Steven Banks is the Emmy-nominated head writer of SpongeBob Squarepants and wrote for Jimmy Neutron Boy Genius and CatDog. His books include the series Middle School Bites, the YA novel King of the Creeps and SpongeBob Exposed. The fourth book in the Middle School Bites series, Night of the Vam-Wolf-Zom, will be published by Holiday House on September 20, 2022.
On your nightstand now:
Honest! Not fibbing to impress people like the jive-cats who do the NYT Book Review and want to show how smarty pants and trendy they are! Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne, The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles, I Was Better Last Night by Harvey Fierstein, 101 Years' Entertainment: The Great Detective Stories 1841-1941 edited by Ellery Queen, Dead Man's Walk by Larry McMurtry, Elliot Allagash by Simon Rich.
Favorite book when you were a child:
Henry Huggins by Beverly Cleary. I even asked my mom to buy me guppies because Henry had them. I later discovered her Ramona books. Ramona is one of the great literary characters of American literature and I am not being facetious.
Your top five authors:
No longer breathing:
John Steinbeck: Just read Chapter 15 of The Grapes of Wrath. The dialogue, characters, subtext, setting.
Kurt Vonnegut: He made literature fun. John Irving (who was his student at Iowa) said about Kurt, "It is not easy to write simple."
Ian Fleming: Why not? Bond is a main character with no backstory at all, yet it works. Some of the finest action sequences written.
J.D. Salinger: When is his son going to publish the other books he wrote?! We're not getting any younger!
P.G. Wodehouse: Anyone else would have had Jeeves (the butler) narrate the books, but PG uses the dolt Bertie instead--harder to write, but funnier! Try writing humor. It. Is. Not. Easy.
Still Breathing:
Simon Rich: Funny, funny, funny. And short. His stories, not his stature.
Amor Towles: Accessible, beautifully written and nice thick stories.
Roddy Doyle: Why has that little, tiny island produced so many great writers? His Henry Smart trilogy is so good. And he knows music!
Jon Klassen: I Want My Hat Back. Chilling. Funny. Picture books may be the hardest thing to write.
Anthony Doerr: All the Light We Cannot See is one of the best books I've read in the past 20 years. Riveting story. Amazing structure.
Book you've faked reading:
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I was a voracious reader, but this stopped me dead in my tracks. I bought the CliffsNotes and am still ashamed. Why do they assign books like this in high school to kill a kid's desire to read? Stop!
Book you're an evangelist for:
The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: The Mysterious Howling by Maryrose Wood. Three kids literally raised by wolves are then taught by a 14-year-old governess in Victorian England. A rousing, witty adventure. Sentences on a par with P.G. Wodehouse. Equally great for kids AND adults. Don't be a book snob, read YA and middle grade books!
Book you've bought for the cover:
I can't think of one. Sorry. However, book covers are important and fascinating. Do a Google search "book covers" for Pride and Prejudice, The Great Gatsby, Lolita and Gone with the Wind. Crazy.
Book you hid from your parents:
007: James Bond: A Report by O.F. Snelling
Book that changed your life:
Cannery Row by Steinbeck. I've read it numerous times. A beautiful, perfect book. I think it's about friendship. And short! I've visited Doc Ricketts's lab at Cannery Row, felt like I walked into a novel.
Favorite line from a book:
Tie!
"I can't go on. I'll go on." --Samuel Beckett, The Unnamable
"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past." --F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Five books you'll never part with:
Cannery Row by Steinbeck (signed first edition, you may come see it when you're in Glendale, Calif.)
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (true first edition with the photo J.D. hated and had removed)
Finishing the Hat/Look, I Made a Hat by Stephen Sondheim (personally inscribed)
The World According to Garp by John Irving (signed, first edition)
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
A Christmas Memory by Truman Capote. Each Christmas morning, for the past six years, I get up early and read it. It's perfect. It's art.
Hey, Steven Banks, what about playwrights? You could learn a lot from people who master dialogue, plot, structure, etc.
Playwrights who are still walking around:
Annie Baker: I've read and/or seen ALL her plays. She won a Pulitzer. I especially love Circle, Mirror Transformation and The Flick.
Martin McDonagh: Hangmen, the Lieutenant of Inishmore. Bloody great. Another damn Irishman.
Noah Haidle: Princess Marjorie was so good I called a friend at intermission and said, "I don't care what happens in the second act, you have to see this play."
Tracy Letts: August: Osage County is great, but so is Linda Vista.
David Mamet: Yeah, he's a big nut and he's written some clunkers, but the good ones are really good.
Playwrights who are not walking around anymore:
Arthur Miller wrote my favorite play, Death of a Salesman.
August Wilson: His 10-play cycle. Massive. The dialogue! He sat in cafés and listened to people talk.
Tennessee Williams: I played Jim in The Glass Menagerie in high school. Did you see it? I was magnificent!
Thornton Wilder: Our Town is not a creaky old cutesy play. Read the third act! Also, The Long Christmas Dinner is maybe the best one act ever in my book.
Edward Albee: Three Pulitzers. Show-off. I like the way he controlled--and now his estate controls--how you can perform his plays.