Spread of Secrets
Last year, I interviewed Frank Warren, founder and curator of Post Secret, for my student newspaper. I didn’t think I’d find him, but I cast a net of e-mails out (mostly with notification of delivery failure) and he called me out of the blue that weekend while I was playing Dungeons & Dragons. I was so flustered, I had to call him back five minutes later. He had a really smart, personable nature about him. I didn’t get the article in under deadline and Frank came and went without the article being published. He deserved better than what I gave him.
Sorry, Frank.
I’d like to think I abide by the school of showing a whole project rather than the foundations from which it’s built, but I don’t have a draft anymore, so here are the seven questions I asked Frank while I tried not to trip over myself too much.
What is your most common confession?
” I pee in the shower,” he jokes, “but the most common kind is from a person feeling particularly lonely and searching for someone they can truly share their secrets with.”
In our society today, where so much information is available and collected, what do you consider the value of secrets in society today?
“In some ways with our technology and in our media we’re developing a culture with far fewer secrets but in that exact way it also develops different kinds of secrets - because they [secrets] will always be very human.”
What kind of rate do you see between legitimate submissions and fraudulent fantasies?
There’s no difference to him, says Frank, “Because with all works of art, it may be the cards contain secrets more true than the artist realizes. If you go into a bookstore, the book that changes your life can very well be fiction.”
What have you learned while trying to market Post Secret as a book while at the same time maintaining the website?
“I treated the website more as living secrets but with the book it became an archive and I found that I could use that to tell a longer story.”
What do you think you message is in these lectures, what do you look to deliver?
Actually, Frank said, “I find that I’m saying less as this goes on and listening more and more, sharing stories I’ve heard. I talk about postcards that were banned from the book by the publisher,” adding that “everyone has secrets, be they silly, sexual or shocking.”
Why do you encourage people to participate in Post Secret?
“I think it can be… transformative,” he said. “You can change who you are or you can change someone else’s life.”
What is the most impactful confession you’ve read?
“We received one written on a Starbuck’s cup that read, ‘I serve decaf to customers who are rude to me,’ he said laughing.
“One thing I’ve learned is that we have secrets that can break our hearts” he said, adding that we can share these everyday and that “with more clarity of ourselves, maybe we can have more compassion.”
