There are many ways to end the sentence, “American Short Fiction is _________.” ASF is its traditional blurb. ASF is stories that take a different way home. ASF is supported by readers and subscribers, and has been since 1991. But we also want to draw attention to the fact that ASF is … because of the generous and sharp folks who volunteer their time behind the scenes, reading submissions with attentive care. We depend on them; our magazine is better because of them, and we want you to know them, because they’re more than just a name on the masthead.
Introducing Vincent Scarpa, an Assistant Editor at American Short Fiction.
Who are you, Vincent Scarpa?
In the existential sense? Still working on answering that. I often feel that I’m very close to understanding, but then I read Kierkegaard and I’m like, fuuuuuck, not a goddamn clue, am I an anything?
In the more literal sense, I’m a fiction writer who now has the privilege to be a part of the American Short Fiction team. I was born and raised in Vineland, NJ, the second least-educated city in the country, did my undergrad at Emerson College in Boston, and am now in the process of moving to Austin to start my MFA at the Michener Center. I’ve had stories appear in Hayden’s Ferry Review, Baltimore Review, and a few other places. Last year, most likely due to a clerical error that went and continues to go uncorrected, I received the 2012 Norman Mailer College Fiction award for a story I wrote about a phone psychic in Independence, Kansas.
What is it about fiction?
It’s what Joy Williams writes, end of thought process. I was going to add more about how I love the form of the short story—its limitations, its challenges, its power—but I think what it is about fiction is that Joy Williams writes it so it’s where I like to hang my hat, in the hopes that one day I will write one story that could possibly ride in the sidecar of a motorcycle of a story like “Health” or “The Last Generation” or “Honored Guest.” More people need to be reading Joy Williams. My favorite JW sentence: “He was gaunt and his head was scarred, and he tended to resemble, if left to his own devices, a large white appliance.”
How did you become an Assistant Editor at American Short Fiction?
Blackmail. Luck. Begging. Prayer (kidding, there is no Comfort).
What jobs, other than Assistant Editor at American Short Fiction, have you held?
In college, I worked as a transcriptionist for about three weeks. All the jobs assigned to my queue ended up being eulogies and it was terribly depressing and also I had a terrible work ethic due to my high intake of marijuana and my propensity to get lost in marathons of Reba. [I was unmedicated at the time, if that wasn’t clear.]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmUaFrVteHQ