Cashing In: Interview with Cash Compson

In 2022 the indie publisher House of Vlad (run by Brian Alan Ellis) had posted they were going to stop publishing.  It was disheartening to see the indie writing community take a hit like that, since HOV always published books with a consistent quality.  It felt like your  favorite band throwing in the towel.  Yet it seems Brian just couldn’t help himself.  In the past year HOV has started a magazine (Vlad Mag) and released several books including Cash Compson’s debut poetry collection People Scare Me.  As soon as I pre-ordered the book, I messaged Cash to ask if he would be interested in doing an interview. 

This book is funny, sad, and endearing.  It has young people living with reckless abandon, shows what a Gilmore Girls reboot might look like, puts Johnathan Franzen in his place, and gives hope even after all the bad decisions we make.  The book fits perfectly with HOV’s literary canon.  

This collection is evidence of a writer who is well read.  Not just of contemporary greats but of all those that came before we were born. These poems are reminiscent of Plath, Whitman, even Brian Alan Ellis.  At times I would forget about everything in my life and disappear into these verses.  After the last page I flipped back to moments I never lived and feel amazed I’m alive.

How long did it take you to write this book?

CC: Generally speaking, I wrote the poems in this book between the summer of 2021

and the summer of 2023. There are some outliers—there’s one I wrote in my early

twenties, another when I was sixteen—but this book mostly came from a time where

there were a lot of changes happening my life. Transition periods freak me out (which, I

realize, is not a great way to live, but what can you do). I started writing these poems

when I moved into an apartment alone during the pandemic. I was spending a lot of

time by myself, my family had just moved away, and the woman I was with had just

broken up with me. I had a lot of feelings and needed to do something with them. I

wanted to make sense of what felt like slow-burn chaos. It felt healthier than drinking too

much and watching nonstop television, which I was also doing. My bipolar disorder was

a mess, too. I also met my now-wife during the period in which these poems were

written, and that exciting and terrifying time is what gave way to the last two-thirds or so

of the book. She’s the reason this book exists, along with my parents. I think it’s healthy

to recognize the people who save your life.

What is the story behind the title People Scare Me? And why did you choose

that image for the cover art?

CC: I wish I had a good answer for the title, but it’s just a phrase I heard someone say in

an interview (I think it was Bret Easton Ellis talking about an element of one of his

earlier novels, but I may be wrong and totally making that up) that stuck with me. The

phrase doesn’t show up in People Scare Me, but fear dominates my life more than I’d

like to admit, so it feels relevant. The cover art actually came from a picture I took a few

years ago at a weird, backyard winter art installation I came across when driving near

Plymouth, Massachusetts. We paid five bucks to go into this series of backyards and

look at all these crude cardboard cutouts in the snow. It was eerie and fun and I took

that picture and, when the time came, showed it to Brian Alan Ellis. We both had a lot of

cover ideas, but that one just felt right. It felt indicative of what’s in the poems.

Who would you list as influences?

CC: Too many to name, but I’ll try. As far as poets go, I’m really into James

Wright, Franz Wright, Anne Sexton, Robert Lowell, Alex Dimitrov (his blurb being

on the front of my book means a whole lot to me, seeing as I read his work

religiously and teach him in my classes), Ocean Vuong, Dorothea Lasky, Sylvia

Plath, Allen Ginsberg, Raymond Carver, Emily Dickinson, and a whole lot more.

Catherine Spino, too, who publishes in a lot of the same places as me. She’s an

incredible poet. For everything else, I’m a huge reader and lover of Faulkner,

Ottessa Moshfegh, Augusten Burroughs, Jonathan Franzen (who I write about in

the book), Elle Nash, Bret Easton Ellis, Emma Cline, Jesmyn Ward, Pat Conroy,

Kimberly King Parsons, and many more.

Those are the people whose work I love. I listed a ton of names because it

felt impossible to exclude any of them. I get excited about the writing these people

produce. As far as who actually influences me—I’m not sure. I can’t really tell. I

imagine anybody who reads the book would be a better judge of that.

What made you pick House of Vlad to publish with? What was it like working

with Brian Alan Ellis?

CC: I’ve been a big House of Vlad fan for a few years now, ever since I went to a

reading they hosted at KGB Bar in New York City. I bought a couple HOV books at

the event, and when I read them later, I felt like I was reading literature that was

different from what I normally read, and that it was really good, too. Memorable.

These were books I read more than once and thought about long after reading them,

which I always consider the mark of something special.

I never considered House of Vlad an option for my book, seeing as Brian makes

it clear on the website that he is not looking for general manuscript submissions.

However, I saw Jillian Luft in Chicago last summer at a really awesome Expat Press

reading/party that Gwen Hilton put together, and while we were there Jillian

suggested I send some poems to her for the issue of Vlad Mag she was editing. I

did, and she ended up reading the full manuscript and passing it on to Brian. He hit

me up and said he wanted to publish it and that was it. Jillian is not only a great

writer but an incredible friend. Her book is coming out in June from House of Vlad.

It’s called Scumbag Summer—check it out.

Working with Brian was honestly perfect for this project. He and I went back

and forth on edits and ideas for how it was going to be packaged, sequenced, and

presented, and at the end of the day, the man respects the vision his writers have for

their work. He’s also such a great writer himself, which really makes it easy to trust the

ideas he has. I also have to say that he put together a book cover and a physical

product that I really love and am proud to see on a bookshelf or bookstore. I’m proud to

have people buy it and hold it. And that matters.

These poems have a healthy mixture of pop culture references and bits of

personal telling. Do you find it difficult writing about personal subjects?

CC: On one hand, I did what I wanted to do with this book: I took everything going on in

my head and my heart and crystallized it on the page. I wrote these poems to try to

catch bits of everything happening in my life at the time and nail them to the wall, and I

am happy to have done that. At the same time, this book is very personal, and when my

 well-meaning colleagues and friends buy this book, I’m very aware that these people

are about to have some new insight into the loves I’ve experienced, my bipolar disorder,

and the contents of my Spotify playlists. I’m okay with that, but I’m aware of it, and I

ultimately love that this book is a place where I could be more honest than I’d ever be in

any other area of my life.

At the end of the day, this collection was always going to be very much about me

and my experiences, though I imagine it’s relatable to anyone who reads it in some way or

another. My goal for going forward is to write outside myself a bit. We’ll see. We’re all

pretty self-obsessed, and I’m no different. Still, there’s so much to try and make sense

of in this world, and I feel like I can look around a bit more now that I’ve purged this

book from my system.

How long have you been writing? Do you only write poetry?

CC: I’ve written poems and stories since I was in middle school and high school. Poetry

has always been the focus. I write short stories, too, and have published some of those

in the indie world, and I’ve written a few novels that gather dust at home, but poetry is

what excites me and what I obsess over. Though I want to publish different kinds of

books, poetry is the constant.

What is your background? Do you have an MFA?

CC: I actually don’t have an MFA or a writing degree. I’m a high school English teacher.

I got my Bachelor’s in English from Western Connecticut State University (go Wolves)

and then, later, my Master’s in Secondary Education from University of Bridgeport. Who

knows if I’ll go after anything else.

I heard that “Cash Compson” is a pseudonym. Is that true? If so why?

CC: Yeah, it is. It’s a combination of Cash Bundren and the Compson family from

Faulkner’s world. I just thought of it and settled on it—it means nothing beyond the fact

that I like Faulkner and I like alliterative names. I use a pen name for a number of

reasons, but my life as a high school teacher is part of it. I don’t need my students

reading my work. I’m not ashamed of it, not at all, and I want them to read anything they

can get their hands on in this world. Still, they don’t necessarily need to read this one

right now.

What are your writing habits? Do you dedicate time each day or do you just write when an idea comes to you?

CC: I don’t have a set, structured time where I write each day. I write a little some days, a lot other days, and I just see what sticks. I write poems in my notebook, type them up, and then tinker with them for a long period of time before they’re really done. I have some months where I write dozens and dozens of poems, and others where it’s much slower. I write a lot, but I also go through dead periods where I think I’ve got nothing to say. And then it’s back. I just try to write through all of it. 

Are you working on any future books?

CC: I’m very happy to be working on a new pile of poems. It feels good to be

returning my focus to unpublished work that nobody knows anything about, and I

can just spend time with it. I’ve also been writing some other stuff, but I don’t like the

idea of talking about things while they’re still being written. Then I’ll just start thinking

about people reading it and psych myself out. Call it a character flaw.

Are you less scared of people since the book came out?

CC: Hell, no. Do you watch the news? Live in this world? Come on, now.

You can purchase this book from Asterism books.