Robert Olen Butler is the author of Severance, Tabloid Dreams, From Where You Dream: The Process of Writing Fiction, and many other books. In 1993, he won the Pulitzer Prize for A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain. His newest book, Intercourse, will be published on May 28 by Chronicle Books. He is the Francis Eppes Professor in English at Florida State University.
Q: What is your preferred environment for writing?
A: I live in Capps, Florida, population one. I write on the computer in a black swivel office chair in my writing cottage about 25 yards from my house. My three bichon frises are snoozing nearby, and two of my five live oak trees, shrouded in Spanish moss, are outside the window before me.
Q: What punctuation mark are you fondest of?
A: I often write deep internal monologues and love the run-on sentence and when I’m not using my adorable “and,” I use my beloved comma.
Q: What punctuation, spelling, grammar, style, or usage error annoys you the most?
A: Robert Owen Butler.
Q: If you weren't in your current line of work, what would you be doing instead?
A: United States Senator. (Or some such. As it is, I declared myself Mayor of Capps, though I’m not at all happy with my performance.)
Q: What drove you to become a writer?
A: I found I had an ongoing, deep intuition that behind the apparent chaos of life on planet Earth there is order and meaning, and the only way I can express that vision of order is to go back to the way life is lived in its primary form—in the moment and through the senses—and pull bits and pieces out of that sensual flow of experience and reshape those pieces into invented narratives built around characters who are full of yearning. Also to meet interesting women.
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