“Goes On Without the World’s Understanding” is an anthology of short stories that thrusts readers into the journeys of diverse characters grappling with the scars of trauma, racism, and the intricacies of sexuality and identity. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

Inspiration for the thirteen stories came in a myriad of ways: my life; other people’s lives; a place or location; musings and imaginings and fantasies, often by posing a “What if…?”” or a “How about…?”; and three or four times where a character just appeared in my mind’s eye almost fully formed. All I have to do is listen very carefully to what they say and follow what they do. The most important thing is that, even if a character or situation is based in real life, I have to eventually see them and hear them as separate and different from myself. They have to be in their own person. That usually happens when they do or say something that surprises me in the very moment I’m writing, not planning or expecting or knowing what those actions or words will be.

What was your inspiration behind creating such diverse and complex characters in “Goes On Without the World’s Understanding”?

I wrote people and stories I wanted to read and wasn’t finding in anyone else’s writing. I’m impatient with the simplified, the reductive, the limited, the unimaginative ways identity and experience is filtered through expected tropes. There is no one kind of a sexual abuse survivor, no “right way” to survive, and no “correct” identity to be built around that experience. Just as whatever image is conjured by the label “older white gay male” or “young Black lesbian” isn’t ever going to be as complex and rich and contradictory as such people are in actual life. The characters in the thirteen stories run a gamut of ages, from eight-years-old to ninety-six-years old and some are at peace in their lives, others are on their way to some kind of healing, while still others are flailing in doing so. Some are at war with themselves, going under or perilously close to it. Human beings are a beautiful, heartbreaking, terrifying mix and mess of so many different elements. Those are the people I want to read about, so that’s who I write.

How did you balance the need to depict the stark realities of prejudice and discrimination with maintaining sensitivity and empathy?

There’s no need to make a conscious effort at “balance” as long I’m honest about those stark realities and imagine the inner worlds of the people who are in the midst of them. Empathy is not limited to or for one “kind” of person or identity. We all suffer, we all struggle, we all do our own version of crazy. And sometimes, even at the same time, we also experience joy, pleasure, wisdom. When I’m with a character, I’m with them all the way in all things.

What is the next book that you are working on and when will it be available?

I’ve been revising two plays of mine from the 1980s, Catharsis and Monasteries, as there has been a renewed interest in them. Later this year, I’ll start a novella That Goddamned Red Rose which I’ve been turning over and mulling in my head for the last year. It will also contain three new short stories, two of which, Not a Very Nice Person and Philip’s Son, have been written and are currently marinating before I do another revision. I hope this book will be published by Spring 2025.

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