JOHN TRAVIS AND HIS ELOQUENCE OF SILENCE

23/3/2022

Could you tell the readers a little bit about yourself?

Hmm… the only important thing is that I write – what I can, when I can. I’d call it weird fiction but with a very strong leaning towards horror. I live mostly in my head but occasionally venture beyond it. I like spicy food, long walks and music. I don’t believe in god. People baffle me. And I’m not very good about telling people about myself.

Which one of your characters would you least like to meet in real life?

I don’t think I’d mind meeting any of them, as awful as some of them are. They’d probably make more sense to me than real people because I created them.

Other than the horror genre, what else has been a major influence on your writing?

Music (dozens of artists, but the group the Pixies have influenced me more than anything); Surrealism (in general but the works of Jan Svankmajer in particular); Comedy (again a lot to pick from but the sitcom One Foot in the Grave stands head and shoulders above the rest).

The term horror, especially when applied to fiction always carries such heavy connotations. What’s your feeling on the term “horror” and what do you think we can do to break past these assumptions?

Personally, I think the term should be as broad as possible, as horror itself can be/is a very broad genre. Generally I prefer ‘Weird Fiction’ as it encompasses horror, sci-fi, fantasy and quite a bit of crime fiction. But even then some people would balk at it, the same as they might with any genre. But horror, even as its most genteel, is still an extreme genre. Maybe we should just accept that, instead of trying to repackage it as something that everyone can get into?

A lot of good horror movements have arisen as a direct result of the socio/political climate, considering the current state of the world where do you see horror going in the next few years?

I have no idea. I’m not really up on trends in the genre. But it’s hard to imagine anything in fiction matching what’s going on in the world at present. You couldn’t make up something as vile as Donald Trump, for instance – no-one would believe it. My own response would be to just go weirder. To quote Victor Meldrew, ‘What’s the point in being sane when the rest of the world is completely mad?’

Given the dark, violent and at times grotesque nature of the horror genre why do you think so many people enjoy reading it?

I know a lot of people don’t like this term, but I always thought Thomas Ligotti had it about right when he called it ‘Confrontational Escapism’. From a personal point of view I’d also add that I’ve never found horror fiction particularly frightening – the thing that’s always attracted me to it is that at its best it’s incredibly imaginative.

What, if anything, is currently missing from the horror genre?

Easy – humour. How many horror stories and novels out there have humour in them? Not nearly enough. I think the two things work together extremely well, although I’ve never met many who’ve agreed with me on that.

What new and upcoming authors do you think we should take notice off?

I’m not that up on new and upcoming authors, but over the past few years I’ve been very impressed by Priya Sharma – I think she’s a hell of a writer.

Are there any reviews of your work, positive or negative that have stayed with you?

Des Lewis’s Real-Time Reviews of Mostly Monochrome Stories and The Terror and the Tortoiseshell stick out, along with the one he’s currently doing for Gaseous Clay and Other Ambivalent Tales. They feel like short stories in themselves!

What aspects of writing to do you find the most difficult?

Finding a way into a story, the angle that’s the best way in to tell it. That can take me years. And endings for short stories sometimes.

Is there one subject you would never write about as an author?

I’m quite squeamish, so various forms of cruelty. I think just suggesting things sometimes can be at least as powerful as spelling them out.

Writing, is not a static process, how have you developed as a writer over the years?

I’ve got slower, which I don’t like. I’m trying to learn how to trust myself again, to let the sentences flow without stopping every farts’ end to change words around. But maybe in that it means I get to the real heart of what I want to say – it’s just that it takes an eternity.

What is the best piece of advice you ever received with regards to your writing?

A couple. One directly from fellow writer Marni Scofidio, who reminded me to use all my senses when writing, not just what’s seen, but also what’s smelled, touched, heard and tasted. Another I got from an article about Kate Bush, which said that she often mixed the personal with the fictional. I was about eighteen at the time and it had never occurred to me you were allowed to do that!

Which of your characters is your favourite?

Harvey ‘The Teeth’ O’keefe, my rabbit informer in the second and third Benji Spriteman novels. He’s turning into an interesting couple of guys.

Which of your books best represents you?

Of my novels, I’d say The Terror and the Tortoiseshell. Of my collections Gaseous Clay – I think there’s a decent sweep of material in that one.

Do you have a favorite line or passage from your work, and would you like to share it with us?

Years ago I wrote a story called ‘The Arse of Dracula’, about a vampire with piles. I managed to crowbar a line in there suggesting that when dealing with such a creature “The onus is on the anus”. People seemed to like that.

Can you tell us about your last book, and can you tell us about what you are working on next?

My last/newest book is called Eloquent Years of Silence, published by Vulpine Press. It’s a haunted house/haunted person story. It was influenced in part by the film The Changeling, Oliver Onions’ masterly novella, The Beckoning Fair One and the works of Robert Aickman. Also by the house I grew up in until I was three years old. It’s the most traditional thing I’ve ever written.

Next book – a novella centred around two surrealists, Jan Svankmajer and Erik Satie, a permanently tired middle-aged student and the strange little old man who lives next door to her. This one most definitely isn’t traditional.

If you could erase one horror cliché what would be your choice?

That one in horror films where someone looks in a bathroom cabinet mirror and there’s nobody there, but when they look again there is. Tedious.

What was the last great book you read, and what was the last book that disappointed you?

The last great book was a very peculiar crime novel called The Red Right Hand by Joel Townsley Rogers. Imagine David Lynch writing a crime novel in 1945. Then make it ten times weirder. Disappointing novel – Kiss Me, Deadly by Mickey Spillane. I found that one bewilderingly bad.

What's the one question you wish you would get asked but never do? And what would be the answer?

‘Well, Mr Travis, we’ve read your novel and we’d love to make a film of it. How about selling us the rights for, say, quarter of a million pounds?’

To which my answer would be, ‘Yes, I think I can live with that.’

john travis

BIO
Called ‘a writer of considerable energy’ in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, John Travis is the author of six books—two short story collections, Mostly Monochrome Stories and Gaseous Clay and Other Ambivalent Tales; two weird crime novels, The Terror and the Tortoiseshell and The Designated Coconut (the former attracting the attention of several Hollywood film companies); and two chapbooks – Greenbeard and Eloquent Years of Silence. His many short stories and novellas have appeared in anthologies and journals such as Nemonymous, The Urbanite, At Ease with the Dead, All Hallows, Supernatural Tales, British Invasion, The Monster Book for Girls, Horror Without Victims, Terror Tales of Northwest England and in both volumes of The Humdrumming Books of Horror Stories, his story from the second volume, ‘The Tobacconist’s Concession’ appearing on the 2009 shortlist for a British Fantasy Award. A third crime novel and a further collection of short stories remained unpublished, looking for homes.

WEBSITE LINKS

https://www.facebook.com/JohnTravisWriter
https://www.amazon.co.uk/John-Travis/e/B0043BAOAS?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1644263896&sr=1-1

Eloquent Years of Silence
by John Travis

It seemed like an ideal situation to Bundrick: a couple of months house-sitting for friends just as he was about to become homeless. He was even okay with the fact that the house next door had been the scene of a strange death a few months earlier - because, for the first time in his life, Bundrick, however briefly, would have his own place.

But when strange noises start coming from that house, noises that shouldn't exist, that simply couldn't have been heard, Bundrick's curiosity leads him down into the dark cellar. Discovering the wall separating his house and the empty house has collapsed, it's almost as if it were inviting him in...