Frederick author, teacher, thespian Aaron Angello writes genre-defying debut book 'The Fact of Memory'

Jun. 16—Aaron Angello's debut book of creative writing, "The Fact of Memory: 114 Ruminations and Fabrications," was published this spring — though to define its genre is tough, even for him.

In it, he writes a short rumination, as the title implies, on each of the 114 words in Shakespeare's Sonnet 29. Each word serves as a jumping off point, but where Angello goes from there is loose and boundless. His associations to the word of origin move the reader through memories, through pop culture, through our collective history, like a mind map of an artist.

No stranger to Shakespeare, Angello developed a deep appreciation for the playwright during his years as an actor. Angello grew up in Colorado, moved to New York City to study acting, then worked as an actor in L.A. and a bunch of other places before moving back to Colorado for graduate school — and ultimately landing in Frederick. Here, he has taught creative writing, poetry and media at Hood College for six years and also directs the school's theater program.

He also serves as creative director for the Endangered Species (theater) Project and founded the Frederick Shakespeare Festival, which has continued to grow. At this year's festival, he is directing "Hamlet," which runs from June 24 through July 9 at the outdoor amphitheater at Hood College.

Ahead of the show's debut, Angello talked with us about his book and his work in the Frederick theater scene.

How were you first introduced to Shakespeare? What was your initial impression of his work?

When I was younger, I studied to be an actor at college. Though I read some Shakespeare in high school, I didn't think about him seriously until I started to work on the plays as an actor. I was drawn to them because of the plots and characters, sure, but really, I fell in love with the language. Speaking those words, feeling them in my mouth and body, gave me an appreciation and love of the poetry that I wouldn't have gotten otherwise. In a very real, direct way, being a classical actor led to my being a writer and poet.

What came first: the desire to write a collection of essays or this idea to write essays based around each word of Shakespeare's Sonnet 29?

I've been a writer for a while, so I'm always working on projects. This one came about when I took part in a workshop in Colorado that focused on writers cultivating a daily practice of some kind. Here's what I did: I wrote each word of the sonnet, in order, at the top of a page of an empty sketchbook, one word per page. Each morning, I'd wake up, sit in the same chair, look at the word, meditate upon the word, then write until the page was full. I did it for the entire sonnet.

I didn't think of it in terms of genre at all, really. It was just the practice. It wasn't until much later that I realized I had a coherent collection of short pieces that work together to form a kind of fragmented, nonlinear memoir of sorts.

I wrote the first draft of this about seven years ago. Then, I worked it, revised, rewrote — all the stuff that writers do — until it went to print. Writing can sometimes be a long process.

Why Sonnet 29, in particular?

I could have been anything, probably, but I've always loved this sonnet. I memorized it when I was very young, and it's always been hanging around in my head. I didn't have any particular reason for choosing it initially, other than that. However, the sonnet is about a person who is unhappy with the state of their life, who is dejected and miserable. But then, when they think of their love, they realize that their life is actually pretty great. I think that theme ended up in the book, that there is a kind of redemptive power that love holds. That may well have come into it via the original sonnet.

Do you consider these prose poems, or what do you call them?

This is the big question! I would probably say the pieces are sometimes prose poems, sometimes short lyric essays, sometimes flash fiction. The generic distinctions don't make that much sense to me. I think the need to really label the genre of the pieces is about marketing. That said, I do think that the pieces, taken together, form a kind of fragmented memoir, like I mentioned, but that happened unintentionally.

There have been a few reviews of the book, and generally, poets and poetry reviewers call them prose poems, and essayists and creative nonfiction writers call them lyric essays.

I understand you are also a playwright, songwriter and poet. Can you talk a little about how your mindset or process shifts when writing in each of these genres? Is there a specific headspace or emotional state, for instance, that lends itself more to one genre than the other? Do you have a favorite or one that feels most like "you"?

Writing "The Fact of Memory" was a unique experience because of the specific nature of the practice, but generally, these things are all kind of similar to me. When I write poetry — or songs, for that matter, though I haven't done that in a long time — I tend to try to get my conscious mind out of the way and let the "beyond-conscious" dictate the work. Then I revise.

When I write plays, it's similar, but I defer to the characters. Once you've created fully realized people, you just have to put them in a situation together, then follow them. It's almost like dictation. However, to be clear, whether I'm writing poems, essays or plays, I revise a lot. It's in revision where the proverbial clay is shaped into something approaching art.

Tell me a little about your directing "Hamlet" at the Frederick Shakespeare Festival. What do you love about revisiting this classic — or this production in particular?

I think "Hamlet" is perhaps the best play ever written. I love everything about it. We [Christine Mosere, ESP artistic director and Angello] decided to do it more than a year ago. It's a play that everyone loves: audiences, actors, designers — everyone wants their Hamlet.

I've directed it before, but it is always a little daunting to approach because it's, well, "Hamlet." However, I'm loving the rehearsal process right now. We have a phenomenal cast, including Evan Crump as Hamlet. They are creative and skilled, and I love working with them. The brilliant Julie Herber is doing costumes — a kind of classic, Elizabethan look with a bit of 1970s CBGBs punk aesthetic mixed in.

The show will be a high-energy, accessible and fun — in the way only a Shakespearean tragedy can be — production.

What do you enjoy most about teaching?

I love everything about teaching. I love my amazing students. I have fantastic, stimulating, brilliant colleagues. It's a great job.

I've come to look at my role as a teacher as creating a space in which students can be creative, to push themselves to think beyond the confines of the ordinary. I think I'm getting pretty good at it, and it's incredibly satisfying.

What did the first year of the pandemic look like for you, when classes were remote and theater productions put on hold? How did you find a creative outlet?

Well, we did do some Zoom theater, which I did not enjoy at all. It was fine for some people, but not for me. I worked on revisions of the book, wrote a couple of plays, and I shot a couple of short films of monologues that some friends wrote. That was fun, theater-like, and kept me somewhat sane.

What was the most difficult word to write a prose poem about? Or which "verse" are you happiest with?

You can't ask a poet that! I really enjoyed writing the pieces inspired by the words we don't think about much — the little articles and pronouns. There are several pieces called "And," and they were a lot of fun to write. I think they resulted in interesting pieces, too.

Then there are pieces like "Beweep." It's an archaic word, so the piece ended up being about archaic words and is pretty fun, I think.

Did you have any breakthroughs — about the writing process or life in general — as you were writing?

I certainly think differently about creativity and memory after writing "The Fact of Memory." Since I finished it, I am always thinking about ways to access the creative mind, about the veracity of memory, and about the relationship between the two.

One thing the book explores, and that has become a minor obsession for me, is if something needs to be factual to be true. I'll probably explore these questions and relationships for the rest of my life.

I have to ask. Do you buy into the theory that Shakespeare was actually multiple people writing under one pen name?

Oh man, the authorship question! First of all, I'll answer the question that precedes your question. I am confident that Shakespeare was a real person and he actually wrote those plays. The argument against that is that he couldn't have written them because he didn't have a formal — Oxford — education. I think he was a self-educated, highly sensitive person who really loved words and human psychology. And he knew how to entertain a crowd. All that taken together, along with a freakish natural talent, he was able to produce the plays we still love today, 400-plus years later.

To answer your question more directly, we know that Shakespeare did collaborate with other writers, especially early in his career and at the end of his career. For example, we know he worked with John Fletcher on "Two Noble Kinsmen" and "Henry VIII." There was probably a good deal of plagiarizing going on between writers back then, so who knows. However, there is a clear linguistic consistency between all of the plays, sonnets and longer poems that point to one dude who was really good at what he did.

This interview has been edited for space and clarity.

"The Fact of Memory" (Rose Metal Press) is available online at rosemetalpress.com/books/the-fact-of-memory.