By Matt Martin
Cole’s Bar doesn’t necessarily fit the bill of trendy Logan Square. The sign out front is nice, no doubt, but when you walk in, it still has that feel of Chicago dive bar: trashed floors, beer signs, strings of lights. They have great tap beer, Malort, and surprisingly friendly bartenders.As I sat with Mason Johnson, author of the novella Sad Robot Stories–a recent publication from Chicago Center for Literature and Photography–Malort was poured, beers were consumed and Mason told me all about what it’s like to be a first time novelist, a literary scene rock star, and a downright hunky heartthrob.
MJ: I want to point out real fast just how new this bar is. It’s only like four years old. Which is funny ’cause it looks like any other divey bar that’s twenty-five-years-old. Anyway, I was recently complimenting Cole for how divey his bar looks, how that look suits the bar beautifully. You know, great drinks, prices, and service. He responded to this by lamenting that everything had been brand new four years before. The floor, for example. Plastic tiles! Only four years old. But they are torn the fuck up. But they look perfect. I mean, they look like shit, but in a perfect way. Absolutely perfect. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Cole might. I wouldn’t.
MM: Can you tell me a little about the genesis of Sad Robot Stories? How did you release it and how did it come to be published?
MJ: Jason Pettus, the man behind the CCLaP, had heard about me from the readings I was doing. I guess he then read some of the stuff I had online, figured for some reason that I wasn’t a total loser, and then approached me about maybe publishing something with CCLaP. I gave him a bunch of work I was in the middle of and he quickly batted it away. It, uh, wasn’t what he was looking for, I guess. So I reached down inside myself, as deep as I possibly could, I guess, and somehow pulled Sad Robot Stories out of my ass.
Now it’s a real, live physical book and an eBook on CCLaP’s website.
MM: Was Sad Robot Stories something that came to you while you were a Fiction Writing student at Columbia College Chicago?
MJ: Nah. Not at all. (laughs) Okay, I’m going to admit right now. I lied a little about before. I didn’t entirely pull it out of my ass. Before Sad Robot Stories was a novella, it was an ebook I self-published online. It was right after I graduated from Columbia [College Chicago]. It was kind of a “fuck you” to Columbia I guess. The goal was to force myself out of the habits of being a fiction writing student. So yeah, I was just trying to give a middle finger to the Department I’d just spent years at. Kind of like a “FUCK YOU, DAD, I’M MY OWN MAN” thing, I guess.
So the original ebook had a short story that was about 2,400 words or so, along with little, stupid poems, and best of all, crayon-drawn comics. I really enjoyed making it. Some people didn’t like the layout or the look. It frustrated them. It was weird, ya know. And I get why someone might not like it. But I liked it, so I did it.
I never thought this thing would be anything more than it was, though. I’d never planned on making it into something longer. But then Jason came along and kinda rejected what I was working on and suggested I take that robot story and turn it into a novella. One long narrative. He’d seen me do funny, silly work, and he wanted to, I guess, see something where I didn’t rely on my strengths. And that idea sounded really awesome! If he hadn’t said that, I wouldn’t have done it. I wanted a challenge, and he kinda set one in front of me. I mean, for like two weeks after he mentioned it, I was like, There’s no way that’ll be a book. Then all of a sudden scenes and ideas started coming to me and that was it. And the challenge of it! I eventually became deadset on doing it.
The funny part, I guess, is if you look at the novella, you’ll see a lot of influence stylistically — I think — from Columbia’s Fiction Department. (laughs) I’d spent all that time flushing it out of my system, but then when trying the harder piece of work that was longer, I went and relied on a lot of the concepts they taught. Especially the folktale aspects the Fiction Writing Department teaches. I think what I ultimately ended up doing was kinda flushing out the “bad” from the Department — the stuff that didn’t connect well with the voice in my head — and really got a better handle on the things from the Department that I liked. So yeah, even though I was like “fuck the Fiction Department” earlier, I couldn’t be doing anything I’m doing now had it not existed.
MM: You are a magnificent participant in all things social media. How has social media played a role in Sad Robot Stories?
MJ: Well, part of my job at CBS is social media. So, doing it as a professional, I guess, you’d hope I’d have an “edge.” More than that though, I have a lot of friends who I’m pretty much solely friends with online. Most of my interactions with them are only on Facebook and Twitter and G-Chat. So when I’m trying to tell people about my book, I’m trying to do it in a way that is playful and fun and that my friends might enjoy. I think some people definitely get tired of all my posts sometimes (laughs). But, that’s just the nature of being a fuckin’ internet pimp, I guess.
MM: One of the hardest things to do, in my opinion, is to hold down a day job while writing a novel. How do you balance everything, including writing, your day job at CBS-Chicago, your active lit-event lifestyle, and posting so many cute cat pictures on Facebook?
MJ: I’m really slow at writing things, I think. So I guess being so busy means I do things slowly. And I do so many things I kinda feel like I’m going insane all the time. In the case of Sad Robot Stories, I had to change my mentality totally. I had to go from writing for hours on end as a wild and free college kid to writing after being mentally drained from my job and other crap. I had to get used to only having a couple minutes at a time to write. I had to get used to writing on the train in the mornings before work stressed me out. What ended up happening is I had all these little scenes and sights and pieces of dialogue in two notebooks and none of it made any sense and none of it was in any sort of order. I then had to sit down and edit it into an order, typing it out, which was as hard as writing it in the first place, but a little easier to do after work, cause the heart was already there. I just had to put it in the right order. You can’t write the “heart” if you’re totally fucking drained…but you can put it into order, I guess.
Jesus Christ, I don’t know if that made any goddamn sense.
MM: Which Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle would you be and why?
MJ: As a kid I had both a bike and a cat named Leonardo. They would get very confused when I called them…
I guess that was a bad joke (laughs). Anyway, it’s true though, I liked Leonardo so much I named both my cat and my bike after him. He had swords. Swords are fucking cool.
MM: Favorite Science Fiction movie director?
MJ: That’s hard. Everyone I love has also made something I hated. I love Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner. Sad Robot Stories is actually dedicated to a bunch of fictional characters, including Kevin Flynn, Joe Christmas and also Roy Batty, who is played by Rutger Hauer in Scott’s Blade Runner.
MM: M. Night Shyamalan…genius or despicable hack?
MJ: Did you know he co-wrote the screenplay for Stuart Little? Yeah. Call him a hack, now.
MM: Batman or Spiderman? And do you own any underwear with their likeness on them?
MJ: Batman. Though I have a Spider-Man wallet that’s about a million years old. I definitely had boxers of both at some point in my adult life, but I don’t got any anymore. Batman socks though. Two pairs.
MM: Besides Cole’s…favorite Chicago watering hole?
MJ: If the Hideout wasn’t such a hideout, it’d probably be a hideout.
MM: Thin crust or deep dish? Go.
MJ: You know, when I was a kid, it was always Pete’s or Father & Son. So those are both thin, but I feel like they’re not as good as they used to be. I’m not sure if my tastes have improved, or if their stuff is crappier. It’s still good, I mean, just not as good as I remember it. But really, I’ll eat any pizza. Any pizza. Most nights are just, like, me in my underwear with white socks up to my knees drinking a six pack and eating a Jack’s frozen pizza from Target. So, yeah, I’ll eat anything. Especially Pequod’s and Giordano’s.
MM: Is Ben Affleck cute enough to be Batman? And do you think he is going to go to the same voice coach as Christian Bale in order to nail the part?
MJ: Dude, all I can remember is Ben Affleck playing Daredevil. At least Daredevil had Coolio in it.
MM: If you were held captive in a weird, foreign prison and some generous prison guard threw you a book to keep you company, which book would you want and why?
MJ: (Takes out phone and Googles how to break out of prison) Well, the first thing Google is telling me about is a book — How to Break out of Prison by John Wareham. Apparently, it’s not about literal prisons though. It’s about, like, mental prisons. Anxieties and stuff maybe?
I wouldn’t ask for that book.
MM: If you were to own one t-shirt with a hip-hop band on the front of it, who you got?
MJ: Wu-Tang Clan ain’t nothin’ to fuck with.
MM: Do you really like Malort?
MJ: It’s there for me. Seriously. When I’ve got a tummyache, a shot of Malort straightens me out. Two shots though, two shots… that’s too many.
