So It Got Misconstrued

Chris Ware: The problem is that we humans have craved these constructs and clichés, and we’re now so steeped in them that they’ve restructured our unconscious, which any writer or artist trying to deal with re-creating actual consciousness can’t ignore.

Q-Tip: So it got misconstrued. [Laughs] You know, it’s just all mixed up.

Ware: Sort of schizophrenic, I suppose.

Q-Tip: Yeah. And that wasn’t the case. People didn’t realize.

Ware: There’s no predicting any of it, especially for someone as racked by self-doubt as me.

•••

Q-Tip: Man, we were just messing around. We were at his crib in Mount Vernon, and we were all supposed to rhyme over this beat.

Ware: That’s like asking to make the bricks in a building bigger once it’s been built.

Q-Tip: But from poor management to not really understanding the ramifications of it, it didn’t work.

Ware: To say nothing of the distractions of cell phones and Facebook nowadays to help us along.

Q-Tip: I want to be able to have some interaction with the people and see what’s going on.

•••

Ware: I have little doubt that it fired off the same dopamine receptors in my brain that marijuana later did.

Q-Tip: I try not to close off any avenues to creativity.

Ware: Sarcasm can only go so far.

Q-Tip: I had a fire and lost all my records.

Ware: That moment was something of a wake-up call, actually.