INTERVIEW with Sara Bynoe | Teen angst poetry.

Ex boyfriends are good for something after all.

At least, Sara Bynoe’s was. The 24 year old Vancouverite is about to set off on a multi-city book tour to promote her new volume Teen Angst: A Celebration of Really Bad Poetry, and it all started with an ex.

Book jacket: Teen Angst: A celebration of really bad poetry, edited by Sara Bynoe.

“One day, I came across some teen angst poetry written by an old boyfriend,” Bynoe said in a telephone interview from her home. “I did the mean thing … I called a friend and read her some of his stuff, then she read some of her ex’s stuff, then we decided we were being way too mean and read some of our own.”

Realizing the hilarity of her high-school literary endeavours, Bynoe decided to start a website.

Three years later, a book deal practically fell in her lap.

“It’s been a fairy tale,” she admits.  “A woman from Random House saw the site and emailed me to say how hilarious she thought it was, and to ask if I’d ever thought of doing a book … and yes, I had.”

She got herself a literary agent and a lawyer and by December 2003, she’d sold her manuscript to St. Martin’s Griffin.

So what’s it about?

Teen Angst is a poetry anthology. It’s filled with “truly terrible, meditative and self-indulgent” poems, written by former angsty teens (who are now happy adults). Common themes include “I am alone, and no one understands my pain; I will never love again; fuck you; fuck off; go to hell; and life sucks.”

“It’s meant to be humorous,” said Bynoe.

“But I worry that not everyone will get it.  It’s not actually meant for teenagers. The poems are meant for adults … we’re making fun of ourselves.”

The bottom line is that if you wrote teen angst poetry, you’re in good company. It’s time to admit it. If you didn’t, consider yourself lucky. The website has a whole section dedicated to people like you. It’s called “Them (Poems About People That Never Had To Write Teen Angst Poems)”.

Funny, right?

Sara Bynoe hopes so. That’s her whole point.

A version of “Teen Angst poetry: so bad it’s good” appeared in Dose magazine’s very first printed issue #001, published April 4, 2005, and is displayed as an image below.

2018: Unlike, say, that random Rock Paper Scissors thing I went to in 2004, Teen Angst is STILL running! Live events tend to happen in Vancouver and continue to be hosted and facilitated by Sara who is a kick-ass person. Sara, the subject of this piece, and one of my very first interview subjects ever, and I hit it off on the phone and kept in touch sporadically over the years. I’d see her around at various events in Vancouver, and eventually ended up writing about some of her other ventures (a Fringe festival show, for example). She’s a really excellent actor, comedian, event guru, and generally hilarious performer and writer, and at the moment is appearing in a lot of different commercials, which is pretty awesome I’m really glad I wrote about her when we were both still kids.

Published April 4, 2005 in Dose.