Meet Nicholas Diak

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Nicholas Diak. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Nicholas, really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?

There is that saying that one should not compare themselves to other people. When we compare ourselves to others, especially in creative endeavors, we will always find some metric we are failing at: the wish to be more successful (commercial, critical, or both), the wish to be recognized, the wish to be more proficient, and so on. When focusing on these perceived faults, one can overlook or forget their successful and unique contributions to the world.

I’m an academic writer, but I did not start writing until after I turned thirty years old. I’ve been writing for over ten years now, and comparisons of my career trajectory when compared to others always pop up in my mind. At conferences I see academics much younger than myself who have already accomplished so much. I see other pop culture writers with their prolific output of essays, books, appearances in other media, popularity on social media, etc.

I try not to compare myself to others, but it’s human nature. It happens.

So, even if I may not be as prolific or recognized, there are many things I take solace in, things that are uniquely me, that not one else has been done, that others have found utility in. My first edited book, “The New Peplum,” was published at the tail end of 2018, which was an exciting milestone. But it was a few months later when I got a *ding* from Google Scholar. Another academic out there had written a paper and had cited the book. Soon after more *dings* happened and more authors referenced my sword and sandal book and the essays within in their own work. It was extremely humbling to see a book I coordinated find utility with others, that these other authors and scholars found meaning in the work to use in in their own work. If they did not see some form of merit or importance, they simply would not use it.

It was a surreal concept to be honest, to be able to create something and actually see the impact on others as I continued to see citations of my work appear in the work of others. As I wrote more and had more essays published, the number of citations also increased. I remember being flabbergasted to find out an essay of mine was cited in an essay that was published in the Journal of intelligence and National Security. How did that happen?

It is these little successes that gives me a major confidence boost. While my work may not be as prolific or well known, it still manages to find its audience who in turn finds utility in my writing, so much so that it becomes a component of their writing. That we are all part of one big network, doing what we can to expand knowledge and ways to interpret the world. At times the part I play may feel small, but it is uniquely me, which gives me a sense of purpose and motivation to keep on going.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

My eight to five job is that I am a business analyst. I am a millennial, a kid during the 90s, so I grew up with booming tech and the proliferation of the internet. I always wanted to do something with computers and tech, even with to school and got a bachelor’s in Computer Information Systems, which led me to my pays-the-bills occupation of doing analytics, implementations, VB coding, 6 Sigma stuff, and so on.

The personal fulfillment and creative job is that I am an academic writer of pop culture studies. I had become quite the cinephile in the 2000s and I went back to school to earn a liberal arts degree that was film studies centric. I wound up diving deep into Italian exploitation cinema, and the films of Antonio Margheriti, penning essays and presenting at academic conferences.

After school I continued my scholarship, broadening my interests across a plethora of subaltern and uncommon topics across a variety of media: films, comics, TV shows, etc. My first book was as an editor of “The New Peplum: Essays on Sword and Sandal Films and Television Programs Since the 1990s.” The peplum genre had long since been dormant, so it was a perfect project to pitch. Afterwards I continued to write off beat essays for other collections: I did an essay on the movie “Encounter with the Unknown” for a “Twilight Zone” book, an essay on synthwave music for a “Stranger Things” book, and even an essay about Industrial-music bands that sample dialogue from the movie Gladiator. I am currently working on a collection of essays about the French “Emmanuelle” and the Italian “Black Emanuelle” films. All these topics, to me, are tremendously interesting as they reside in that liminal space between the underground and traditional pop culture. This is an area plump for academic analysis and I love to be one of the vanguard essayists who stumble upon something new, unknown, and underscore their importance.

Aside from writing, I co-host a podcast called the H. P. Lovecast Podcast with my partner Michele Brittany, who is also an academic writer and editor, and we have partnered on many projects together. Speaking of partnership, the theme music to our podcast was composed by Philippe Gerber, one of the prior interviewees at BoldJourney.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

I’m a big fan of using memory maps. Before and during writing processes I often find myself brainstorming and using memory maps to get all my ideas out there and grouped together is immensely helpful. Many times these ideas become points and ideas, which I’ll use to structure my writing. I many times do this with note cards. I grab a stack of notecards and on each one I’ll write a statement, a point, a fact, an idea, a something that needs to go into my project. I lay these on the ground and start arranging them in an order. This becomes the foundation of whatever I am writing about, but it also allows me to see gaps, which I can note to dive into later.

Self-motivation can be hard as we sometimes look to others for validation and support, but it is super important to give yourself some wins and feel the spark of successfully completing a project. I keep a to do list, a list of projects I am currently working on, but also projects I’d like to work on. Some of these are short (compose a review) some are long (write a book about a film). Anytime I get a project accomplished, it goes off the to do list and I feel a wave of accomplishment and satisfaction.

A non-technical skill I advocate is altruism for your fellow creatives. Helping others out – be it with reviews, sharing work, being a mentor, helping out, giving advice, even being friendly – is all important. No one is in a vacuum and we are all part of some community. Helping others in your community to be successful and feel welcomed also means others will want to help you and cheer on your successes.

What do you do when you feel overwhelmed? Any advice or strategies?

I tend to become overwhelmed every now and then when projects pile up and I am not accomplishing as much as I would like as quick as I would like. Many times my project list fills up because I have a hard time setting boundaries and saying “No.” I promise a lot to other folks, which does cause me to become overcommitted which in turn also causes me anxiety which can led to a temporary shut down. I’ve started reading literature on boundary setting in the hopes to improve on this facet of myself.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.nickdiak.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nicholasdiak/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nicholasdiakwriter
• Twitter: https://x.com/vnvdiak
• Other: https://bsky.app/profile/nicholasdiak.bsky.social

Image Credits

The two profile pictures of me were taken by Michele Brittany.

The pile of books was taken by Nicholas Diak.