Bookslut interviews Kathleen Rooney, founding editor of Rose Metal Press and the author of Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object. Describing herself as the “frequently that-girl-with-the Moleskine, shamelessly/potentially obnoxiously jotting my direct sensory impressions of experiences as they are happening,” Kathleen explains the difference between nude and naked, and why “photography is arguably more creepy than painting,” and some more.

Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object by Kathleen Rooney

Kathleen Rooney is a founding editor of Rose Metal Press, and the author, most recently, of the collaborative poetry chapbook Don’t ever stay the same; keep changing and Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object. In late October 2009 she was interviewed over e-mail about the latter by Elizabeth Hildreth, herself no stranger to the world of professional nudity. They discuss, among other things, why art modeling is probably neither as sexy nor as boring as you might think, how to tell whether you happen to be nude or naked, why photography is arguably more creepy than painting, and why forced epiphanies in creative nonfiction — in general, even — suck.

I’ve been wanting to read your book for a while now. Frankly, I think I held off because I was kind of afraid. I’m close to the subject, and the title sounds so… sexy? Which, of course, exactly represents people’s ideas about nude modeling. Like it’s total French cinema, with beautiful women rolling around on mattresses — their labias all front and center and lit up like a painting. Anyway, when the book came in, I looked at the cover and thought, well it doesn’t look overly girly and silly and inappropriately sexy. Anyway, I started reading and it was just… not what I expected at all. So smarty pants. And funny. Not to mention, really, really accurate. I was reading portions of it to David [Abed, my husband, a figurative painter] this weekend when we were on a car ride, and I would wait for his response, which I expected to be, “Well, not really” or “Not always.” But passage after passage, it was [long, long pause] “Yeah.” [Even longer pause] “That’s about right.” So where did the idea for the title come from? And who was your audience while you were writing this? Who did you anticipate might read it?

Read more of the interview at Bookslut.