Beauty for Ashes: Writer David Zahl
in Conversation with Emily Chambers Sharpe
Creativity is usually some form of working something out… it's exploratory. The idea that you would find a completely finished work of art, or a completely perfect work of art, is almost antithetical to the very idea of art.
— David Zahl
David Zahl is the director of Mockingbird Ministries and editor-in-chief of the Mockingbird website. Born in New York City and brought up elsewhere, David graduated from Georgetown University in 2001 and then worked for several years as a youth minister in New England. In 2007 he founded Mockingbird in NYC. Today David and his wife Cate reside in Charlottesville, VA, with their three boys, where David also serves on the staff of Christ Episcopal Church. He is the author of A Mess of Help: From the Crucified Soul of Rock N’ Roll, Seculosity: How Career, Parenting, Technlogy, Food, Politics, and Romance Became Our New Religion and What To Do About It, and co-author of Law and Gospel: A Theology for Sinners (and Saints). His most recent book, Low Anthropology: The Unlikely Key to a Gracious View of Others (and Yourself), was published by Brazos in Sept. 2022. Even after all these years, he’s still mourning the end of Calvin and Hobbes (and hoping that Morrissey and Marr will bury the hatchet). His favorite theologian is probably a cross between Johnny Cash, Flannery O’Connor and his brother Simeon.
The following transcript has been edited. The full conversation is available in the audio interview above.
Emily Chambers Sharpe: My favorite thing from your bio is that you're mourning the end of Calvin and Hobbes, and your favorite theologian is probably a cross between Johnny Cash, Flannery O'Connor, and your brother Simeon. And maybe that's a good launching point. Could you tell us a little bit about your story? Who are you? And how did you come to be this person who's done these things in your bio?
David Zahl: I certainly didn't set out to do it. I'm originally from the Northeast. I'm the son of an Episcopal minister who also wrote a bunch of books. I grew up not really wanting to have much to do with that, though. It was a very intellectual home and wonderful childhood. But we moved around quite a bit and ended up living in Europe for a while when I was in adolescence. But I would say that when it comes to my faith, I felt almost duty-bound to push that away for a while. I mean, I didn't have terrible experiences of church. It was just what we did because my dad was there. And I didn't have some sort of traumatizing or particularly inspiring experience of church—outside of the fact that the people around our house were people to whom Jesus and God meant a great deal, and it didn't seem phony or like any kind of caricature that you would run into in pop culture.
After college, I took a couple of biblical literacy courses. I went to Georgetown, which is a Jesuit university, and so they make you take theology. And so I took a really wonderful biblical theology class from a Jesuit. I haven't thought about that class for many years, but it did open me up. But then what really cracked me open was just suffering in my personal life. And, you know, the crash course in Romans 7 is what I would like to say. The sort of watching yourself do things you didn't know you were capable of while also watching other people do those things to you. And through a roundabout series of events, I found myself working as a youth minister and involved in a Bible study of people that were really thoughtful and caring and also very funny. But then I was made to be a professional Christian very quickly, and probably too quickly, to be honest with you. But I found a facility for it. I love working with students especially. I worked as a sort of traveling youth minister in boarding schools in the Northeast. And I had gone to one, and it had been, in many ways, a wonderful experience. But in many ways, a very lonely and spiritually desolate experience. So I felt like I was able to redeem parts of my past or heal in that way.
I grew up in the Episcopal Church, and the Episcopal Church was going through a whole lot. It was basically 2005–2006, that era. There was major infighting and splitting and problems. Everyone I knew who was involved in the church was on all sides of the various culture wars going on. Everyone was miserable. So I thought, I don't really want to become a professional minister. And I was getting married. I moved to New York, where I'm from originally, and just decided to keep doing youth ministry, but with an older group, and a little bit more focused on the life of the mind.
That was 2007. And this was right around the explosion of the blogosphere. We just happened to start a little blog as part of our outreach, and we found that getting traction really quickly. And then we started publishing books and holding conferences. And over time, it just blossomed into something larger than I ever thought it would, or at least more robust. And it was drawing all sorts of people. And the emphasis was always on the grace of God as it relates to everyday life and reclaiming the grace of God as the central comfort of the Christian faith.
So one thing led to another. I've never had a five-year plan. At one point, I got asked to ghostwrite a book for someone, and that turned into ghostwriting. And I thought, hey, you know, I can do this. So I wrote a book about music, and then did a bunch of publications for Mockingbird, and then I got a contract to do Seculosity, and that did well enough to get a contract with Brazos to do Low Anthropology. All of this just spirals, you know. People aren’t doing blogging now; they're doing podcasting, you know, et cetera. And then we were like, Hey, we want something in people's hands. So we started a magazine. So it's been a fairly organic process that was completely un-engineered, and for that reason, quite arduous in certain ways, but also really exciting in others.
ECS: It sounds like there was a lot of organic growth into the work that you do. I've read you quoted as saying that you're a writer and a speaker, which are really creative work pursuits. But I also, I don't know if this is fair, I look at you almost like a curator as well. The first book that you mentioned, I've not read it, but I had a look at it, and it looks like it's a lot about curating music and looking at music and the intersection of music and faith. Would you want to talk a little bit about how you see yourself? Does curator seem like an accurate description? Or how would you classify what you do in terms of looking at the world?
I consciously avoid dividing things into high and low culture. Because in my consuming life, I rarely divide that way.
DZ: I think my role at this point—and it could change because it's changed a number of times—but what interests me and what I feel like I've got some facility with is synthesizing. The key part of curating is synthesizing things. But my interests are fairly wide-ranging, and I've always been a “culture vulture.” But I just love music. I love art, and I love film. I love reading. So what I'm trying to do is synthesize things that I'm taking in and possibly, yes, curate. Maybe filter is another word. And certainly the website Mockingbird was more curation—here's a quote, here's a song, here's another quote, here's a poem, you know. That's what I was interested in doing. I don't feel like I'm terribly original. And that's what Mockingbird the name, by the way, is—like we're repeating what we've heard. But in terms of synthesis and translation—that excites me. Finding new ways to communicate timeless things.
ECS: You quote everything from Greek poets, Augustine, Seinfeld… You kind of run the gamut in your new book. It’s an interesting thing to do. I like that, in a way, what I'm hearing is that these aren't things that belong in different corners. In your role as a person who synthesizes information and communicates it, is that something that you're passionate about? That these themes or things that you see aren't just restricted to one particular artist or group of thinkers?
DZ: Oh, absolutely. It drives me crazy. It's a shame when I feel like different worlds that could be talking to each other and learning from each other, aren't. Or I see some major overlap that's being missed. I consciously avoid dividing things into high and low culture. Because in my consuming life, I rarely divide that way. And so I think that it's exciting to approach the world, to find the red thread that goes through all sorts of creative work and into unexpected alleyways. I like to say, “Oh, hey, this thing that this person on the far left is writing about such and such, is very similar to something that someone 300 years ago said over here. They're using different terms, and some of their presuppositions are different, but I think the two things are actually not. They're both getting at something universal, or something that can teach us something.”
Today, I feel like we're so atomized and siloed into different demographics, and so it touches me when I run into something that I think is speaking, on a subterranean level, across divides. And I think that people say nothing can do that. I feel like lots of things can do that. It might mean, as with anything creative, you have to risk the fact that you could make a total fool of yourself. You could be completely wrong about something. But a little bit of recklessness or a little bit of courage, in that respect, goes a long way, I think, in terms of reaching out beyond the approved set of resources. I remember, like Brad Bird had a movie that came out a few years ago, and someone's like, “Oh, I heard that he was really into Ayn Rand, I don't want to read anything about the Incredibles anymore.” I thought to myself—I haven't even seen the movie in question, but like, let's watch it first, you know, you did love the Incredibles, so maybe he's not totally off base. And I don't like Ayn Rand either. Instead of looking for reasons to write people off, I think it's much harder and much more worthwhile to look for things you can learn from them.
ECS: I think that theme comes out really strongly through your book, this idea that there are these common things that are true about who we are as humans, and then that informs how we can relate to one another. But ultimately, I feel like we can feel better about ourselves. I don't know how that sounds to you, but when I read your book, I kept thinking, Yeah, this feels like it's both addressing how we relate to each other, but also a little bit how we relate to ourselves.
I want to see a decrease in loneliness, because I think that's sort of hell, and it bears all sorts of terrible fruit and suffering.
DZ: Absolutely. I hope that comes across. I take the loneliness in the world pretty seriously. ’Cause I see it in myself, and I see it in our community. And if the book can help, in any way, address that core loneliness–people not feeling seen or heard or recognized, and that usually has to do with omitting the darker parts of our nature—that's what I want to do. I want to see a decrease in loneliness, because I think that's sort of hell, and it bears all sorts of terrible fruit and suffering.
ECS: This might be a good time for you to define low anthropology for us. And then we can get a launching point from there, because that will connect our new-to-you folks, who might be reading or hearing this, with your idea.
DZ: With Low Anthropology, I'm proceeding from the point of view that everyone has some operating theory of human nature, some idea of what it means to be human. You hear the phrase, “I'm only human,” a lot, and everyone uses it. Or “that was such a human thing for them to do.” And what is the content of that phrase? It varies for different people. We all have these theories of human nature, or views of what it means to be human, that end up creating expectations of other people in our relationships, in our art, you know, the art we consume, in our politics, but especially I think, in our relationship with ourselves and our religious life, our relationship with God. And so I was interested in unpacking how the competing or the jumble of anthropologies work out in people's lives. Because I do think there's some views of human nature that set people up for a lot of disappointment and cynicism and bitterness. And there are ones that set people up for awe and wonder and connection and compassion. And they're not the ones you think usually.
I was also always interested in drilling down underneath, as I said, the subterranean. And so, when I was reading discourses about stuff, I'd always see there's some sense of what it means to be human here that is different from what this person means. If I say people never change, that's an anthropology. Or if I say people can always change, or some people never change, or some people are like such and such—those are all anthropologies. Any sense of there are these people and those people—that's an anthropology. And so a low anthropology is a more sober estimation of human nature.
A low anthropology is a more sober estimation of human nature… The lows tend to be places where people actually connect with each other, are the places of weakness, limitation.
But I would also counter to say it's a comprehensive view of human nature. A high anthropology basically views people through the lens of their best days and their greatest accomplishments, through the lens of their potential. And while that's wonderful, that also can be kind of crushing in practice. A low anthropology says people are more reliably defined by their weaknesses than by their strengths. And what I mean by that is like—what ties me to you, Emily, not even knowing you, is we've probably both experienced loss in some way, just by nature of getting older. But I don't know if we've had the same highs and lows in other ways. But the lows tend to be places where people actually connect with each other, are the places of weakness, limitation. I call it conflict, conflictedness. So that may be a very broad brush, but those are what I mean by low anthropology.
ECS: I think that it's really helpful. I loved—I'm going to quote you from your book for just a minute and then we'll go to the next question. I loved that you wrote into this idea that [there are] a lot of ties to faith in low anthropology. Here's a quote from, I think it's around the sixth chapter. You said,
Perhaps faith, then is the ultimate fruit of low anthropology, the willingness to admit we do not possess all the facts. Not when it comes to other people, not when it comes to ourselves, not when it comes to something as metaphysical as God.
And I just was wondering if you can wrestle a little with how an idea like that impacts what folks who are interested in art and creative things might do? Or how we might be?
DZ: Wow, that's such a cool question. I think creativity is usually some form of working something out. Like [working] an idea out or a impulse or a feeling out, or just a picture out. There's not always a point to it. It's just to realize some expressed idea—it might be emotional, it might be intellectual, it might be visual, it might be the expression of the absence of an idea, I don't even know. But I feel like there's always a wrestling in that particularity. And it's exploratory. The idea that you would find a completely finished work of art, or a completely perfect work of art, is almost antithetical to the very idea of art. I mean, yes, we reach what we talk about Michelangelo or something like that, or people lift up Homer or Moby Dick, or I don't know what it is, for the viewers. It could be that the most recent Taylor Swift record is pretty perfect, you know. But there's always some door left open. And that's where the creative impulse plays out. A low anthropology basically proceeds from the conviction that you can never be fully a master of anything or done with something. And so it undermines certainty on a core level. The only certainty is uncertainty. I really believe that. And the only works of art that are interesting are ones that are not not pedantic. They're not necessarily teaching. They may teach in a way that's almost secondary, but they're not. Like, that's why people don't like Christian music, a lot of times, it's like they've got a conclusion they've come to, and then they're sort of working backwards from that, rather than the art being the process by which they sort of come to some kind of conclusion or some sort of expression. And so the lack of certainty that we experience is a call to humility. Yes, in our relationships, yes, in our own in our life with God. But if you see life through that lens, I think that means there's always possibility for more, there's always another step to be taken another stroke to be, another work of art.
My wife's a painter. And she kind of knows when paintings are finished. And yet, the first thing she wants to do is do the next one. Because she—and I noticed that artists who work 12 years on one painting sometimes just go crazy. Because you're trying to say everything. I had another fellow writer here in Charlottesville—I was really struggling with writing this book, and he said, “Don't write your vindication.” Meaning, don't try to think you can include everything about this, everything about yourself, everything about these ideas in here. And if you do, you are going to be shackled under a law that is going to paralyze you. But instead, there's always going to be one corner left unfinished that you can explore the next time around.
ECS: Yeah. I think there's a lot of wisdom in that. It keeps us being able to actually create things if we're free not to feel like it has to be this complete or whole or mastered item. I'm curious, as you were just talking about that, you said this was a bit of a struggle. Would you mind letting us peek into what was your process? What do you do? I think we're always interested as creatives in knowing how are people getting anything done. And what are things that you've enjoyed? What were the stumbling blocks maybe you faced?
A low anthropology basically proceeds from the conviction that you can never be fully a master of anything or done with something. And so it undermines certainty on a core level. The only certainty is uncertainty.
DZ: I love process questions. Because I'm interested in that too. Well, it was tough. There are parts of the book that were really fun to write, and parts of it that were really hard to write. Because you're delving. You know, I preach at our church a lot. And if you ever going to preach an effective sermon, you have to figure out where you're connecting with the material. Where it's gonna ring false, I think, [is] if you're just trying to convey information. So to delve into the parts of oneself that I'm talking about in the book, for it to have any kind of authority, is exhausting. And I find that to be, even if I'm talking about something that's not extensively personal, I have to have some buy-in if I'm going to be interested, or if it's going to “come through the page.”
So, first of all, there's the material that I've chosen to write about, which is weakness, limitation, self-centeredness, conflict madness, and the beautiful fruit that flows from an understanding of humanity that can allow for those things. And yet, the experience of those things in and of themselves is often quite painful. So that was difficult. I wrote the book, though, mostly during COVID, during the lockdown. I had signed a contract, I think, in January 2020. So I thought I was going to be able to deliver the manuscript much more quickly. And I'm a person that writes in coffee shops, in public spaces. I don't really write in my office, because it's a lot of people coming through, I've got too many toys. I can't write in a cabin in the woods. But all of a sudden, all my favorite coffee shops were closed. And that was hard.
And then COVID itself confronts you. The lockdowns here in Charlottesville were more aggressive, I realize now, than a lot of the country experienced. So I didn't have a universal experience with that. But it forced you into contact with other things that were usually pretty difficult. So I was way behind on the book. And then we went on vacation, actually. And there was a library that was opened up in the beach town where we were, and I just went to the library, and that really got me going.
The other thing that happened, frankly, I got stuck and I got depressed, like really depressed. And my younger brother, who I thank in the acknowledgments— he's an academic and a theologian— about being my hero. He had the wherewithal to fly across the ocean. You know, he's got three kids and a wonderful wife. And he came and helped me for a week and sort of jumpstarted the project. And then once it gets going, then the momentum, you can just follow it, and it's really fun. But it was a stop-start thing, and I look back, and my therapist says, “I can't believe you got a book written during COVID.” You know? Remember those early days of the lockdowns? Like, you know, what was it—Shakespeare wrote King Lear? What are you going to do? I guess I got this done. And I had a really good editor, Katelyn Beaty, was wonderful, helpful. I had another chapter actually all about art that we cut. It needed to be a certain size. She was right about that.
ECS: Well, maybe that's something that you can share down the road. It's really interesting hearing your process and your story. So far, there's been a few themes that you've talked about—loneliness and depression. And I noticed in the book as well, I mean, those are the stories you related a lot to open yourself to show your personal stake in understanding the world through this low anthropology lens. I think those are pretty common human experiences. And I think we've all, especially folks who are in the creative life, I think there's often times of loneliness, and especially in the process. I wonder, as you've put the art out there, has it felt any different than in the time of the creation of it?
DZ: I guess, all writers, or I think all human beings, are pretty sensitive when you get down to it. And I'm thin-skinned. So I'm both really excited for people to read this thing that I've been working on. And I really think it's as good a thing I can make. And when I say “I,” I am referring to the committee of people that worked on this book that I'm very fortunate to have the goodwill and help of. So, there's a real excitement about that, when you write a book—I mean, my wife had an exhibit and had about 15 paintings in it. With a book, it’s one, you know. If it's not a good one, or if you put your eggs in the wrong basket, there's a gamble to it that’s scary. So I'm both really touched by the fact that folks have been understanding it. The criticism I get was sort of expected. Not threatening. Like I said, I'm a sensitive person. So there's no aspect of this creative process where you can deaden your senses, I don't think. And sometimes I wonder, you know, my wife's like, are you sure, this is a lot and to put yourself out there this much and open yourself up to this much judgment and this much critique on a single project that you spent two years on. She's like, are you insane? I guess I am. But the more I hear that people are touched by it, or they're resonating on the same frequency. And when I talk about loneliness, I feel less lonely, certainly having written something. And a lot of people already have understood this book. I don't think it's a hard book to read. And that's very intentional like that. I work really hard to make sure it's easy to digest. But the more you hear from people being like, Oh, I feel seen. And it was funny. It was both like women in their 60s that told me, I felt better with every page of this book, like I just felt so seen and heard. And here I am a man in his 40s. And that's a really cool thing to hear, that they didn't feel like it was some condemnation, that it actually was the burden-lifting thing that I intended it to be.
ECS: It does seem like it relates a lot to your life story going back to the very beginning. I mean, you talked about your boarding school experience, right? There was something that you felt, I can almost imagine, as a teenager, and now later you're saying, maybe from this place there’s something that we all share. I think that's really very, very cool.
This is a little bit of a shift in gears, and [it’s] hard from loneliness to go into this maybe. But you put out a playlist, I think, to go along with your book. I would love to hear you talk about what those songs are. Where did they come from? How does it relate to either the subject or the process?
Head to Mockingbird to see David’s full playlist for Low Anthropology.
DZ: Oh, that's such a good question. You know, music is my greatest passion, and I don't get asked about it almost ever. I have a podcast called The Well of Sound which is my great extracurricular thing I do. It’s just deep dives into music with a friend of mine. It has no Christian or religious utility whatsoever, outside of the fact that good art is beautiful I think.
I had songs in mind. Not a group of songs that I listened to while I was writing the book but a group of songs that captured the themes of the book. The themes of the book being: being loved in the middle of weakness, and what it means to be human, and what it means to be acknowledged. For me, it starts with a song. Probably my favorite John Mellencamp song is this song called “Human Wheels,” about the human suffering and self-defeating things just going on and on. And yet he's written this beautiful song about it, so that there's something to write. Something beautiful about something discouraging is, I think, part of the interplay of this.
And then it shifts to a Morrissey song, and he's one of my heroes, and it's about everybody being lost. We're just pretending that we're not lost, and that commonality is something I'm trying to get through. Weyes Blood just put out a song called [“It’s Not Just Me, It’s Everybody”], and she just talks about how, as she's gotten older, coming to the knowledge that we're all in the same boat together. It ends with with a song by Damien Rice about bringing your true concerns to God, and who you are, and that God cares about the real you and not the false you. There's a song about surprise, because I really think that the life of low anthropology is not a life of cynicism; it's actually a life where, given what human beings are like, given the burden of life, how amazing is it that such beautiful things happen on such a frequent basis?
The life of low anthropology is not a life of cynicism; it's actually a life where, given what human beings are like, given the burden of life, how amazing is it that such beautiful things happen on such a frequent basis?
And I feel grateful for the music that inspires me. I just put a new Marcus Mumford song on there that came out about life boils down to drawing the line in the sand. This book is very much a book that tries to erase the lines in the sand that separate us from God. There's a new Johnny Marr song called “Human.” But music is the language of my personal heart. Oh, yeah, there's a song by The The on there called “Slow Motion Replay.” The chorus is “Everybody knows what's going on in the world, but I don't even know what's going on in myself.” There's a song by Mavis Staples that Jeff Tweedy wrote, “You Are Not Alone, I'm Lonely Too.” There's a song by Florence + The Machine about freedom coming from the acknowledgement that she's not free. And the video for that, it's just unbelievable. And there's an ABBA song about being Jekyll and Hyde and not understanding our own motives and a lot of that in the book. There's some prayers in there.
One of the core ideas in the book is that if you're an incomplete person, you need help. Not just from God, though—from other people. So it's like this low anthropology is not an invitation to shame. It's an invitation to friendship and collaboration. And again, as I said, surprise— the surprise of love and the reality of grace. So there's songs on there about people help people. And God being the ultimate help. “All I Need Is Everything” [Over the Rhine]. Tame Impala song “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards.” And then there's a bunch of songs by Brian Wilson about love in the midst of failure, which I think is real love.
ECS: You have a great quote in the book about love. I'll quote you to you again: “But it takes enormous courage to see the world as it truly is and move forward in love.” And I really I like that, because even with the list of songs that you're talking about, it sounds like I'm hearing that theme, this idea of, let's see ourselves as we are. Let's see what's happening as it really is—but also still love. Yes.
DZ: I don't think it's a depressing playlist at all. And I don't think it's a depressing book in the slightest. And that's why I just wanted [the cover] to be upbeat. This is actually really great news, although it sounds to modern ears a little defeating. But it's much more defeating to be told that you can do everything; you can have it all, be it all, care about it all, and just you haven't been able to figure out how to strike the right balance yet. I mean, that's much more defeating. But what did you ask?
This is actually really great news, although it sounds to modern ears a little defeating. But it's much more defeating to be told that you can do everything; you can have it all, be it all, care about it all, and just you haven't been able to figure out how to strike the right balance yet. I mean, that's much more defeating.
ECS: I was trying to say that's almost the miracle as well, right? The idea that not only can we see the world as it is, but we've been seen as we are, and there's love. And I feel like that's what a lot of the theme here is trying to remind us. That facing reality goes beyond. There's been increasing dialogue around vulnerability, like Brené Brown that you quote in the book or others. But there's something beyond that, kind of saying, “Okay, it's real messy, but now what?” And I think that idea of moving forward in love or grace that you're trying to wrestle with, for yourself and for us, in this text. I don't know, what do you think? Is that something that might help us? Is there something beyond just being vulnerable?
DZ: That's such a perceptive observation. I think highly of those books. But I was read book after book after book about the beauty of vulnerability, or something like that. And I liked that—it's so much better than the perfectionism that comes naturally to me and to so many other people, the type-A, high-achieving, neurotic Westerners. But if we can just acknowledge that we're all a little messed up and a little, like, messy, then that's okay. But what about the people on whom our mess gets spilled? You know, if I'm depressed, yes, that's terrible, and have sympathy with me. But also that means I've got three children and a wife that needs to pick up the pieces. And it's not neutral. People are so scared of any kind of value judgment. You want to say, yes, there's brokenness in the world. A lot of the strongest stuff I was finding about the human condition was coming from secular sources, even though Brené is a churchgoer. And I thought, we could go beyond that. It's not just enough to acknowledge that we're all captive to things and that we're all broken, and that vulnerability is the birthplace of love. But I want more. I want what the actual proclamation of love in the midst of vulnerability. and vulnerability is not just some. I would never want to speak for someone that's accomplished as Brené. But there's a lot of the disciples that want to avoid any kind of value judgment because they think it's related to shame. But in fact, you end up starting to paint a curated view of vulnerability. Vulnerability can become a performance. And what we really need is not just a greater admission of vulnerability; we need forgiveness and reconciliation and some way forward. And for me, that's God's grace.
So the book is not really meant to just be a re-conceiving of your own weaknesses, though I hope that happens. I hope that it allows people a little permission to be honest or transparent. But I really also want to point to the great change agent and source of goodness and light in the world, which as a Christian, I believe is God.
ECS: Yeah, that's really wonderful. And I think it is a good news story when you when you put it like that. There's not just being seen, but also being loved while being seen.
You told us some of your passions around music and some of your interests. Would you mind sharing some of what inspires you? Who do you look to? Who helps get you creatively flowing? Or what's interesting for you?
You end up starting to paint a curated view of vulnerability. Vulnerability can become a performance. And what we really need is not just a greater admission of vulnerability; we need forgiveness and reconciliation and some way forward. And for me, that's God's grace.
DZ: Sure. I'll tell you two things. Well, first of all, these days the biggest pastor in the sense of someone who's spoken to my soul is Nick Cave, the songwriter, who’s become a very religious voice and has become increasingly Christian in his view of the world. He just got a new book called Faith, Hope, and Carnage. I've had the chance to read—it's unbelievably profound. But he's got The Red Hand Files where he answers people's questions about life. Because he writes about such darkness, and he's constantly unflinching in his view of human nature. And he's had two children die. When you read him talk about God, faith, grace, you believe it, you know? It's not Pollyanna. So he writes these letters to people with so much wisdom, and also with so many beautiful turns of phrase that I find they speak to my soul. And they get me wanting to write.
The writers that really inspired this book… Alain de Botton—he's an English Swiss atheist who writes a lot of books, where he's borrowing from Christianity, he's borrowing basically low anthropology and grace to some extent, but he just can't go all the way. And I found his books to be deeply resonant with people. And I wanted to write a version of that that was probably a little more American and less erudite. As I say, I believe Augustine is not just right about humanity, but also God.
The writers, though, that I most often recommend are late middle-age Christian women who are in recovery. Like, those are the voices that I find to be the most effective today. There's a triumvirate of them. Mary Karr is the Catholic version of that. Nadia Bolz Weber is the progressive Lutheran Christian version of that. And Anne Lamott is the sort of West Coast, hippie Presbyterian version of that. And for whatever reason, I find that these are women who, because their addiction has confronted them with certain truths about themselves, they do not have a high anthropology. They go a little further than Brené Brown does. And they're also rooted in the deep understanding of God as Savior and Jesus as grace. I asked myself, What is it about these women in this particular age bracket and generation or experiences like, oh my gosh, they're all in recovery. And they've all connected the dots between that understanding of humanity and God. They're all gifted poetically, but they actually can speak from the gut, from the heart. And they’re funny. So something about that point of view is what inspires me.
ECS: I think that's great. I love it. To me, it always has been, how many creative types out there—those that you just mentioned are all wonderful examples. But even the Stephen King book on writing, which I just think is incredible, and he actually talks about how recovery played a huge role in him becoming better at writing and even giving writing the right role in his life, I think. And I thought that was a really interesting thing. There's this part where he talks about having a giant desk that consumed an entire room. And when he got sober, he tore the desk down, replace it with something normal, you know? And I thought what an interesting thing, like right-sizing even that in his life, right?
DZ: Isn't that true? I like that. That book though. When he says I go into a room and I locked the door and don't come out until 2000 words have been written. That's not me.
ECS: Yeah, no. Anne Lamott’s advice is like, five minutes, just go write five minutes.
DZ: The phenomenon of the shitty first draft is a true truly liberating experience.
ECS: Really, her shitty first draft. Yes, I use it for work stuff all the time. When I'm struggling with something, I'm like, I'm just going to turn in rubbish. And at least it's done. (Don’t tell my boss!)
DZ: I love the process of editing. And that's a process of collaboration. But it's also fun to make things a little bit better. And it's why I love it. I love hearing about bands mixing albums, because they've recorded something and then the mixing is where they fit the pieces together to make things just a little bit better. And then they sometimes go back and remix it later. And then it makes it a little slightly different too. I find that process to be tremendously rewarding.
ECS: Maybe I'll ask you this as before we close because, on your website, you're an editor, and you're also seeking out content, putting things together. What is it like for you to work with and relate to all these other writers and artists? And I know in the magazine, you actually also do visual arts, right?
DZ: Yeah. I mean, artists are difficult, for the most part. We’re self-absorbed is a nice way to put it a lot of times. But it's tremendously rewarding. That's a gross generalization. I meet so many people—and the triumvirate of women I just mentioned, I've gotten to meet all of them, and they're unbelievably kind. And I've heard the same thing about Nick Cave.
I find that writers are competitive too, though. And that side of my nature is not my favorite side of my nature. You know, people rooting for your book, but also wanting their own book to do well. And the games you have to play today to market and to promote, are aimed at, I think, undermining the creative mindset in a way that is undeniable. But it's also like we have to learn to live with it, I guess.
So there's nothing cooler than when you read a book that you inspired in some way. Or you see someone that you know at a Mockingbird conference. They'll give us like a sculpture that they made based on some podcasts we did, and that to me is so unexpected and surprising and neat. I love those moments. But I also think it's important to have a few colleagues who are writers and can tell you, “Hey Dave, this is not good,” or “You need to revisit this,” or “This isn't working,” or “I'm not sure you've really read this person. That would be helpful.” And because of my work with Mockingbird, I get to be surrounded by interesting folks like that. I get asked all the time, “How do you find time to read everything you read?” And I was like, “I don't. I have friends that say, this is the thing you should read and not that.” So it's the community effort that makes this a lot more fun. But also the community effort or the competition effort that makes it draining.
ECS: Well, thank you so much for sharing the time with us and helping us to see a little bit about your writing and creative life and to understand a bit more about Low Anthropology.
