Amber Tamblyn: no longer taking her cues from the almighty on TV, the actress unleashes the voice within

When Emmy-nominated actress Amber Tamblyn's culty television drama Joan of Arcadia was canceled earlier this year, a collective wall went up from her fans. But with her recent starring role in the surprise hit Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and the release of her newest book of poetry, Free Stallion (Simon & Schuster), it's obvious there's plenty more to come from this 22-year-old multi-threat. While poetry may seem an unlikely medium for a former child soap star, Tamblyn credits her parents with providing her with a childhood steeped in creativity. Her father, the actor Russ Tamblyn, entertained an eclectic crowd at the Tamblyn household, and young Amber would soak it all in when Dennis Hopper, David Lynch, Ed Ruscha, or Neil Young stopped by. Here she speaks with another DIY wordsmith, rapper and poet Sage Francis.

SAGE FRANCIS: Hi, Amber. First tell me: What did you do last night?

AMBER TAMBLYN: [laughs] Um ... let's see, walking home from a restaurant, I gave a homeless man my salad. He threw out the carrots, which are my favorite part.

SF: I thought you were going to a poetry event.

AT: Oh, yeah. I went to something like that the night before. It was all slam poetry. I'm not really sure what I think about it yet.

SF: You've been hitting up the spoken-word scene quite frequently. Is it because you're looking for a new venue to do your thing?

AT: I've been kind of submerged in my own little geographic location for a really long time in Venice Beach. I've always been reading here, but with this book coming out I wanted to branch out and start reading with other people and seeing other styles and just waking myself up a bit.

SF: The slam scene is a strange little world. It has a style all unto itself--for a lot of poets who work on the page it doesn't translate all that well live. I've heard you read before, though, and you're able to bring it to life off the page. Has that scene accepted you?

AT: The response has been pretty great. People who have seen me read usually come up afterwards and invite me to be a part of something. But it's hard for me because I'm coming at poetry from a very old-fashioned era that's more diverse politically. A lot of young poets today, from what I've heard and experienced, can't get their heads past George W. Bush, and I've heard so many poems about this democracy and this era of politics that I'm kind of bored by it. Whereas a lot of older poets talk about what's happened over the ages that might have created the mess we're in now. And a lot of times in slam poetry I feel like people are so worried about the performance that the words might not be as strong. Being a performer myself I can understand that, but I think that poetry, for me, might be less about the performance and more about the words.

SF: That's what separates the big fries from the small fries--when you let the words stand on their own and don't try to distract people from the actual content of the poem. How was the process of putting your book together?

AT: It's interesting--there's a lot of my poetry that I don't think I could ever publish because it's almost too personal. But this book was like a timeline for me. I just want people to get an idea of what I've been writing in the last seven years. When it's just on a piece of paper and you're gonna read it somewhere, it's totally fine because you're like, "Oh, it's just words, I can translate it through my mouth." But when it's in a book? Oh, my God, it's terrifying, because then it just stares you down, and you don't know what kind of inner voice people have. It might be really lame and sound like Mr. Rogers. And then everything you've written will sound like Mr. Rogers to them.

SF: Yeah, but Mr. Rogers is a good guy.

AT: He is, but he's got that monotone voice.

SF: Well, who are some of your influences?

AT: There's a writer named Jack Hirschman who is really incredible. Some other ones have been Nathanael West, Pablo Neruda, and Dylan Thomas. And I'm influenced by female writers more interested in their own deconstructions and who are really clever and hilarious. Like Virginia Woolf or Katherine Mansfield or Corrina Bain.

SF: I don't know any of these writers! I'm just a rapper. [Tamblyn laughs] All these poets that I know I should've read but haven't--

AT: [laughs] That's okay. I don't think it's always good to read lots of poetry.

SF: Well, you have a book coming up that I think people should be psyched about. It's got some great writing in it. Reading it actually got me interested in finally putting together my own book. I think you did a really good job.

AT: Thank you.

SF: Good luck to you. I'll be seeing you.

AT: Soon enough.

SF: You can bring me some salad.

AT: [laughs] I'll do that.

Sage Francis will be touring this fall in support of his Epitaph debut release, "A Healthy Distrust."

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COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning