Kevin Sampsell was born in Kennewick, Washington around the time
people landed on the moon. In middle school he carried around a
blank book which he used to pen bad pop songs lyrics in. This book
was a favorite among his classmates who passed it around when the
teachers weren't looking. Despite being a lifelong fan of football
and basketball, Kevin would eventually spurn high school coaches
to wear stretch pants and paisley clothing instead. In college,
he never went to college. College=one year. College=community college.
He did not go to UCLA. Later he went to broadcasting school and
worked as a disc jockey for a few years before moving to Arkansas
for a short time. He moved to Portland in the early 90s and began
publishing his work more extensively in small magazines. He also
wrote record and book reviews for many magazines. His favorite music
magazine used to be Melody Maker. Now it is Devil in the Woods.
A couple years ago he finally learned how to send attachments on
his computer and started appearing on numerous web sites. He works
at Powell's City of Books, the largest independent bookseller in
the world, where he coordinates the reading series and runs the
small press and zine sections. He has been publishing small books
under the name Future
Tense Books since 1990 (when he was living in Spokane, Washington).
He is the father of an 8-year-old boy. His girlfriend is the writer
Frayn Masters. Together, they are starting a spoken word/fake karate
performance group called Haiku Inferno. The author of many chapbooks
(most of which are already out of print), his most recent book is
A Common Pornography: A Memoir of Youth & Trouble in the Nuclear
Land of Eastern Washington.
Kevin Sampsell e-mail: futuretense@q7.com
KS on IDT:
Links to more of Kevin's work:
http://www.pindeldyboz.com/kssublit.htm
http://www.wordriot.org/stories/sampsell/0203.html
http://www.surgeryofmodernwarfare.com/archives/feb1003/feb1003.html
http://www.ajprint.net/archive_authors/sampsell/discourage.html
http://www.weepmag.com/archive.asp?y=2002&m=02&d=11
http://www.mcsweeneys.net/2002/06/25shots3.html
http://www.gutcult.com/litjourn1/html/KS.html