It's wonderful to be here to listen to John D'Agata read
from his new book.
So I am going to turn the mic over
to Fenton who's going to sing you a song first,
and Vivaldi in fact.
But first, let me mention that the next reading in the UA
Prose Series is the Mexican Fiction anthology
reading, which is coming up on March 12th.
So the Mexican Fiction anthology was put out by Dalkey Archive
Press this past year, and it's a very interesting
bilingual anthology.
And we have the editor and two writers coming in from Mexico
to be with us, and to give a reading,
and also to do a panel on Friday on contemporary Mexican
fiction.
It's three writers in conversation,
so that should be very interesting.
Cibelle is also arranging, has arranged this amazing book club
in general, but in specific, for this book coming up
on Thursday.
So these are some other things to look forward to,
but without further ado, I'd like
to introduce Fenton Johnson.
[APPLAUSE]
Sorry.
Thank you.
Reminded me of that.
Yes, I'm Fenton Johnson.
I'm on the faculty of the creative nonfiction/ essay/
nonfiction program here at the University of Arizona.
And it's my pleasure to introduce John D'Agata.
Reading John D'Agata brings to mind Joan Didion in part
because like Didion, he confines himself to the background
even when writing deeply impassioned prose.
Every essayist can learn--
I had originally written every writer of creative nonfiction,
but I changed that.
Those people who were at the Q&A today will know why--
every essayist can learn from John's measured and careful use
of the first person.
John is not invisible to the reader, of course.
He is all over his pages, but he declares himself not explicitly
but through a style that is at the same time as limpid
as EB White and as complex as Guy Davenport.
Jump cuts, juxtapositions that are fanciful yet profound,
one-sentence paragraphs, a wry and knowing irony resting
on a profound faith in the human condition,
all these were present in his earlier work--
I'm thinking of Halls of Fame-- but achieve their apotheosis
in About a Mountain.
Some time ago, I conceived an exercise for my students
in which I asked them to juxtapose two seemingly
unrelated topics.
On its surface, the point of the exercise
is to demonstrate the ways in which the mind creates
meaning, how given an apple and an orange, we will,
indeed we must arrive at fruit.
At the most superficial level of analysis,
About a Mountain is such an exercise.
Exactly what does the proposal to bury generations
of nuclear waste under Nevada's Yucca mountain
have to do with a young man's suicide?
You'll have to read the book to find out,
but I will tell you that it proceeds
in the most powerful way, which is
to juxtapose the apple and the orange so artfully
that we the readers arrive at the connection organically.
In this way, reading becomes the most interactive of media.
The writer presents the reader with what is,
then humbly and gracefully withdraws,
trusting the reader to do the work.
In the juxtaposition of our rape of the West
and the death of a young man, John
shows us how the political becomes personal.
It's an extraordinary achievement,
bending and shaping nature writing, one
of the most commonplace of American literary forms
to recognizable if unsettling ends.
It innovates not through flash and dazzle, but through pause
and think.
And this is a quotation.
"Yucca mountain is where we are.
It's what we have come to now, a place
that we have studied at this point more
thoroughly than any other parcel of land in the world.
And yet still it remains unknown,
revealing only the fragility of our capacity to know."
That sentence captures the revelations and limitations
of empiricism, situating it within the mystery in which
our investigations take place.
David Foster Wallace called John D'Agata one
of the most significant American writers.
He has dedicated himself, made a life practice--
the Buddhist would say--
to the study and practice of the art of the essay.
His two anthologies-- these books are all for sale over
here--
his two anthologies, The Next American Essay and now
The Lost Origins of the Essay, both standard offerings
and writing classes nationwide, set forth the history
and the destiny of the form.
John is what the Buddhists call a bodhisattva, a fully unified
artist.
One feels a seamlessness between the person and the writing,
with both showing forth a generous heart
coupled with a brilliant mind.
It's a great pleasure to welcome John back
to the University of Arizona Poetry Center.
[APPLAUSE]