Amitha Jagannath Knight is an Indian American writer and poet for all ages, and an award-winning picture book author. She is a graduate of MIT and Tufts University School of Medicine. Dr. Knight has lived in Texas and Arkansas, and now lives in Massachusetts with her husband, kids, and cats.
Amatha’s poem, “My Mother, the Exoskeleton", originally appeared in Tower Magazine, and will appear in BRAVE NEW WEIRD: The Best New Weird Horror Volume Two, available to preorder now.
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Give us the elevator pitch of your BNW-nommed story, please.
“My Mother, the Exoskeleton" is a multi-part speculative poem about a strange alien species, and it is also about feeling trapped by biological and ancestral cycles.
What does your writing routine look like? Do you have an office? A preferred coffee shop? The back of the bus? Standing under your neighbor’s eaves, avoiding the rain? Are you one of those true modern Weirdos who write your entire novel on your phone?
With my prose writing, I have a regular routine and a home office with a built-in desk and lovely bookshelves and my family's junk everywhere. I mostly write on weekdays when my kids are in school, and once a week at the local indie bookstore cafe with a group of writers, one of whom I have been writing with for more than a decade!
However, my poetry writing is different--I write poems randomly as they occur to me, usually as I'm falling asleep. I keep a notebook in my bedside drawer for this specific purpose. The poem in this anthology came to me as I was falling asleep one day pondering an alien side character I had already written in another story for children. As I was thinking about whether the character could be the main character of its own book, the words for this poem started emerging from some part of my sleepy brain. Because my family was in a house we'd rented to attend a family wedding, I didn't have my usual notebook. Instead I either got out my laptop (or another notebook) and the poem basically emerged whole onto the page. Later, at home, I opened the poem and still liked it, and revised only a little for clarity before starting to submit it to speculative poetry venues.
What does “Weird” mean to you, in the context of storytelling? And what creators/experiences/influences helped sculpt this definition for you in your creative journey?
"Weird" for me is a story that isn't told in a typical fashion, or is about a topic most people do not touch in their writing. The meaning may even be a bit opaque for most readers. This type of writing is difficult to get published, but can't be revised into being something more mainstream--the story is what it is, take it or leave it!
On the Tenebrous Discord, we ask everyone to introduce themselves as a Film-meets-Music Artist (Citizen Kane x Metallica, f’rinstance). It doesn’t have to be your favorite, and don’t spend too much time overthinking it; now GO.
Amélie x Radiohead
What’s the Weirdest thing—capital W—that’s ever happened to you (that you’re comfortable sharing)?
Drawing a blank on this one! The weirdest thing that happened is probably anything having to do with my writing journey. It might even just be the writing of this poem!
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BRAVE NEW WEIRD: The Best New Weird Horror, Volume Two, is out June 26th.
