Hello and Welcome, Fiednish Friends,
Today in The Madhouse, I’m thrilled to welcome back one of my favorite poets and magical women, Kailey Tedesco. Tedesco is a New Jersey-born caul bearer and mother. She teaches courses on Gothic literature, the archetype of the witch, and horror at Moravian University and Northampton Community College. She has recently led poetic craft workshops with The Poetry Society of New York and is an active member of the Horror Writers Association. Her poetry has been nominated for various prizes and has won contests such as BPAL x Haute Macabre's TOTALITY perfume contest (2020) & White Stag's 2018 Poetry MS contest. You can find her work in Electric Literature, Fairy Tale Review, Black Warrior Review, Epiphany Lit, The Journal, Driftwood Press, Passages North, and more.
I’ve been reading and teaching Tedesco’s work for years, and when asked to blurb this devilishly delicious collection, I jumped at the chance. For those familiar with her poetry, it’s always hard to pick a favorite, but Motherdevil…well, it’s something special.
“This collection is the legend of the New Jersey Devil’s creator, [and] through poetry, Tedesco imagines and explores the full interiority of this often overlooked mother as well as the twelve siblings who came before the legendary 13th child. The poet infuses this collection with her own truths and experiences with parenting, mental health, and postpartum depression. Mrs. Leeds was rumored to have been a witch, known to have been a mother, and then reduced to a single, perhaps misinterpreted, quotation. Come lurk in the branches of these confessions if you’re brave enough to know how far a mother might go to make herself known when no one can seem to remember her name.”
Please enjoy the following interview, and be sure to share your own stories about the Jersey Devil in the comment section below! Cheers and happy hauntings.
“Motherdevil is an initiation ritual to birthing monsters. Readers will be possessed, obsessed, and screaming by the end.’- Stephanie M. Wytovich, On the Subject of Blackberries
SW: Hi Kailey! Welcome back to my author series that I affectionately call The Madhouse. I hope the start of summer has been treating you well. It’s been devilishly hot here lately, which is an excellent excuse to stay in and write! Could you introduce yourself to us for those who might not know you or be familiar with your work?
KT: Of course! I’m a mom and professor living in the Lehigh Valley of PA. I was born in NJ though and have always considered myself a Jersey girl at heart. I love horror movies, antiques, vintage clothing, and animals. I’ve been publishing poetry and CNF somewhat regularly since getting my MFA from Arcadia University in 2016. My current poetry fascinations are related to major (for me) form experimentations, abandoned honeymoon hotels, and nursery rhymes. My work, no matter the focus, seems to always center around all things haunted.
SW: What was your writing process like while writing MOTHERDEVIL? When did the idea for the collection take shape?
KT: I had wanted to write about the NJ Devil for years, but I had trouble finding my access point. It’s a legend I grew up very close to, so I struggled mainly to figure out what I could say about it that hasn’t already been said or explored. When I found out I was pregnant, I wrote “the thirteenth child.” Initially, this was a poem from my own POV exploring the joy, but also confusion & utter fear & paranoia I felt when finding out I would soon become a parent. I really loved projecting these early pregnancy emotions into the Jersey Devil narrative. This gave me license to explore them more honestly and block out some of the guilt I was feeling when anxiety would eclipse my more positive emotions surrounding the pregnancy.
One day when I was a few poems in, it just clicked that I could write a book from the POV of the Jersey Devil’s mother, Mrs./Mother Leeds. In all tellings I’ve engaged with, Mrs. Leeds is given no backstory, no developed motives, and in most tellings, not even a first name. She’s a figure that was in need of her own legend, and that kind of revisionist exploration tends to be one of my big writing jams. I had perinatal and severe postpartum anxiety/depression, so it wasn’t until my son was nearing a year old that I could commit myself fully to this vision (or any writing, really), but once I did the poems came very naturally.
SW: Your poetry is so bewitchingly beautiful, and I’ve been a fan since reading your collection FOREVERHAUS. In what ways do you find poetry and spellwork similar?
KT: Poetry is spellwork in my personal practice. Anna Marie Tendler recently said in an IG Live (and I’m going to paraphrase big time here—sorry!) that she first had to process her trauma before writing about it in her new memoir Men Have Called Her Crazy— which I adore, btw. This really stuck with me because it articulated something I’ve long struggled to put words to: experience is the first step in the ritual. The poem, then, feels like a cleansing instrument. I have been through this, I have processed this, and now I am putting this experience into words and shapes that I alone have control over. Through poetry, I derive the power and agency to tell my story in my own way. That’s totally magic.
SW: Your collection obviously has a strong focus on the mother image, which I’ve always loved but relate to even more now. That said, horror has a long history of doing wrong by mothers, and I’m curious about 1) who your favorite horror mothers are and 2) what you hope to see done differently in contemporary fiction surrounding this topic.
KT: I will always go to bat for Wendy Torrance and Olivia Crain. I think both of these characters are explored so beautifully as both individuals and mothers who are doing their best in a society that is not structured to support them.
The thing horror can get wrong is sometimes giving in to the good mom vs. bad mom binary, which is obviously so mythical. This is frustrating and reductive, for sure. I will say, though, that some of the most complex and authentic views of motherhood, specifically mothers dealing with mental health issues, have come from the horror genre. I found myself thinking a lot about Nicole Kidman’s character in The Others and Ellie from Evil Dead Rise as well. Maybe it’s within the context of passing time and greater understanding of mental health, but I’ve actually found so much solace in the way these characters are given space to feel all of the complicated emotions that parenting evokes, even if it is presented in a more exaggerated way. These explorations of how trauma is shared and passed down are so uncomfortable, but when done well, I think they can really work to help us question the more fallacious notions of what it means to be a parent. I’d love to continue to see more of these more vulnerable explorations.
SW: Your poem “self-succubus” has a line that reads, “I could confess/ possession only I am not yet demon-full.” There are strong images of religious horror and iconography throughout the collection, and after this poem is one titled “fertility,” which I equally loved. Pregnancy often feels a little like possession in a way: we’re filled with and growing a child who is using our body to grow and feed and survive, and it’s altering our appearance, moods, and relationship with our body. Now, I know you’re a big film buff. Were there any films or scenes that inspired you or that you found yourself thinking about while working on these poems (or the collection as a whole)?
KT: Absolutely! Film is always so integral to my writing process. I found myself thinking a lot about films like Rosemary’s Baby (big surprise, I’m sure), The Blackcoat’s Daughter, Gretel and Hansel, Skinamarink, Through the Eyes of my Mother, and the entire Haunting of Hill House series. The commonality here is all of these narratives center on mother obsession, mother absences, or both.
I don’t want to spoil any films for anyone so BEWARE, but I kept returning, emotionally, to a scene from The Blackcoat’s Daughter (I’m a huge Osgood Perkins fan). There’s a scene at the end where the protagonist, Katherine, is exorcised and then finds herself deeply lonely and in want of demonic possession again. This reminded me so much of pregnancy!
The negotiation between wanting your body and hormone levels and sense of self back vs. the deep and maddening love of the child I was about to have really reminded me of Katherine’s profound look of grief/lovesickness/desperation at the end of the film. Mrs. Leeds, by nearly all accounts, had this same desperation in commanding her thirteenth child to be born as a devil, which is maybe to say she commanded that child not to be born at all. It was an exorcism in the form of a possession, or a possession in the form of an exorcism, depending on how you view it. Either way, it’s such a visceral and lonely part of her narrative.
SW: Fairy tales play a big part in your writing, and we’re seeing more and more subversions of the originals hit the market lately. What is your advice for people interested in writing their own fairy tales?
KT: I’m so excited to see more and more of this. My biggest piece of advice when taking on an established story or fairy tale/folkloric figure is to allow it/them to set the pace of the project. In other words, to authentically explore something existing from a new angle, I think you have to allow your own ego to take a backseat and let yourself be surprised by the ways this story/figure can dictate how you write their truth. I work on this all the time, but I love the satisfaction of taking risks and separating myself from myself for a while.
SW: Animal symbolism, especially the goat, is littered throughout your work. What initially drew you to the Jersey Devil, and what did your research process look like while writing?
KT: It’s possible that the legend of the Jersey Devil might be the very first story I’ve ever heard. I grew up in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey and camped right near Leeds Point in Galloway Township every single summer. The Jersey Devil is one of those archetypal stories that’s now less story and more just a part of my conscious identity.
Because of this a lot of my research was based on the many, many oral accounts of the NJ Devil I heard on the playgrounds at recess, in the deep woods, and in my own childhood bedroom. I did consult texts like The Pine Barrens by Johnathan McPhee to get a firmer understanding of the natural history of the Pine Barrens (an otherworldly landscape in itself). Otherwise though, I wanted to rely on the dozens of tellings and explorations I had heard throughout my entire life. They differ, for sure, but to me the one commonality is the deep anxiety related to pregnancy and childbirth, and also the ways that social systems historically fail families. I ran with this general idea and then infused my own personal experiences into this structuring. So, while it is a collection about an established folkloric figure, it is also maybe my most confessional collection yet.
SW: What poets are you currently reading? Are there any collections you’re looking forward to adding to your TBR list?
KT: I have recently and deeply loved Bianca by Eugenia Leigh and The Shining by Dorothea Lasky. I’ve also been really into discovering new lit mags lately. I love everything that Bleating Thing, Broken Antler, and Moth Eaten Mag are doing!
SW: What’s next for your readers?
KT: Soon, a celebration of MOTHERDEVIL’s release on Halloween weekend! White Stag Publishing will be holding a ZOOM launch on November 1st, so look out for more details on that soon. There will also be a little party at the Convent in Philadelphia.
I am also coordinating a small book tour as we speak, so please look out for some upcoming dates along the East Coast. I’d love to meet and see you, dear readers!
The spooky season ahead holds a lot of opportunity to share this book—I really hope that readers resonate with Mrs. Leeds (and my own) experiences. It’s been many years in the making and I’m really excited to get it out there.
Bonus questions:
SW: What cryptid do you think you are most like and why?
I feel this is a silly answer considering my book, but definitely the Jersey Devil. We’re both Pine Barren babies, our births were both unplanned, and we both have extremely complicated feelings about dairy farms!
Do you think you’ve ever seen anything supernatural? Cryptid, ghost, etc?
Oh, for sure. More in the last few years than ever! It’s been happy hauntings though. For that, I’m very appreciative.
Please visit kaileytedesco.com or follow @kaileytedesco.