Cecilia Corrigan's Titanic in the Spotlight at Publik/Private

Online arts and culture denizens Publik/Private spend a while with poet and performer Cecilia Corrigan on the occasion of her new book of poetry, Titanic. Learn more about Cecilia's writing life, especially the way that she balances writing poetry and writing for television, here:

How is writing for television different from writing your poetry and fiction?

I would say each thing has its own set of rules. They are very different but also have a lot in common. They can do the same things. They can create expectations and change expectations. I would say that poetry and television have more in common than fiction and television because with a poem and an episode, it’s the small surprises that give people a feeling of dissonance or other worldliness. When it comes to the differences, the situations that support both of those things in a financial, social and cultural kind of way are very different as well.

Are both processes interchangeable for you? Can you switch back and forth between writing styles seamlessly?

They are totally different things, but I guess my brain kind of works like a machine gun. It goes in all different directions. I think if I put down everything that was in my head, it would come out pretty jumbled. The real work comes when I’m sorting the information. Part of that comes with deciding like “this content would go better in this medium.”

Poetry is the place where my secondary ideas come from when I am writing for a show or a screenplay. It is more of a place where things kind of float on the periphery.

Learn more from the rest of P/P's interview right here. Read on!