Author Samantha Irby.Lori M Gottschling/Supplied
Samantha Irby’s authenticity is unparalleled. Having built a career on essay collections that honour the complexity (and sheer messiness) of what it means to be a person, she has established herself as an author whose humour and honesty have built a lifeline for millions of readers who choose to laugh at – and through – the best and worst parts of life.
Her fourth book, the bestselling Quietly Hostile, is another triumph within the Samantha Irby canon. Tackling everything from her appreciation of Dave Matthews to body horrors to her experience writing for television (Irby’s TV credits include Shrill and And Just Like That...), Irby’s latest instalment is another testament to her unique ability to walk the line between poignancy and making one laugh to the point of tears. We spoke over Zoom. Irby joined me from her home in Michigan.
When did you realize how important it is to commit to being authentic?
This is a new thing for me. I am undereducated, so my knee-jerk response is to reflexively think that I’ve got it wrong. I defer to the experts. But within the last few years there’s been the thing where everybody wants you to justify everything and know things that you couldn’t possibly know, and that is too much for regular people to do. I think it’s okay to watch whatever it is you’re watching; life sucks and it’s so hard.
And this truly comes from a place of being stressed out because there’s so much culture and you want to stay on top of it. I got so tired of feeling dumb and out of the loop that my response was just to be like, “I like what I like. If you don’t like it, that’s on you.”
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I think to feel like we’re a part of something, we decide to hate that thing collectively. And you don’t take into account that tastes are different, people are different.
Or that if I don’t watch every show that Vulture says is good, I don’t want to feel bad or lost or like I’m missing out. I just haven’t watched it! It’s like if you can’t participate, you either scramble to try and keep up, which feels bad. Or it’s like, “Forget it, I’m going to go watch 30 Rock again.”
Do you ever feel pressure to be the Samantha Irby readers think you are versus the Samantha Irby you are actually?
I used to interact with people all the time, and I have made friends with people through my writing, but now it’s just too fraught so I have sealed myself off pretty well. If I meet people when I tour, I keep the energy. I really am so flattered that anybody would spend money on things that I do, so when I meet people I’m just excited. I want to give them the best me possible. I always smile, I talk to anybody. One of the events I stayed three hours after to sign and talk because I couldn’t believe people were standing three hours in line to talk to me!
I think I live up to people’s expectations as long as we keep it brief [laughs]. If someone hangs out with me for an hour, I feel like they’d be, “Damn! Can you be the you in the book?” But I can keep it up for 10 minutes.
Quietly Hostile by Samantha Irby.Supplied
In your books, do you ever feel like you should share a story because you’re expected to now? Or is doing that something you still want to do?
I never share anything I’m not comfortable being asked about. You have to be prepared for that, so I never put anything in that I couldn’t defend or talk about if I was accosted on the street. I do sometimes look at categories and think, “Okay, I gotta check out the ‘body falling apart’ box” because those are things I’ve talked about in the past. I want to have continuity. But then after I check those boxes, when things are happening, I’ll think, “Oh, I gotta write about this.” Like when I went into anaphylactic shock and then stood in line [at the ER] waiting for a crackhead to use the phone.
This book was a little difficult because it was written in the pandemic and I wasn’t doing much. Thankfully we got a dog, so I could spend 5,000 words talking about how much we hate each other.
I was so interested in reading about your relationship with television because I think when people hear about writing TV, they think you’ve made it. Did writing for television change your definition of success?
No, girl! Because TV doesn’t pay unless you make TV! [Laughs.] These are jobs I enjoy and like doing, but it’s like, “No, I’m making a regular amount of money, I have a job for six weeks, and then no job for many months.”
The weird thing about doing books and TV is that people don’t read, and nobody knows how TV works. I would flip it a little: It’s surprising how much less successful you feel when you get into TV versus doing books. Because if it’s a show that nobody watches and you have no audience and don’t have your own platform, nobody’s going to care! I am a successful book person, though. I am mystified by it. I’m incredibly grateful for it, but TV’s more interesting [to people]. I get it!
You wrote the pool episode of Shrill and the episode of And Just Like That... where Miranda and Che get together, though. And those are huge episodes!
They [are]! I want to make people happy. I want to make people laugh, I want to be the silver lining to your day. But they don’t compensate you because you wrote a thing that people talk about. I love that people love anything I do. I feel successful, but mostly because of the books.
How has your relationship to writing changed?
When I first started blogging, it felt like shouting into the void. I could say anything. Now I’ve found that I have to consider potential audiences. I know it’s still confessional, but it feels more curated than it used to be. With Meaty – and the circumstances were different because I did that on an indie press – I was like, “I’m going to write whatever!” But now I have to be much more thoughtful and considerate. And it’s not to say that I’m generally inconsiderate, but it was never part of the process.
But writing still feels good when I get into the groove of it. And this is a thing: I feel totally confident every time I sit down to write. And that confidence is not something I always had, I’m not a very confident person. But when I’m doing these essays, I feel like I know what I’m doing. I don’t feel like I know what I’m doing when I’m driving a car, but when I’m writing butt jokes, I’m like, “This will hit! This feels good!” And that’s a new thing. Writing never feels like a chore. It hasn’t soured in that way for me.
Do you think your writing has made you learn about yourself differently?
Yes! ... I used to say anything about anything, but now I do think first. I do think that when writing for a small, targeted, niche audience, I definitely feel more myself, and I feel more publisher-y when I do the other stuff.
I think that’s the big distinction: I take my metaphorical bra off when writing my own little blogs. But with the book stuff, I have to be more thoughtful.
Samantha Irby will discuss Quietly Hostile at Toronto’s Hot Docs theatre on September 28.
This interview has been edited and condensed.