Alyssa Favreau Interview (Janelle Monáe’s The ArchAndroid)
Alyssa Favreau is a Tiohtià:ke/Montreal-based writer and production editor at the McGill-Queen's University Press. Her new book is a 33 1/3 volume on Janelle Monáe’s The ArchAndroid. Alyssa wrote a thesis on Octavia Butler’s science fiction, so she was uniquely primed to unpack parts of the album.
How did you get to where you are today, professionally?
I started with a marketing degree that I hated, so instead I began writing for my student newspaper and made that my life for a bit. Most of my twenties were spent noodling around the publishing and media industries, doing some freelance odds and ends for magazines and publishers, and figuring out what I wanted to do.
After a couple years I remembered that I do actually like school, so I went back to do a Master’s in English lit and wrote my thesis on Octavia Butler’s science fiction. After my degree I figured I’d start writing more cultural criticism, maybe working up to a book-length project, but pretty soon after the pitch I’d sent to the 33 1/3 series on a whim got accepted, so I kind of hit the ground running.