Looking to prepare for your interview or brush up on some do’s and don’ts when interviewing? PRISM editorial assistant, Derrick Gravener, interviews poetry editor, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, to chat about the interview process. Shazia has interviewed authors such as André Alexis, Jonina Kirton, Thalia Field, and Jay Gamble, and shares steps for starting interviews as well as tried-and-true pro-tips.
Starting Out:
Reach out. Appeal to the importance of your story and understand the common human elements of it. Prepare to reach out by asking yourself these questions:
-What it is going to do for the community and for the field?
-Who is your audience?
-Why is the interviewee’s work important?
-Which aspects are most timely?
-What is the context in current affairs?
Generally, people are open to sharing their stories and are happy to tell you about themselves.
Know your stuff, which means know their stuff. Know their biography and their bibliography, and prepare many questions (questions that would exceed the allocated timeframe of the interview). Preparing more questions than needed helps with feeling prepared in advance and could make the conversation more lively with improvisation.
Probing questions. The space where people are uncomfortable about something or reserved about something is where the “hook” of the interview could be, so finding ways to probe those questions in a way that is both respectful and investigative could make a really good interview. It’s best to have a thorough understanding of their work so that you can articulate questions sensitively if the chance arises.
Pay attention to the narrative of the interview. The transcription takes a lot of time. Spend more time on the interview and forming the narrative out of the transcript than on the transcript itself. Pick out important bits from the transcript and arrange them thematically when drafting. Chronology is one way to approach the narrative of an interview, but themes that grow out of the “hook” can also be another way.
Shazia’s Pro-Tips:
- Avoid asking people questions about things that you should know about e.g. bibliography. It might come across as though you don’t care about their work enough or that you haven’t done the research. People sometimes ask obvious questions for the sake of talking. If it gets awkward, then simply say it’s awkward, and that’s ok.
- Part of the fun of interviewing is finding that people are surprising – they are not what you would expect. The kinds of stories that they have and the lives they’ve lived are not immediately visible on the surface, or in the way they might be presenting themselves in their life.
- Do a two-tier interview if possible. They’re much better than a straightforward Q&A. Q&As are great if someone has put out a new book or has a new project, but for profiles and more in-depth pieces it helps to layer questions and answers over a period of time. The first tier would be preliminary questions, a way to get to know them. This might involve some small talk between emails or consultations. In the second stage, pose questions that are more personal. A multi-layer interview approach builds rapport and friendship, and makes for deep and thoughtful interviews.
- Learn to feel comfortable in the silences. The fact that there are silences usually means that some sort of comfort level has been achieved. Silences might also be a matter of perspective and sometimes they (or you) might just need time to think. To avoid getting caught in a trap of self-doubt during silences, you could simply say that you need a moment to think.
- It’s best to be less self-conscious than you already might be. Being in a state of mind that is open and attentive allows you to be receptive, and that is super, super important for interviews. You’re here to tell their story and share their words, so it’s important for you to be “present” for them. Being attentive and open also helps you engage more personally and intuitively, making the interview feel like a conversation instead of an interrogation.
Derrick Gravener is an editorial assistant at PRISM and a BFA Candidate in the Department of Creative Writing at UBC. When he’s not writing, he watches a lot of trashy TV.
Shazia Hafiz Ramji is an interviews editor for the Canadian Women in the Literary Arts and the poetry editor for PRISM international. Her interviews, non-fiction, and criticism have appeared in Hamilton Review of Books, Canadian Literature, Quill & Quire, and subTerrain. She was a finalist for the 2018 Alberta Magazine Awards, received the 2017 Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative Poetry, and was a finalist for the 2016 National Magazine Awards. Her first book of poetry, Port of Being, is forthcoming from Invisible Publishing in fall 2018.