Photo courtesy of poetry.arizona.edu

I found this link (found below at the end of this post) with an interview of Manuel Munoz. What I found quite interesting was the fact that he discusses Candy and talking about writing in the second person. My initial interpretation of Candy speaking in the second person weirdly, was that she was talking to herself. As we discussed it in class, we seemed to conclude that it was a device meant to be an aggressive act, to drag the reader into certain scenarios, such as at the drive-in. However, when I read his interview here is what he had to say about it: “I’m aware of two reactions. I know that some people just don’t like the second person at all, and I’m fine with that because I knew the risk. But to me being against the second person sometimes can be a failure of thinking of what the you can do. The you isn’t an imperative. It’s not telling you what to do. It is a voice, and it’s essentially Candy talking to herself. It’s not really me, author, talking to anyone, to say, Here, imagine yourself in this place, even though that is the effect.”  It is a great interview and he goes into great length about his writing process. One other thing that I found quite interesting was when he discussed his dislike for slasher films, like Saw and that it made him sometimes feel like a puritan, much like how people reacted to the new form of cinema in the 50’s and 60’s. It circles back to our discussion in class about how Psycho may not seem controversial to our modern eyes, but back then, it was a shocking movie.

http://www.swback.com/interviews/Manuel-Munoz-interview.html