Q&A With Charles Velasquez-Witosky
Analog newcomer Charles Velasquez-Witosky discusses how various influences, from David Sedaris, to the science of gravity, to New Yorker profiles, all came together to form
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Analog newcomer Charles Velasquez-Witosky discusses how various influences, from David Sedaris, to the science of gravity, to New Yorker profiles, all came together to form his debut story. Read “Susan Rose Sees Mars as the First Frontier” in our [May/June issue, on sale now!]
Analog Editor: How did this story germinate? Was there a spark of inspiration, or did it come to you slowly?
Charles Velasquez-Witosky: The opening image of “Susan Rose”—a landscape painter painting a Martian horizon—was my initial spark of inspiration. Building the story surrounding that image took me three years to get right. I wrote many drafts that didn’t work for several reasons. After trying to turn the story into a play (yes, really) I abandoned it for an entire year to write a completely unrelated novel. Though that novel was ultimately unsuccessful, it both sharpened my skills and gave me a missing element of the story: the billionaire benefactor of Susan’s trip to Mars. In my novel, he was a main character and served a different purpose, but after spending a year and three hundred pages with him, he fit seamlessly into the story, completing the puzzle, so to speak.
AE: How did the title for this piece come to you?
CVW: The story is written in the style of a New Yorker profile of an artist. So too is the title meant to emulate the way those stories are titled. As well, because the phrase “final frontier” is widely recognizable and most often associated with space (and Star Trek), I felt alluding to a “first frontier” in the title would be a good hook. And finally, I’m a fan of long titles. When I was in high school and college, I thought I might want to be a memoirist and most admired David Sedaris, Jonathan Ames, and Sloane Crosley, all three of whom crafted the best long titles for their stories and books. When You Are Engulfed in Flames (Sedaris), I Love You More Than You Know (Ames), and I Was Told There’d Be Cake (Crosley) were some of my favorite books and titles. When titling pieces, I’m often chasing the high of reading those titles for the first time.
AE: What made you think of Analog for this story?
CVW: As I was nearing the point that I felt ready to submit the story to publications, I sent the story to a few trusted readers for notes. One of those readers told me that his favorite moment in the story was the description of the paintbrush, specifically that under Earth’s gravity it felt like holding a can of chicken noodle soup. I responded that I was gratified that he liked that moment because finding it came through both research and math, the latter of which is not a major strength of mine. But even while I was working on that moment and the others that qualify this story as hard science fiction, I didn’t think of the story as hard science fiction. I felt that I was just doing the work to make the story as immersive as possible. After it was noted that one of the moments that made it immersive was built on real math and science, it finally occurred to me what I had written, and that Analog might have an interest in it.
AE: Who or what are your greatest influences and inspirations?
CVW: The artists that inspire me the most are those that push on the interior walls of fiction, expanding what storytelling can accomplish, what it even looks like. Sometimes that means traditional prose with scope, works that dream big and ask mind-expanding questions. The novels of Isaac Asimov, Kim Stanley Robinson, N.K. Jemisin, Jonathan Franzen, Helen DeWitt, to name just a few, are my taste in ambitious novels. But expansion for me also means playing with form. All Tomorrows by Nemo Ramjet pushed me to change my definition of prose fiction. 17776 by Jon Bois—which, for the uninitiated, is an SF work that uses American football as its launchpad into the far future and a distorted-beyond-recognition sports blog (SB Nation) as its choice of presentation—made me think definitions for fiction aren’t even useful. I’m equally inspired by filmmakers, theatre makers, and comic book artists—especially the ones that are pushing boundaries in their respective mediums.
he artists that inspire me the most are those that push on the interior walls of fiction, expanding what storytelling can accomplish, what it even looks like.
AE: How much or little do current events impact your writing?
CVW: I resist writing about current events in a direct way as much as possible. When specific real world events are on my mind while writing, my stories end up feeling didactic and one-sided, which is a quality I dislike in my fiction. One of the strengths of SF, however, is the ability to write around current events, distort them, and extrapolate on them. Susan Rose touches on a few current events, particularly the trend of billionaires funding vanity space expeditions. What I tried to do, though, was not write an editorial on the subject and instead use real life happenings as a starting point to ask questions about where these expeditions might lead, including “What good could come of these?” Though writing this story didn’t change my overall view of the trend (dim), it was a good way of challenging my own beliefs through fiction. Maybe it’ll challenge others’ beliefs too.
AE: If you could choose one SFnal universe to live in, what universe would it be, and why?
CVW: Becky Chambers’ Pangaverse, if that’s how it’s referred to. The universe she set up in her Monk and Robot books, beyond its solarpunk, post-gender diegesis, is also a universe where people always have time for a cup of tea and good, contemplative conversation. That is about as perfectly utopian of a reality as I could imagine for humanity.
AE: What are you reading right now?
CVW: I just received the second issue of You Will Own Nothing and You Will Be Happy by Simon Hanselmann in the mail. Simon is the funniest comics creator working today so every new release of theirs is a cause for celebration. Most oddly, I’m also reading The History of Sexuality, Volume 1 by Michael Foucault. I usually struggle reading philosophy of any kind, but I found this at the thrift shop my fiancée works at last week, began reading it in the store, and within two paragraphs, in which he discusses the frankness with which sexuality was discussed in the seventeenth century, I was hooked.
AE: How can our readers follow you and your writing? (IE: Social media handles, website URL…)
CVW: I’m most active on Instagram, @c_vel_witosky. I also keep a Medium blog, which can be found by searching my full name, Charles Velasquez-Witosky, on Medium.
