Interview with History and Literary Maven, Chester Sakamoto
Papers: We noticed that poetry was something you didn't pick up until you were in undergrad—do you mind telling us a little about yourself, and the story of how your poetry came to be?
Chester: I was born, raised, and live in the San Fernando Valley, which was made famous by the film Clueless. All joking aside, it’s immediately due northwest of the Greater Los Angeles Area. My father is an immigrant who was born in Japan and came here as a teenager. My mother was born in Iowa, and was the daughter of Holocaust survivors who immigrated to the United States from Germany after being displaced from their homeland (Poland). Ironically, my parents met in a bookstore in West Los Angeles (which is to what I personally owe my love of literature).
Growing up, I didn’t pay much attention to poetry or care for it, as the verse we studied in school I found to be a bit formulaic at the time, largely due to its use of meter and rhyme. I should clarify that I have absolutely nothing against the traditional structure of poetry now and have come to love some of its greatest practitioners, but it’s a form that I only use on occasion myself. But then, when I was fourteen years old, I read Howl by Allen Ginsberg in a withdrawn volume my aunt brought me from her local library. The clouds just opened for me and though it wouldn’t be years until I laid down my own verse, it was a work that haunted me and stuck with me through both high school and undergrad. It’s because of that poem that I started composing.
Papers: You were literally born to be a writer, which is probably why your writing has such a strong storytelling aspect to it—similar to Allen Ginsberg. Is that style something you grew into, or was it something that came on more naturally?
Chester: As I read mostly fiction and novels up until a certain age, I suppose the storyteller aspect of my writing comes naturally to me. Incidentally, I also write short stories, but what I love (and almost prefer) about poetry is that you can say so much in far fewer words. Therein lies the medium’s power. Short stories, though limited in detail when compared to full-length novels, still divulge far more than poetry. Poetry is all about inference, sometimes subtlety, and oftentimes contains even richer symbolism than fiction. It was the poet Rita Dove who famously said, “Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful,” and, my God, was she ever right about that!
Papers: Poetry does have a subtlety that is so in-your-face, and your poems seem to encompass these qualities effortlessly. One of the things we love about your writing is the heavy historical references—where does that come from? Are you a big history buff?
Chester: I’m a big history buff, yes! Though I’m more of what you’d call an “armchair historian”—that is, I never officially studied it at length—but it’s an area in which I’m largely self-taught and about which I’m quite passionate. The stories that have reached us from the past have always inspired and fascinated me and reveal not only how far we’ve come as a society and species, but also just how little (for better or for worse) we’ve changed over the centuries. I’d even go as far as to say that history, both personal and that of the world at large, and art are the two subjects that inspire me the most. I even do a weekly history podcast! It’s called History Loves Company. I do so hope you’ll check it out!
Papers: Ah, we love that! We wanted to ask you about your hobbies since we noticed you started poetry so late. What are some things that younger Chester got into as a kid?
Chester: To be honest, mostly reading. I’ve always been a bit of a solitary creature. Though I’d hang out with friends often enough (largely the fellow outcasts like me), I was bitten by the reading bug the minute I was brought home from the hospital as a newborn, when my mother cracked open a picture book and read it to me. To quote her, she often recalls how my face positively lit up. Needless to say, I was hooked, and it’s a pastime I enjoy right up to the present moment.
Papers: It seems that’s an origin story that many writers share. As you continue to writer, how do you see your poetry developing? Do you have any projects you're working on, or publications you're interested in being a part of?
Chester: The great aspect about poetry is that it’s constantly evolving. The best poets experiment with form and content, and that’s something I find myself doing far more often as of late. When I began writing poetry, I admittedly was trying to imitate those whose work I greatly admire—Ginsberg, Kerouac, Rimbaud—but as I’ve been exposed to far more poets whose styles vary greatly, I’ve learned to broaden my horizons and, I feel, have found my own poetic voice along the way. As for projects, I’m currently working on my premier poetry collection, Visions of the Outside World, for which I hope to find a publisher. Written under lockdown during the height of the coronavirus pandemic two years ago, they’re largely meditations, ruminations, and musings on the state of the world at the time as well as a longing for a return to normalcy. But, while composed under specific circumstances, my only hope is that I’ve written something that transcends both time and place!