The following interview with Dallas was conducted via email way back in January, before we started working together, but I figured the launch of Dallas’ new charitable foundation was as good a time as any to post it. With a focus on promoting literacy, the Awesome World Foundation will donate one book for every copy of An Awesome World sold. Check out the video below for a glimpse of Dallas’ tubular book tour and the philosophy behind all this awesomeness, and then read on for our interview!

Aside from having a child of your own, what inspires you to write for children? Do you find it more rewarding than when you write for adults?
As near as I can tell I get more out of sharing writing than I do out of actually putting the pen to the page. That said if I had to choose one age bracket of the many to “share” with exclusively it would be young children. Reason? They appreciate fun things more than anyone else, have the best reactions to the most simple concepts and won’t get bummed out when I misspell words. I feel rewarded by sharing with anyone, young or old, but like I said if I had to choose, kids for sure. Hands down.

Is it ever a strain to keep your thoughts confined to a few paragraphs, or does your minimalist style come naturally?
I used to write a lot of words. Mostly adjectives. But the more times a wrote, the less adjectives I seemed to need to say what I was thinking. Nowadays I find it hard writing more than a few sentences. The future? All single letter thoughts? Maybe that’s what happened to E.E. Cummings.

What do you enjoy more: the process of writing, or sharing what you’ve written?
Damn, I fully just answered that one without even seeing it here first. I’m pretty good at this stuff…ha!

When did you start distributing pamphlets of your work, and how did that become one of your primary mediums for expression?
I started doing zines when I was 13. That was a time when making things by hand made more sense. Just something you did to let people around you know you were young and loud and ignorant as could be. I moved to California when I was 18 and realized there were so many shows every night here that I could make enough zines to sell to strangers to make a living, keep writing, and meet tons of people. So I did. And I guess still do, in many ways.

Aside from your book, do you ever use your writing and illustration for profit? How do you support yourself as an artist?
Is it considered profit if I just use the money to buy expensive cars and rare animals and jewels? If so, then Hell Yes I do!

Actually at this point I’ve done/been hired to do just about every aspect of writing one could do in one way or another. Editorial, fiction, screenwriting, poetry, bio, blog, copywriting… all kinds of crazy junk and to a degree the same goes with arts and illustration. I guess that’s a pretty good measure as to how I support myself as an artist as well - Make lots of stuff for lots of people.

How does the book party for the release of a children’s book end up being presented by Bjork and Matthew Barney, and sponsored by ArtForum, LACMA and Mercedes-Benz?
Dream big!

Much of your work has a sense of childlike wonderment about it. What was your own childhood like? Did you begin writing and drawing at an early age? Did you ever go through an angsty, world-hating phase as a teenager, or have you always seen the best in the world?
I’ve actually had a pretty charmed live and childhood in particular. Other than my parents divorcing at an early age and being totally weird, as all adults are, there’s no real hectic aspect of my youth to be noted. I started getting into music and radness really young and writing just took off from there. Mixed in somewhere between 11 and 17 there were likely a lot of youth/angst moments with really funny T shirts about telling the government how to improve its effectiveness but nothing that ever made me feel like I needed to set a McDonald’s on fire or anything. I was always too busy breaking into swimming pools and climbing on rooftops.

How has the Internet affected your work? From directly handing people pamphlets on the street to instant global availability, how has your process changed?
Well obviously it’s a million times quicker, easier, and less wasteful which are all things I really love. Also the reach is so substantial, and people’s abilities to share in other countries I’ve never even been to that’s pretty amazing. I got an email today from Turkey from someone telling me that had translated my book into Turkish to read to their niece. That’s insane! To be able to speak to people in that way is totally thrilling. Plus I like that internet culture is inherently based on sharing (for better and for worse) and how things spread around so quickly BUT as per the usual writer/artist response there’s always a reaction one has to touching something and being able to put it in someone’s hands. That reaction definitely keeps me making things tangible. At least until nanotechnology replaces us all with cyborgs. (3 more years?)

On of my favorite projects of yours is the “More Popular Than You” blog— do you ever feel anxiety over that kind of stuff? Do you hope to be as popular as Warwick Davis and Dollywood, or was the project more of a meditation on the absurdity of fame?
Man people love that blog. I put it on the back burner so long ago and just haven’t had a chance to get back to it. But I will this year for sure. I guess the answer is that’s the whole reason I made the blog in the first place, how absurd it is that people are trying to hard just to be popular rather than just to make good things. I mean, I don’t have too many friends who have done as many things, seen as many places, made as many products, or met as many people as Napalm Death. But are Napalm Death popular? Has my mom heard of them? Does it matter? Who knows, but Napalm Death is doing exactly what Napalm Death needs to be doing. And that makes me happy.