On Friday Sept. 20, Shepherd students of Professor of English Dr. Heidi Hanrahan’s Young Adult Literature class had a face-to-face discussion with best-selling author and punk rock drummer Rob Rufus of the Blacklist Royals on Friday, Sept. 20 in Knutti Hall.
Rufus’ 2016 memoir, Die Young With Me, was the center of discussion amongst Rufus and the class, which deals with Rufus’ upbringing in Huntington, West Virginia, his rise to prominence in music, and his cancer diagnosis that would change his life. The diagnosis arrived when Rufus was just 17-years-old, after discovering a mass in his chest.
He was declared as having stage four cancer and would need the mass removed as soon as possible. The result would be Rufus’ right lung and most of his diaphragm being removed.
This Punk Rock renegade explained to students that stage four cancer and many other challenges he faced were the catalysts that fueled his success.
“Having Rob Rufus visit Shepherd was incredible. Being able to talk to him about his story gave amazing insight to our discussions and the personal impact of disability, empathy, and hope. I think it was a really valuable experience for the class, and I would love to have an author visit every semester.” Shepherd student Caitlin Carson said.
Rufus began the discussion by opening up about the deep mental experiences he had during the process of book writing.
“The writing process with Die Young With Me, which was my first book, I had no f—king idea what I was doing,” Rufus said. “The first edit of the book I got it written and got it done, and I took it to get printed off to edit it, and it looked like a suicide bomber manifesto or something. (…) I think the most emotional part for me to write was probably just putting myself back the headspace of like ‘I’m going to get this surgery, and then everything is gonna be cool.’ And then waking up and it’s like a totally different surgery than anyone expected it to be.”
Despite the grim nature of his story, Rufus couldn’t help but fill the awkward silence of the class with laughter as he took on each of the students’ questions.
Despite his harrowing experience with cancer, Rufus came out of it with new insight and ideas about the music that has always been the root of his life—Punk Rock.
“[The experience] didn’t alter my love for [punk rock] any, and it didn’t alter my connection and the spirit of it. Which I really credit for helping me through that ordeal. [But] there’s a bulls—t factor that I suddenly became very aware of. The interesting thing about punk and rock n’ roll in general is like there is a self-destructive element to it,” Rufus explained. I’ve got my own self-destructive issues for sure, but suddenly I was aware that being self-destructive was a privilege. Because you can get detonated by the world. So, it definitely did alter my perspective a little bit.”
Despite including many deeply personal memoirs in his book, there were cuts to the published version which Rufus struggles to grapple with. “[The publishing company] edited out the end, that I got sick for a second time. And they said, ‘it’s not fair to the audience’ and I said, ‘it wasn’t fair for me motherf—ker!” Rufus went on to further detail his experiences working with people to publish his book and get the whole thing off the ground, Rufus said.
Rufus also explained his experience with the publishing process in regard to how publishers see books as mere products, no matter how much time and emotion the author put into their written work. “Once you get a publisher and get an editor you gotta just be prepared to stomach [some things], because they focus group this stuff. That’s something I really found out, is that in the publishing world, Hollywood, and screenwriting too, your story even if it is autobiographical is just another story. It’s just another product, and you have to be willing to sell that little part of your soul that you feel f—ked up being okay with that.”
While fighting cancer, Rufus was constantly reading, and it was his growing interested in reading and learning that acted as the catalyst for writing his book.
“One day I’m screen printing these t-shirts, and I went, ‘you know, there’s millions of people who say they want to write a book. Why don’t they try to do it?’ But they never try to do it. So, it was like a switch for me, and I was like ‘I’m gonna do it,” he said. “And then I sat down and was like ‘I have no f—king idea what I’m doing.’ It took me a couple of years to get my sea legs, but it was the obvious epiphany ever.”
Regarding future plans, Rufus shares that he has been pitching around a book concerning a topic very close to him; the opioid epidemic.
According to John Hopkins, not only did West Virginia have the highest rate of opioid-related deaths in 2017. Cabell county, home to the city of Huntington, was responsible for 20% of these deaths in West Virginia. Additionally, in 2021, there were over 1262 opioid-related deaths in West Virginia. Rufus hopes to shed some light on the issue with the book.
“It’s about the correlation between the opioid epidemic and disability. Opioid addiction is considered a disability, but they don’t offer the same protections as if you were a paraplegic or whatever. It’s kind of the second half of the book that got edited out, except [it has more of a] socio-political lean on it.”
Aside from that, he also mentions some work in television on the horizon.
“I have two TV shows in development right now, which is really exciting. Both of them are set in West Virginia. (…) [One of them] is like an X-Files type nineties throwback show.”