Walden Books Interview with Jewel

A MULTIFACETED JEWEL

WALDEN BOOK REPORT:  Poetry, as you've said, makes you more intimate with
yourself.  Did you ever hesitate in sharing intimacy with other people?

JEWEL:  At certain times I did, only because since i already am known as
a pop singer or song writer, people, I think, will be reading this book
looking for clues into my life, which will be disappointing to them and
me.  A lot of it is just very vivid imagination.  And some of it is
stories about my childhood or anecdotes, but i think that was the biggest
fear on my part, was that people would be very literal with the book.

WBR:  And is that where you came up with the title, A Night without
Armor?

J:  Yeah. For me poetry is one of the most honest things i can think of
doing with myself, it just has no. . .it's never had any pretension with
me, it's a very raw emotion.  I think if i want to be most articulate and
most undiluted and most honest about emotion or any particular situation,
I write poetry about it because songs can be clever very easily.

WBR:  Do you write when you have an idea or do you write as an exercise
and ideas come from that?

J:  It's never really been an exercise.  I began to depend on writing at
a young age just because my life had gotten hard and it helps me deal
with it and I use it as sort of a crutch to lean on.  And since then,
it's just been a need.  I don't exist unless i'm writing.  I don't feel
comfortable at the end of the day unless i write about what i see.  I
sort of seem to process the world better that way/

WBR:  Do you know then while you're writing if what you're writing is
going to be  a poem or a song or just maybe some notes in your diary?

J:  Yeah, it's been always a very naive, almost process for me---the need
to get outside of myself, the need to understand what's around me or
something.  It's a vague thing.  I don't know why some are songs and why
[some] are poems.  They just seem to be very, very different and rarely
do they cross over.

WBR:  How did you choose which poems to include in this book?

J:  It was sort of. . .all my poetry is handwritten; I haven't yet
ventured to the computer, so collecting all this was very archaic.  I had
to go through books--- about 20 books---that i had handwritten , and pick
out poems, and i was doing that between touring.  And so there were
entire books that were skipped and parts of books got left behind and
things like that, so sort of whatever i ended up with and then the best
poems out of those.  And then the ones i didn't feel like reworking, i
just didn't, and it was sort of a nonsensical process.

WBR:  You're planning a book tour for A Night without Armor.  This will
be obviously a different kind of touring than you're used to.  What do
you hope the tour will produce?

J:  You know, I don't know what to expect from it.  I love poetry more
than i love music.  I just love poetry, and i hope to get a lot of kids
into poetry and reading other poets.  It should be fun for me.  I have no
idea; i've never read my poetry to anybody in my life, and now i'm doing
a book, which is very odd to me.