20 QUESTIONS WITH NED VIZZINI

Book cover image used with permission of
Free Spirit Publishing.

THE QUESTIONS 1 - 10

In the book you say you started writing about what happened to you to help you deal with the frustrations of teen life - did it really help?

Absolutely, writing helped me deal with high school. First off, it gave me an accomplishment to be proud of. I could go to homeroom and bungle some sort of social situation, then run to English and read an essay out loud to the class and think "Hey, at least I can do something right." Also, writing gave me a sense of control over my own life, and an outlet for my emotions. Before I found writing, my only emotional outlet was Nintendo.

Your writing style is hilarious, are you that funny in real life?

Nah. I spent two years making that book funny. I'm funny in real life, but not as much, and only in spurts, and a lot of people don't get the humor.

You went to a high school for the academically gifted - do you think that your experiences at that school are typical?

Well, my school was a weird place, no doubt about it. We had a large and vocal collection of chess fanatics, plus a kid who dressed up like Jesus and carried a cross around on Halloween. But despite that, I think my basic experiences -- girls, getting drunk, getting into stupid situations, learning how to deal with authority figures - were typical. You go through those things no matter where you attend school.

You were in high school when the school shootings started happening - any thoughts? Are teens today more violent and/or more apathetic?

I get asked this a lot. First of all, many parents don't realize what a big deal Columbine was. They think we teens are so jaded that we just shook it of. Nobody shook it off. The day it happened, kids were shocked, and for the next two weeks we all went to school wondering, "Hey, is that goth kid who hangs out on the fourth floor a normal weirdo, or one of the extra special kind that comes to school with firearms?" It made us re-evaluate everyone we saw in the halls.

I wasn't too worried, because I went to school in New York, where I didn't think a school shooting was likely to happen. In New York, there's no space; if you tried to load a machine gun in the morning, your mom would hear you in the closet.

Yes, teens today can be very violent and apathetic, but teens in the 60's could be violent and apathetic too. It's the parents' job to recognize those traits. Blame for the school shootings rests directly on the parents, no question. TV is an influence, but it's your job to make sure that your kid isn't a gun nut, bomb enthusiast, Nazi, etc. That shouldn't be too hard.

Girls - you don't say much about them in the book, have you learned anything more since high school that you want to share?

The advice I gave in the book was pretty sound.

1. If a girl expresses interest in you, act fast -- you have two weeks, and after that, she will move on.
2. Don't talk too much around girls; they like guys who are quiet and brooding.
3. When you do talk, make them laugh.
4. It helps if you can dance well.

That's it. The only thing I've learned recently is, try to date outside your race, social class, age group, etc. You'll learn a lot and you'll get good stories.

Parents - yours come across as kind of goofy but basically easy to get along with, is that really how they are? Any tips for teens?

Yeah, they're cool, except when they treat me with that parental mixture of anger and pity ("How could you do such a stupid thing?! Ah, youth, you'll never learn").

My tip for teens is to use your parents. They're smart. They have a repository of information that can help you out. They know how to buy a car, deal with landlords, and apply for credit cards. So ask them questions when you're in trouble, and don't piss them off so much that you'll be unable to ask them questions when you're in trouble in the future.

Virginity and sex - almost absent from the book, what are your thoughts on the role they play in the life of the average teen?

Sex was almost absent from the book? Well, it was almost absent from my high school life. Oh, wait, except on TV. TV taught me that sex in America is available anytime, anywhere: on office copy machines, in high school locker rooms, in movie theatres and in airplane bathrooms.

Sex is what corporate America uses to sell teens. If you watch enough TV, you'll start to think that the whole world is having wild threesomes and you'll feel pretty bad about your own sex life. (You also might wonder why your school is full of such ugly people.) The role that sex plays in young people's lives is highly exaggerated by television, and that's sad, because TV is sexier than we can ever be.

You admit to drinking while underage - is this common in teens? Do you think the drinking age is too high?

Yes, it's common in teens, and no, the drinking age is fine. I think we're actually at a good place with adolescent drinking. Teens drink, but they know it's bad, and they feel guilty about it, and they have a general idea that it's very bad to drink and drive. Of course, there are some drunks - there are always going to be - but keeping the drinking age officially 21 with the understanding that kids will "experiment" (love that word) earlier on seems to have put us in a good place. I don't think America is overrun with drunk kids.

Is there anything you regret about your high school experience, anything you wish you had tried or hadn't done?

My regrets are social and mostly girl-related. Nothing big, just people I wish I'd talked to or hung out with. Give me ten years, I'll have some good ones, maybe.

What 5 words best describe your generation? Why?

Rich, motivated, smart, Nintendo, and trying-hard-to-be-jaded

We're rich because hey - the whole country's rich! We just lived through a decade that made the roaring 20s look like nothing. You're reading this on a computer that would have been unthinkable 10 years ago. Congrats.

We're motivated because we see successful people getting younger and younger. We have young tennis stars, young actors, and a fairly young president…We feel that we have to succeed just as quickly as they did.

Smart - I don't buy this whole declining-test-scores American youth idiocy business. Teens today may not be book-smart, but they deal with cell phones, pagers, computers, and many-pocketed pants. They manage complex school and social schedules. They find new and interesting ways to cheat on everything. For street smarts and business smarts, I would put us up against any generation.

Nintendo isn't an adjective but it has to be there. My generation was raised on Nintendo. We love it and it brings tears to our eyes.

Trying-hard-to-be-jaded…I wish that were one word. Our generation tries hard to act like we've seen it all because in some cases, we have. We've seen people brutally beaten on TV; we're seen the president talk about his pee-wee for a whole year; we've seen a truly great Pee-Wee, Mr. Herman, get treated like a witch for masturbating! We can go on the Internet and see whatever we like. So we are ashamed to act surprised, amused, or interested in anything. We just want to act old and cool.

More- Home - Q&A 11 thru 20 - The Full Interview