Q&A with Caroline Hagood

 

 

 

Caroline Hagood is the author of the new book Goblin Mode: A Speculative Memoir. Her other books include Ghosts of America. She is an assistant professor of literature, writing, and publishing at St. Francis College in Brooklyn. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write Goblin Mode?

 

A: I was thinking about how often I think about what I should have said or done instead of just doing it. I imagined my life, but as a different person who finally went off the rails, acted out, did all the things I only think of doing.

 

This led to a book about a character who is and is not me, living a life that is and is not mine...with the addition of a goblin. The goblin is there to remind this character to be more fierce. 

 

Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: I remember when Goblin Mode was Oxford Dictionaries’ word of the year. This caught my attention and also fit with the mood that the book I was writing was trying to capture. I wanted to write a Covid-era book that really captured that altered reality we all lived in and the state we sort of fell into.

 

At the same time, this state of goblin mode finds its apotheosis in the actual goblin character that is in the text. 

 

Q: Would you consider this book a memoir?

 

A: I always like to say it's full of "emotional truth" or "spiritual truth" about my life, even if most of the things never happened. This is why I call it a speculative memoir. It combined memoir and speculative fiction in a way that I hope is fun for the reader to navigate.  

 

Q: What impact did it have on you to write the book, and what do you hope readers take away from it?

 

A: I like to think that I'm braver for having written it and that readers will also find themselves braver. The book invites you to really consider the role of the pleasing women and how to break out of it. I hope it can help all readers find their own bravery.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I did an event with the amazing writer Megan Volpert. We really connected and she emailed me the beginning of an epistolary book. And I just wrote back, and here we are 25,000 words later and still going.

 

It is one of the most spontaneous and creative things that has ever happened to me. She's a brilliant writer and thinker and I find myself looking forward to her letters all the time.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I just want to share that, for some reason, in order to write Goblin Mode, I listened to Kendrick Lamar's album To Pimp a Butterfly a billion times on repeat. I can't explain this but I highly recommend it if you're working on a book.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Caroline Hagood.