience of walking through a favela)
is going to be Jike and end up with a k
S.Z.: I don’t know anyone who masturbates.
B.P.: The changing nature of publishing
completely different impression.
does
put a lot of pressure on a novelist to ’
There is amazing community organizing -/
(laughter)
promote
their book through social media
going on. There are people who wield power
inside that infrastructure. Yes, maybe
B.P.: Exactly. The book has some foul
S e e PARZYBOK, page 5