Quick Bio:
Joseph Cavano is originally from Kingston, NY and now calls Charlotte, NC home. He has earned a BA degree in English from Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY and a BA degree in English from American University in Washington, D.C.; further, Cavano has completed graduate work in Philosophy at Georgetown University.
1. What type of writing do you do? What challenges you the most and what comes naturally?
My main interest as a writer continues to be writing fiction. I'm especially interested in the short story and the challenges it presents for communicating something of importance in a relatively brief space. Like Faulkner, I believe an author must concern himself'/herself with matters of importance. Faulkner referred to such matters as the "verities," which is really but another way of suggesting a writer must investigate the "human condition" or what it means to be truly human.
Fortunately, writing fiction has always come easily to me. I have a feeling it does with most if not all accomplished writers. I can't imagine it being any other way. So much of a writer's life is filled with difficulties, I can't see many of us keeping at it if the creative part wasn't so rewarding and comfortably accessible.
2. How do you cultivate inspiration for your work?
If by cultivating inspiration for one's work you mean how do I go about making it more likely to occur, my answer would have to be nothing and everything. Nothing, because if one truly has an artistic sensibility there are situations in everyday life that are all but screaming to become the stuff of story. In my view, one of the most important differences between someone who is an artist and someone who is not, is that where the latter may see in an event or experience merely the minutia of everyday life, the latter is able to see meaningful truth.
On a more practical level, I find inspiration in people who most choose to ignore.... those whose only mention in the local paper is likely to be their obituary. I've always found heroes and heroines there. I'm fascinated by those on the outer edges of society... ginseng hunters, septuagenarian African -American jazz piano players, poor white girls like the Bob Euell's daughter in To Kill a Mockingbird who continues to place a rose in a glass inside the window of her shack near the dump. And I write about them.... Much of the time and always lovingly.
Finally, if you are stuck inside with nobody to talk with, read a book by one of the greats like Faulkner or listen to a tune played by a modern jazz genius like Garner or Monk. If that doesn't inspire you, check the obituary. You may well have passed away.
3. What do you enjoy most about the Charlotte Writers' Club?
Some say a writer's life is a lonely one. I disagree. How could it be with all those characters and situations dancing around in our heads. Still, sometimes one does need a break... a chance to speak to another "in the trade." That, and the opportunity to hear others tell their stories-be introduced to their creations-is all it takes.
4. What writing advice would you pass on to other writers?
As to writing advice, I feel like Twain must have when in the foreword to Huckleberry Finn, he noted, "Those looking for a moral (in the story) will be shot." There is no one way to write and no one definitive story. If you have the talent (and even if you don't but love to write anyway) keep at keeping at it, confident in the knowledge that it's your story and nobody can tell it exactly like you.
5. In a sentence or two, what else would you like people to know about you?
Jazz pianist... ginseng and edible plant forager . Rattlesnake hunter (pictures only). Fly fisherman (trout). World traveler (Africa, China, India (my favorite... story was in the Charlotte Observer), most of Europe etc). golfer. Had a tryout with New York Yankees at sixteen. Fan of the Charlotte Writers' Club. Human being, warts and all.
