WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.755 align:middle line:90% 00:00:02.755 --> 00:00:04.130 align:middle line:84% We have to answer some questions. 00:00:04.130 --> 00:00:07.370 align:middle line:84% But also in the back, Riverhead has this unique approach 00:00:07.370 --> 00:00:09.330 align:middle line:84% to marketing, which is the tattoos. 00:00:09.330 --> 00:00:12.080 align:middle line:84% I don't know what the logic is, but these 00:00:12.080 --> 00:00:19.010 align:middle line:84% are semi permanent tattoos, which means permanent. 00:00:19.010 --> 00:00:21.800 align:middle line:84% My daughter has one from last fall, so be careful with them. 00:00:21.800 --> 00:00:23.190 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:23.190 --> 00:00:25.190 align:middle line:84% These are for the new book, In Persuasion Nation 00:00:25.190 --> 00:00:26.440 align:middle line:90% so please take-- 00:00:26.440 --> 00:00:28.649 align:middle line:84% especially if you're attractive please wear them. 00:00:28.649 --> 00:00:32.072 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:32.072 --> 00:00:34.030 align:middle line:90% 00:00:34.030 --> 00:00:37.090 align:middle line:84% Any questions at all to be addressed? 00:00:37.090 --> 00:00:41.080 align:middle line:90% 00:00:41.080 --> 00:00:43.300 align:middle line:84% Well, it must have been very definitive. 00:00:43.300 --> 00:00:43.840 align:middle line:90% Yes? 00:00:43.840 --> 00:00:47.110 align:middle line:90% When did you start writing? 00:00:47.110 --> 00:00:48.670 align:middle line:84% Really, I started in college, but I 00:00:48.670 --> 00:00:52.138 align:middle line:84% was in engineering school, so I was kind of doing on the side. 00:00:52.138 --> 00:00:53.680 align:middle line:84% So I started then, and I kind of just 00:00:53.680 --> 00:00:55.030 align:middle line:84% didn't do anything for a long time. 00:00:55.030 --> 00:00:57.420 align:middle line:84% And I went overseas, went to Sumatra in the oil fields. 00:00:57.420 --> 00:00:58.420 align:middle line:84% And when I was there, I kind of got 00:00:58.420 --> 00:00:59.587 align:middle line:90% a lot more serious about it. 00:00:59.587 --> 00:01:00.962 align:middle line:84% But my first book didn't come out 00:01:00.962 --> 00:01:02.530 align:middle line:84% until I was 33 or something, so I was 00:01:02.530 --> 00:01:04.140 align:middle line:90% kind of a late, late bloomer. 00:01:04.140 --> 00:01:07.150 align:middle line:90% 00:01:07.150 --> 00:01:09.550 align:middle line:90% What [INAUDIBLE] did you do? 00:01:09.550 --> 00:01:12.760 align:middle line:84% What made you want to publish [INAUDIBLE]?? 00:01:12.760 --> 00:01:16.240 align:middle line:90% 00:01:16.240 --> 00:01:16.990 align:middle line:90% Oh. 00:01:16.990 --> 00:01:19.810 align:middle line:84% Well, I just sent them out, you know? 00:01:19.810 --> 00:01:21.895 align:middle line:84% I just sent him out over the transom. 00:01:21.895 --> 00:01:25.990 align:middle line:90% 00:01:25.990 --> 00:01:27.490 align:middle line:84% Yeah, I just literally just sent out 00:01:27.490 --> 00:01:29.657 align:middle line:84% a little cover letter saying, would you publish this 00:01:29.657 --> 00:01:31.090 align:middle line:90% and-- is that what you mean? 00:01:31.090 --> 00:01:34.090 align:middle line:84% Were you writing books [? in light of ? ] publishing? 00:01:34.090 --> 00:01:35.290 align:middle line:90% Yes, very much. 00:01:35.290 --> 00:01:38.290 align:middle line:84% I mean, like a lot of young people, even 20, 00:01:38.290 --> 00:01:40.480 align:middle line:84% I thought, my goal is to write a book that 00:01:40.480 --> 00:01:43.840 align:middle line:84% is so good and popular that I get rich instantly. 00:01:43.840 --> 00:01:46.750 align:middle line:84% And I can skip over all that banal middle American shit, 00:01:46.750 --> 00:01:47.470 align:middle line:90% like-- 00:01:47.470 --> 00:01:49.590 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:01:49.590 --> 00:01:51.010 align:middle line:90% Say it again? 00:01:51.010 --> 00:01:51.550 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:01:51.550 --> 00:01:53.320 align:middle line:84% I mean, I really had the idea that it 00:01:53.320 --> 00:01:55.612 align:middle line:84% would be great to pass over all this stuff. 00:01:55.612 --> 00:01:57.820 align:middle line:84% And of course, it didn't happen for another 13 years, 00:01:57.820 --> 00:01:59.990 align:middle line:84% and then it wasn't enough to even buy anything. 00:01:59.990 --> 00:02:00.490 align:middle line:90% But-- 00:02:00.490 --> 00:02:03.345 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:03.345 --> 00:02:04.720 align:middle line:84% Honestly, that's a great blessing 00:02:04.720 --> 00:02:06.370 align:middle line:84% because I did have the idea that I-- 00:02:06.370 --> 00:02:08.650 align:middle line:84% we all grew up in our parents' houses, 00:02:08.650 --> 00:02:11.553 align:middle line:84% and we feel like, oh, compromise, compromise. 00:02:11.553 --> 00:02:12.970 align:middle line:84% So I had any idea that it would be 00:02:12.970 --> 00:02:16.000 align:middle line:84% great to just leave out of that, but it didn't happen at all. 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:18.340 align:middle line:84% So that has been a great life to have 00:02:18.340 --> 00:02:20.160 align:middle line:84% to do what everyone has to do and never 00:02:20.160 --> 00:02:21.160 align:middle line:90% have quite enough money. 00:02:21.160 --> 00:02:23.530 align:middle line:84% And then that, of course, becomes your material. 00:02:23.530 --> 00:02:25.673 align:middle line:84% So I'm grateful that I got nice things, 00:02:25.673 --> 00:02:28.090 align:middle line:84% but it was always later than I wanted them, which is good. 00:02:28.090 --> 00:02:31.620 align:middle line:90% 00:02:31.620 --> 00:02:32.880 align:middle line:90% Yeah? 00:02:32.880 --> 00:02:35.460 align:middle line:84% I was wondering where you got your inspiration for the story 00:02:35.460 --> 00:02:38.500 align:middle line:84% Sea Oak because that was one of the craziest things I've ever 00:02:38.500 --> 00:02:39.000 align:middle line:90% read. 00:02:39.000 --> 00:02:40.538 align:middle line:90% I totally didn't see it coming. 00:02:40.538 --> 00:02:43.080 align:middle line:84% And I guess they said that they were turning it into a movie. 00:02:43.080 --> 00:02:45.810 align:middle line:90% What are your plans on that? 00:02:45.810 --> 00:02:46.320 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:02:46.320 --> 00:02:48.430 align:middle line:84% Ben Stiller owns-- I wrote two scripts, that one 00:02:48.430 --> 00:02:49.590 align:middle line:84% and CivilWarLand, and Ben Stiller 00:02:49.590 --> 00:02:50.940 align:middle line:90% has the rights to both of them. 00:02:50.940 --> 00:02:54.120 align:middle line:84% So I'm hoping that something will happen. 00:02:54.120 --> 00:02:56.532 align:middle line:84% And that story-- really, what I do honestly 00:02:56.532 --> 00:02:58.740 align:middle line:84% is just start with the smallest thing I can think of. 00:02:58.740 --> 00:03:01.340 align:middle line:84% In that case, I lived in Syracuse. 00:03:01.340 --> 00:03:03.840 align:middle line:84% And I was walking in the mall, and there were these two kind 00:03:03.840 --> 00:03:06.270 align:middle line:90% of white trashy Syracuse girls. 00:03:06.270 --> 00:03:08.410 align:middle line:84% And their conversation was so funny. 00:03:08.410 --> 00:03:12.300 align:middle line:90% It was like, [INAUDIBLE]. 00:03:12.300 --> 00:03:14.820 align:middle line:84% It was like they were from Moldavia or something. 00:03:14.820 --> 00:03:16.247 align:middle line:90% I couldn't understand them. 00:03:16.247 --> 00:03:18.330 align:middle line:84% And then very slowly, I just followed them around, 00:03:18.330 --> 00:03:20.940 align:middle line:90% and they were talking. 00:03:20.940 --> 00:03:24.120 align:middle line:90% But it was all this [INAUDIBLE]. 00:03:24.120 --> 00:03:27.250 align:middle line:84% So I thought, really, that's a form of poetry 00:03:27.250 --> 00:03:29.460 align:middle line:90% when you get right down to it. 00:03:29.460 --> 00:03:31.200 align:middle line:90% I mean, I grew up in Chicago. 00:03:31.200 --> 00:03:33.960 align:middle line:84% All these people that I knew were very loving, 00:03:33.960 --> 00:03:38.220 align:middle line:84% very passionate, sentimental people, but in many cases, 00:03:38.220 --> 00:03:40.920 align:middle line:84% they didn't take the traditional approach to expressing emotion. 00:03:40.920 --> 00:03:43.440 align:middle line:84% They would tell you sort of on the side of their mouth 00:03:43.440 --> 00:03:44.280 align:middle line:90% or sarcastically. 00:03:44.280 --> 00:03:46.800 align:middle line:84% So I kind of fall in love this idea 00:03:46.800 --> 00:03:49.207 align:middle line:84% that any diction can be overflowed. 00:03:49.207 --> 00:03:50.790 align:middle line:84% I have a story in this new book that's 00:03:50.790 --> 00:03:53.650 align:middle line:84% written in a technical writing jargon or a corporate 00:03:53.650 --> 00:03:54.150 align:middle line:90% or whatever. 00:03:54.150 --> 00:03:57.160 align:middle line:84% So that story just started with those girls talking that way. 00:03:57.160 --> 00:03:59.820 align:middle line:84% And after a while, I think it's kind like a sea crystal. 00:03:59.820 --> 00:04:02.310 align:middle line:84% You come up with one little riff that you kind of like. 00:04:02.310 --> 00:04:04.680 align:middle line:84% And then you say, OK, well, where are they standing? 00:04:04.680 --> 00:04:06.320 align:middle line:84% And then you write off from there. 00:04:06.320 --> 00:04:08.900 align:middle line:84% So really, it just started as that. 00:04:08.900 --> 00:04:11.400 align:middle line:84% I don't want to give it away, but there's a surprising thing 00:04:11.400 --> 00:04:12.400 align:middle line:90% that happens in the end. 00:04:12.400 --> 00:04:14.760 align:middle line:84% And I got stuck for about four years on that part. 00:04:14.760 --> 00:04:17.700 align:middle line:84% I wrote something like 300 pages of alternate endings, 00:04:17.700 --> 00:04:19.209 align:middle line:90% but always were disappointing. 00:04:19.209 --> 00:04:21.795 align:middle line:84% And then one day I had the idea that those of us 00:04:21.795 --> 00:04:22.920 align:middle line:90% on the in-crowd know about. 00:04:22.920 --> 00:04:26.160 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:04:26.160 --> 00:04:26.660 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:04:26.660 --> 00:04:28.640 align:middle line:84% I mean, I'd love to see it made into a movie. 00:04:28.640 --> 00:04:29.990 align:middle line:90% I'm kind of-- 00:04:29.990 --> 00:04:34.910 align:middle line:84% I wrote it, so I hope it gets made in time for the old folks 00:04:34.910 --> 00:04:35.690 align:middle line:90% home payments. 00:04:35.690 --> 00:04:39.155 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:04:39.155 --> 00:04:42.440 align:middle line:84% Who are some of your biggest influences? 00:04:42.440 --> 00:04:44.512 align:middle line:84% I said in the classroom I was a big Hemingway 00:04:44.512 --> 00:04:45.470 align:middle line:90% fan, believe it or not. 00:04:45.470 --> 00:04:48.830 align:middle line:84% I don't think there are too many traces of it any more, 00:04:48.830 --> 00:04:50.840 align:middle line:84% but I really loved the economy and the sort 00:04:50.840 --> 00:04:52.520 align:middle line:90% of simple objective sentences. 00:04:52.520 --> 00:04:55.880 align:middle line:84% And then later, Kerouac, I really loved. 00:04:55.880 --> 00:04:58.672 align:middle line:84% Thomas Wolfe, I loved, and then I went to the Syracuse program 00:04:58.672 --> 00:05:01.130 align:middle line:84% and studied with Tobias Wolff, and Raymond Carver was still 00:05:01.130 --> 00:05:03.230 align:middle line:84% living there at the time, so they were big influences. 00:05:03.230 --> 00:05:04.820 align:middle line:84% And then I think really it was kind 00:05:04.820 --> 00:05:07.220 align:middle line:84% of a process of just loving those people so 00:05:07.220 --> 00:05:09.352 align:middle line:84% much in their work and then getting to a point 00:05:09.352 --> 00:05:11.060 align:middle line:84% each time where you tried to imitate him, 00:05:11.060 --> 00:05:12.310 align:middle line:90% and it just wasn't satisfying. 00:05:12.310 --> 00:05:15.922 align:middle line:84% Your life, you know, didn't quite mesh with their vision. 00:05:15.922 --> 00:05:17.630 align:middle line:84% And you could feel the falseness of that. 00:05:17.630 --> 00:05:20.150 align:middle line:84% So finally, for me, the big break through 00:05:20.150 --> 00:05:22.370 align:middle line:84% was permitting myself to be funny 00:05:22.370 --> 00:05:24.980 align:middle line:84% and to be a little scatological, which we were 00:05:24.980 --> 00:05:26.682 align:middle line:90% doing at home all those years. 00:05:26.682 --> 00:05:28.640 align:middle line:84% But somehow the idea that it was in literature, 00:05:28.640 --> 00:05:31.250 align:middle line:90% I hadn't made that leap. 00:05:31.250 --> 00:05:32.660 align:middle line:90% And then later, I mean, Gogol-- 00:05:32.660 --> 00:05:34.070 align:middle line:84% I love the Russian writer, Gogol. 00:05:34.070 --> 00:05:36.500 align:middle line:84% And the Russian writer Isaac Babel was a big influence. 00:05:36.500 --> 00:05:38.042 align:middle line:84% He's not a funny writer particularly, 00:05:38.042 --> 00:05:40.520 align:middle line:90% but his prose is so tight. 00:05:40.520 --> 00:05:42.410 align:middle line:84% Even Hemingway said, he does what 00:05:42.410 --> 00:05:44.375 align:middle line:90% I do only he does it better. 00:05:44.375 --> 00:05:46.250 align:middle line:84% And Babel also was able to take that approach 00:05:46.250 --> 00:05:48.542 align:middle line:84% and apply it to a really domestic themes, which I don't 00:05:48.542 --> 00:05:50.780 align:middle line:90% think Hemingway ever quite did. 00:05:50.780 --> 00:05:53.150 align:middle line:84% And Tobias Wolff was a huge influence in his writing 00:05:53.150 --> 00:05:55.590 align:middle line:84% as a person because he was my teacher at Syracuse. 00:05:55.590 --> 00:05:58.910 align:middle line:84% And he was such a nice, loving guy, 00:05:58.910 --> 00:06:00.290 align:middle line:90% great father, a great husband. 00:06:00.290 --> 00:06:02.810 align:middle line:84% And I always thought that to be a writer, you had to be off. 00:06:02.810 --> 00:06:05.090 align:middle line:84% And I was wondering when my addiction would kick in 00:06:05.090 --> 00:06:07.340 align:middle line:84% because I was kind of a straight arrow, and I thought, 00:06:07.340 --> 00:06:07.965 align:middle line:90% oh, I'm doomed. 00:06:07.965 --> 00:06:10.465 align:middle line:84% Meeting him was really inspiring because he didn't have any. 00:06:10.465 --> 00:06:12.290 align:middle line:84% The only thing he did intensely was write. 00:06:12.290 --> 00:06:16.900 align:middle line:84% And he'd come out of there, and he'd be a great father. 00:06:16.900 --> 00:06:19.130 align:middle line:84% I remember once he called his teenage son, dear, 00:06:19.130 --> 00:06:20.600 align:middle line:84% and I thought, shit, that's great. 00:06:20.600 --> 00:06:21.977 align:middle line:90% That's something. 00:06:21.977 --> 00:06:23.810 align:middle line:84% So he was a big personal influence for sure. 00:06:23.810 --> 00:06:29.110 align:middle line:90% 00:06:29.110 --> 00:06:30.570 align:middle line:84% In terms of-- some of your stories 00:06:30.570 --> 00:06:32.565 align:middle line:90% have a political edge to them. 00:06:32.565 --> 00:06:34.440 align:middle line:84% [INAUDIBLE] writing stories like that, do you 00:06:34.440 --> 00:06:35.815 align:middle line:84% think about the audience that are 00:06:35.815 --> 00:06:38.065 align:middle line:84% going to be reading the stories, assuming that they're 00:06:38.065 --> 00:06:40.080 align:middle line:84% going to share your politics or you may try 00:06:40.080 --> 00:06:41.503 align:middle line:90% to change the minds of someone? 00:06:41.503 --> 00:06:42.670 align:middle line:90% It's a really good question. 00:06:42.670 --> 00:06:44.050 align:middle line:90% It's a good question. 00:06:44.050 --> 00:06:47.460 align:middle line:84% Honestly, for me the politics is sort of more-- 00:06:47.460 --> 00:06:49.980 align:middle line:84% I think of it as more just landscape, the landscape 00:06:49.980 --> 00:06:51.418 align:middle line:90% in which the story takes place. 00:06:51.418 --> 00:06:52.960 align:middle line:84% In other words, if you were Turgenev, 00:06:52.960 --> 00:06:55.328 align:middle line:84% you'd have a landscape of peasant villages in forests 00:06:55.328 --> 00:06:57.870 align:middle line:84% and so on, and that would be the stuff out of which you would 00:06:57.870 --> 00:06:59.560 align:middle line:90% make the psychological moment. 00:06:59.560 --> 00:07:02.160 align:middle line:84% So for me, a lot of times the politics 00:07:02.160 --> 00:07:03.700 align:middle line:84% is kind of just background noise, 00:07:03.700 --> 00:07:06.330 align:middle line:84% but I'm aware that also sounds like I'm advocating something. 00:07:06.330 --> 00:07:09.990 align:middle line:84% So I think like a lot of people, 9/11 kind of messed me 00:07:09.990 --> 00:07:11.910 align:middle line:84% up a little bit, and I suddenly started 00:07:11.910 --> 00:07:15.550 align:middle line:84% writing much more politically than I ever would have before. 00:07:15.550 --> 00:07:18.415 align:middle line:84% And this book in a way, is kind of the story of that trajectory 00:07:18.415 --> 00:07:20.040 align:middle line:84% because towards the end, the last story 00:07:20.040 --> 00:07:22.020 align:middle line:84% is-- for me anyway, it was kind of a way out 00:07:22.020 --> 00:07:26.187 align:middle line:90% of the trap of being political. 00:07:26.187 --> 00:07:28.020 align:middle line:84% I think all stories are political if they're 00:07:28.020 --> 00:07:29.018 align:middle line:90% about human beings. 00:07:29.018 --> 00:07:31.560 align:middle line:84% Chekhov has this beautiful story called "Grief" where there's 00:07:31.560 --> 00:07:34.680 align:middle line:84% this guy whose son has just died that day, but he's a poor guy 00:07:34.680 --> 00:07:37.440 align:middle line:84% and he's a cab driver, like a horse cab driver. 00:07:37.440 --> 00:07:40.290 align:middle line:84% And the whole story is just him trying to get somebody 00:07:40.290 --> 00:07:41.190 align:middle line:90% to listen to him. 00:07:41.190 --> 00:07:42.690 align:middle line:84% He just wants to talk about his son, 00:07:42.690 --> 00:07:45.253 align:middle line:84% that he was a good boy, that he was-- 00:07:45.253 --> 00:07:46.920 align:middle line:84% they don't want to talk to a cab driver. 00:07:46.920 --> 00:07:49.470 align:middle line:84% He gets whipped at one point, and he's spit on 00:07:49.470 --> 00:07:51.970 align:middle line:90% and whatever, just ignored 00:07:51.970 --> 00:07:55.470 align:middle line:84% And at the end of the day when no one would listen to him, 00:07:55.470 --> 00:07:57.118 align:middle line:84% he takes the horses in the stable, 00:07:57.118 --> 00:07:59.160 align:middle line:84% and he kind of takes the horse's head in his hand 00:07:59.160 --> 00:08:02.910 align:middle line:84% and he whispers something in the horse about his son. 00:08:02.910 --> 00:08:04.080 align:middle line:90% Is that a political story? 00:08:04.080 --> 00:08:04.740 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:08:04.740 --> 00:08:06.510 align:middle line:84% I mean, it is in the deepest sense 00:08:06.510 --> 00:08:08.610 align:middle line:84% because that's the Russia that's going to erupt 00:08:08.610 --> 00:08:10.350 align:middle line:90% in revolution in 15 years. 00:08:10.350 --> 00:08:11.850 align:middle line:84% And there's a whole nation of people 00:08:11.850 --> 00:08:13.830 align:middle line:84% like that who can never tell their secrets to anyone 00:08:13.830 --> 00:08:14.660 align:middle line:90% who will listen. 00:08:14.660 --> 00:08:17.250 align:middle line:84% So my highest vision is that a story 00:08:17.250 --> 00:08:19.950 align:middle line:84% would be political because it's happening to a human being. 00:08:19.950 --> 00:08:22.950 align:middle line:84% And you extrapolate that times a million, and it's political. 00:08:22.950 --> 00:08:27.197 align:middle line:84% But in this book, a lot of them are much more overt than that. 00:08:27.197 --> 00:08:29.280 align:middle line:84% I just felt frustrated that our country had gotten 00:08:29.280 --> 00:08:31.620 align:middle line:84% so stupid all of a sudden and so passive, 00:08:31.620 --> 00:08:33.840 align:middle line:84% and I couldn't help-- it just wouldn't stay out 00:08:33.840 --> 00:08:35.434 align:middle line:90% of the stories. 00:08:35.434 --> 00:08:37.559 align:middle line:84% I wrote some of anti-war things for the New Yorker, 00:08:37.559 --> 00:08:42.090 align:middle line:84% but still that pressure was really there. 00:08:42.090 --> 00:08:44.820 align:middle line:84% I think what I'm trying to do now is remember that fiction 00:08:44.820 --> 00:08:48.150 align:middle line:84% basically is a tool to wake us up, 00:08:48.150 --> 00:08:51.360 align:middle line:84% and it's also a tool to disassemble 00:08:51.360 --> 00:08:53.190 align:middle line:84% your own projections and prejudices. 00:08:53.190 --> 00:08:54.990 align:middle line:90% So when I think Republicans-- 00:08:54.990 --> 00:08:56.652 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:08:56.652 --> 00:08:57.610 align:middle line:90% There may be some here. 00:08:57.610 --> 00:08:58.500 align:middle line:90% Who knows? 00:08:58.500 --> 00:09:00.345 align:middle line:84% But when I think that, I'm being full 00:09:00.345 --> 00:09:03.390 align:middle line:84% of shit because there is really not such thing as a Republican. 00:09:03.390 --> 00:09:06.460 align:middle line:84% I mean, there is, but deep down in a fictional way, 00:09:06.460 --> 00:09:08.790 align:middle line:90% the Republican is Keith. 00:09:08.790 --> 00:09:11.880 align:middle line:84% And Keith is self-conscious because he's 00:09:11.880 --> 00:09:14.190 align:middle line:84% got a slight overbite, and he always 00:09:14.190 --> 00:09:16.020 align:middle line:84% feels that people are making fun of him 00:09:16.020 --> 00:09:17.820 align:middle line:84% because of that overbite, which has 00:09:17.820 --> 00:09:20.130 align:middle line:84% happened to him his whole life, especially 00:09:20.130 --> 00:09:22.470 align:middle line:90% those liberal elites. 00:09:22.470 --> 00:09:26.040 align:middle line:84% So really, Keith is a guy with a vulnerability who's 00:09:26.040 --> 00:09:27.610 align:middle line:90% exported it to somebody else. 00:09:27.610 --> 00:09:30.360 align:middle line:84% So I think the fictional thing is to reside with the character 00:09:30.360 --> 00:09:32.970 align:middle line:84% until you start to see him as a three dimensional human being, 00:09:32.970 --> 00:09:35.230 align:middle line:84% and then the process of loving them can start. 00:09:35.230 --> 00:09:39.030 align:middle line:84% And so for the next book, that's the plan anyway. 00:09:39.030 --> 00:09:40.453 align:middle line:90% No more [INAUDIBLE]. 00:09:40.453 --> 00:09:43.904 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:09:43.904 --> 00:09:47.700 align:middle line:84% [INAUDIBLE] a lot of your dialogue 00:09:47.700 --> 00:09:52.080 align:middle line:84% the sentences that were spoken by characters ended in question 00:09:52.080 --> 00:09:56.310 align:middle line:84% marks, and yet they didn't always seem necessarily 00:09:56.310 --> 00:09:58.250 align:middle line:90% like interrogative statements. 00:09:58.250 --> 00:10:00.330 align:middle line:84% I was wondering if sometimes you feel limited 00:10:00.330 --> 00:10:03.990 align:middle line:84% by having only sort of question marks and periods and stuff 00:10:03.990 --> 00:10:05.130 align:middle line:90% to end sentences. 00:10:05.130 --> 00:10:06.390 align:middle line:90% Yeah, I think so. 00:10:06.390 --> 00:10:09.150 align:middle line:84% I mean for me, the big fun is the tonal communication. 00:10:09.150 --> 00:10:12.510 align:middle line:84% So where I live, a lot of the kids 00:10:12.510 --> 00:10:14.655 align:middle line:90% are always talking like this. 00:10:14.655 --> 00:10:16.480 align:middle line:90% There's a spike in my head. 00:10:16.480 --> 00:10:19.758 align:middle line:90% And you think, there is? 00:10:19.758 --> 00:10:20.550 align:middle line:90% But it's beautiful. 00:10:20.550 --> 00:10:22.508 align:middle line:84% I mean, there's something beautiful about that. 00:10:22.508 --> 00:10:24.420 align:middle line:84% And there is something different. 00:10:24.420 --> 00:10:27.540 align:middle line:84% "There's a spike in my head" is different than "there's 00:10:27.540 --> 00:10:28.750 align:middle line:90% a spike in my head?" 00:10:28.750 --> 00:10:30.507 align:middle line:84% And so in a certain way, I don't quite 00:10:30.507 --> 00:10:32.590 align:middle line:84% know that I could quantify what the difference is. 00:10:32.590 --> 00:10:34.340 align:middle line:84% But sometimes you just hear it and you go, 00:10:34.340 --> 00:10:37.290 align:middle line:90% that's a question mark there. 00:10:37.290 --> 00:10:39.000 align:middle line:84% It's amazing, too, isn't it, how we 00:10:39.000 --> 00:10:41.970 align:middle line:84% read they're so perceptive that a reader who's fully 00:10:41.970 --> 00:10:44.220 align:middle line:84% in the moment of the story gets to that question mark, 00:10:44.220 --> 00:10:46.170 align:middle line:84% and that's different than if it was a period. 00:10:46.170 --> 00:10:48.810 align:middle line:90% So yeah, thanks for noticing. 00:10:48.810 --> 00:10:50.146 align:middle line:90% I mean, thanks for noticing it? 00:10:50.146 --> 00:10:53.548 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:10:53.548 --> 00:10:58.240 align:middle line:90% 00:10:58.240 --> 00:10:58.740 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:10:58.740 --> 00:10:59.240 align:middle line:90% Oh, yeah. 00:10:59.240 --> 00:11:00.110 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:11:00.110 --> 00:11:01.235 align:middle line:90% You're almost out of there. 00:11:01.235 --> 00:11:03.070 align:middle line:84% If everybody else wants to leave, that's-- 00:11:03.070 --> 00:11:03.780 align:middle line:90% We'll just talk. 00:11:03.780 --> 00:11:06.300 align:middle line:84% I was just going to ask a couple of words of advice 00:11:06.300 --> 00:11:08.650 align:middle line:90% from you, right? 00:11:08.650 --> 00:11:10.150 align:middle line:84% We talked a little bit in the class. 00:11:10.150 --> 00:11:14.000 align:middle line:84% I think the biggest advice is don't stop. 00:11:14.000 --> 00:11:16.500 align:middle line:84% As far as I can tell, when I look at my students in Syracuse 00:11:16.500 --> 00:11:18.375 align:middle line:84% who've published, the main thing they've done 00:11:18.375 --> 00:11:19.530 align:middle line:90% has just been like tanks. 00:11:19.530 --> 00:11:22.740 align:middle line:84% And with their minds open, they just keep going 00:11:22.740 --> 00:11:26.047 align:middle line:84% and gradually the work rises to meet them. 00:11:26.047 --> 00:11:28.380 align:middle line:84% But then the other thing that we talk about in the class 00:11:28.380 --> 00:11:32.970 align:middle line:84% was this idea that maybe when you really get down to it, 00:11:32.970 --> 00:11:36.960 align:middle line:84% originality in art means settling into where you 00:11:36.960 --> 00:11:40.140 align:middle line:90% actually are in a certain way. 00:11:40.140 --> 00:11:43.020 align:middle line:90% Like me, I have this voice. 00:11:43.020 --> 00:11:44.130 align:middle line:90% You may have noticed. 00:11:44.130 --> 00:11:46.200 align:middle line:84% I talk a little fast, and it's a little nasal. 00:11:46.200 --> 00:11:47.850 align:middle line:84% And when I was a teenager, that caused 00:11:47.850 --> 00:11:50.580 align:middle line:84% me no end of embarrassment because I 00:11:50.580 --> 00:11:52.050 align:middle line:90% was sort of an easy target. 00:11:52.050 --> 00:11:54.530 align:middle line:84% And I talk with my hands, and I really hated it. 00:11:54.530 --> 00:11:57.330 align:middle line:84% And there was even a time where I tried to slow down 00:11:57.330 --> 00:12:00.840 align:middle line:84% and really tried to be an attractive alpha male. 00:12:00.840 --> 00:12:03.570 align:middle line:84% And then that didn't work very well. 00:12:03.570 --> 00:12:05.310 align:middle line:84% So I think in capsule, that's kind 00:12:05.310 --> 00:12:07.248 align:middle line:84% of what my artistic trajectory was 00:12:07.248 --> 00:12:09.540 align:middle line:84% like was to finally say, god, I don't know why I always 00:12:09.540 --> 00:12:11.280 align:middle line:90% write about corpses. 00:12:11.280 --> 00:12:14.010 align:middle line:84% I don't know why every time I get to a place in the story 00:12:14.010 --> 00:12:16.050 align:middle line:84% where I'm getting a little bit deep, 00:12:16.050 --> 00:12:18.120 align:middle line:84% I have to undercut it with the joke. 00:12:18.120 --> 00:12:20.370 align:middle line:90% But I do. 00:12:20.370 --> 00:12:22.290 align:middle line:84% So for me, the whole thing was to relax 00:12:22.290 --> 00:12:25.170 align:middle line:84% into that and say, well, I'm going to be here another 30 00:12:25.170 --> 00:12:27.500 align:middle line:84% years, so let's go ahead and throw everything 00:12:27.500 --> 00:12:28.500 align:middle line:90% you've got at the thing. 00:12:28.500 --> 00:12:30.990 align:middle line:84% So I think maybe one thing is whenever you find yourself 00:12:30.990 --> 00:12:32.610 align:middle line:84% saying to yourself as a young writer, 00:12:32.610 --> 00:12:34.020 align:middle line:90% I don't know how to do a story. 00:12:34.020 --> 00:12:36.240 align:middle line:90% I don't really know the rules. 00:12:36.240 --> 00:12:40.560 align:middle line:84% Relax into the idea that you, at whatever age you are, 18, 00:12:40.560 --> 00:12:42.450 align:middle line:84% you have lived in the world 18 years. 00:12:42.450 --> 00:12:48.570 align:middle line:84% And when Faulkner was 18, he did not know more than you know. 00:12:48.570 --> 00:12:50.940 align:middle line:84% He may have been technically more adept or something. 00:12:50.940 --> 00:12:52.680 align:middle line:84% But in terms of actual experience, 00:12:52.680 --> 00:12:53.950 align:middle line:90% 18 years is 18 years. 00:12:53.950 --> 00:12:56.490 align:middle line:90% So what seems lovely to you is. 00:12:56.490 --> 00:12:58.470 align:middle line:90% What seems sad to you is. 00:12:58.470 --> 00:13:00.660 align:middle line:84% The greatest tragedy of your life, it was. 00:13:00.660 --> 00:13:03.852 align:middle line:84% And your heart being broke is just as real 00:13:03.852 --> 00:13:05.310 align:middle line:84% as Shakespeare's being broke, and I 00:13:05.310 --> 00:13:08.040 align:middle line:84% think then you can start to get purchase on how to do it. 00:13:08.040 --> 00:13:11.040 align:middle line:84% And of course, it's got to be a new way. 00:13:11.040 --> 00:13:13.050 align:middle line:84% When I say there's that beautiful Turgenev story 00:13:13.050 --> 00:13:15.630 align:middle line:84% First Love, when I say First Love, 00:13:15.630 --> 00:13:18.040 align:middle line:84% the room lights up with thousands of ideas, 00:13:18.040 --> 00:13:19.410 align:middle line:90% memories of first love. 00:13:19.410 --> 00:13:26.160 align:middle line:84% And how wonderful it is that one, when I say first love, 00:13:26.160 --> 00:13:30.200 align:middle line:84% I can see people kind of going, hmm, Sally, or whatever. 00:13:30.200 --> 00:13:33.410 align:middle line:84% And so in a way, what that proves 00:13:33.410 --> 00:13:36.410 align:middle line:84% is that we're all basically different variations 00:13:36.410 --> 00:13:37.220 align:middle line:90% of the same model. 00:13:37.220 --> 00:13:38.990 align:middle line:90% We've got the same brain. 00:13:38.990 --> 00:13:40.730 align:middle line:90% First love means first love. 00:13:40.730 --> 00:13:44.990 align:middle line:84% Now for me, it means 1973 in a back seat of a '69 Camaro that 00:13:44.990 --> 00:13:46.780 align:middle line:90% smelled like Love's Baby Soft. 00:13:46.780 --> 00:13:50.390 align:middle line:84% But that has nothing to do with anybody else. 00:13:50.390 --> 00:13:52.850 align:middle line:84% But if I say first love, you get it. 00:13:52.850 --> 00:13:55.190 align:middle line:84% So to me, that's the thing that gives you 00:13:55.190 --> 00:13:57.590 align:middle line:84% confidence is that the person on the other end 00:13:57.590 --> 00:14:01.740 align:middle line:84% is just you on a different day in a slightly different world. 00:14:01.740 --> 00:14:03.470 align:middle line:90% So you can communicate. 00:14:03.470 --> 00:14:05.822 align:middle line:84% And in fact, it's almost impossible not to communicate. 00:14:05.822 --> 00:14:07.280 align:middle line:84% And this stuff that you have to say 00:14:07.280 --> 00:14:10.500 align:middle line:84% is perfectly wonderful and valid. 00:14:10.500 --> 00:14:11.000 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:12.542 align:middle line:84% Thank you so much for your attention. 00:14:12.542 --> 00:14:15.500 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:14:15.500 --> 00:14:16.000 align:middle line:90%