Bosworth. Reynolds. Figure skating. Outsider Writers Collective. Wowness.

We can get crazy happy when we see even one TBWCYL, Inc. favorite being interviewed or conducting one, so imagine the crazy excitement channeling through our very core today as we read an interview with the Ryan W. Bradley by the Mel Bosworth at the Outsider Writers Collective and Press. Wowness. Indeed.

MB: Let’s talk about this thing we call writing, Ryan W. Bradley the non-figure skater, although if figure skating were part of your repertoire that would be rad and I might demand pictures. I still might demand pictures of you working really hard at crappy jobs because that’s even harder than figure skating and speaks volumes about character. Are you a character, Ryan W. Bradley? And why writing? Goddamn. What is it exactly about this thing we call writing? Why, Ryan W. Bradley? Tell me why!

RB: I can certainly pull off at least a photo of me working at one or two crappy jobs. Me in figure skating outfits is something I’m not about to reveal, even fictitiously. I don’t know that I’m a character. That’s the kind of thing I feel Humphrey Bogart might accuse some bit player of in a old school crime drama, and I’d much rather be Bogart.

As for your more pertinent question: many writers, of much higher intelligence than myself have tried to explain the compulsion to write. And it is a compulsion. But beyond that I can’t explain why. I can, however, explain how. I came to writing through injury. I always loved reading, but hated writing. I was more into sports. And acting. But when I suffered a severe back injury in high school I found myself in a lot of physical pain without any of the outlets I normally took advantage of. That is when I began writing. I was lucky to recover from the injury, but my addled brain has yet to recover from the writing compulsion I developed.