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Jonathan Safran Foer: Novels can learn from poetry

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    Well, people often talk about the death of literature.
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    People have been speaking about it since shortly
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    after the first work of literature was ever made
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    but there's more and more talk about it.
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    It's been propelled by diminishing readership,
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    by what feels like an increasing apathy,
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    or even anxiety or even mistrust of literature
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    and the movement towards screens, everything being
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    on a screen and what would that mean for books which
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    aren't very well served on a screen.
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    It's not that you can't read a book on a screen
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    perfectly well but you can't read a book on a screen
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    that also has email and your calendar and texting.
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    Books can't compete with those kinds of media.
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    So we wonder will people read books?
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    There are still things and there will always be things that
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    only literature can do, only literature can communicate.
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    I don't think that literature is necessarily any better,
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    whatever than means, than film or dance or music.
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    In fact, I'm often drawn personally more
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    to film and dance than I am to literature
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    but I know that there are moments in my life
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    when I feel the need for literature and only for literature.
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    So for example, the mother of my oldest friend
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    passed away about week ago.
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    And I went down to visit her in Washington DC.
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    I live in New York. I was quite worried about what to say
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    and how to fill what I thought might be very awkward,
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    or even painful silences. And I brought poems,
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    about 20 poems. I read them to her and we talked
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    about them. And in that moment when we, together,
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    mostly just her, of course, but together, were confronting
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    this, the biggest moment of life which is death.
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    We relied on poetry.
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    Poems and stories and novels are very helpful
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    exactly when we most need language the most,
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    sort of dire, or urgent or existential moments of life.
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    Novels are meant to be read over the course of many
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    hours or many days. And even a story takes half an hour
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    to read. And I just wasn't sure, in this case, what her
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    energy level would be, so I wanted them to be quite
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    small, but even though that's the case, it's also true
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    that poetry is the most condensed form of literature
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    and in certain ways, it's the most pure form.
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    I don't think that novels are any less good than poetry
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    but novels has a lot to learn from poetry
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    in terms of what's possible, how direct one can be,
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    how concentrated language can be,
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    and how evocative and resonant.
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    Sometimes I think novels make the mistake
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    of being too much like their own description.
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    Somebody says, ''What is this book about?''
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    My dream is to write a novel where somebody would
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    have to say, "I could tell you, I suppose,
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    but that would really miss the point.
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    You'd just have to read it."
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    That, to my mind, is a good novel.
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    A novel that is its own synopsis,
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    just an expanded version of its synopsis,
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    comes awfully close to television actually.
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    Novels can still do something that poetry
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    does in terms of being kind of ineffable or mysterious
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    or not quite graspeable, just on a much larger scale.
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    All of my life, I have been more drawn to the visual arts
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    than to literature. And even still, when I'm feeling like
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    I can't remember why I wanted to be a writer,
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    I don't go to books, I actually go to paintings
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    or to sculpture. To me, the distinctions have been drawn
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    too sharply. The difference between a musician, a writer,
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    an artist, a dancer. We've categorized them,
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    segregated them, so that there's very , very little overlap
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    but in fact they're all just people who want to make
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    things that you could say have no use.
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    Everything in life has a use. The person who made
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    the camera that this is being shot with, made it
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    so that it could record something like this.
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    And a television or a computer that someone's watching
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    it on was made with specific functions in mind. A bridge
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    is made so that people can get from one land mass to
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    another. But novels and paintings and songs really ...
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    They might have effects in the world --
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    they might be political, they might be entertaining,
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    they might be objects of commerce, but they're not really
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    really made for any of those reasons. They're just made
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    for their own sake. Anyone who makes something
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    for its own sake, whether you try to have it published
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    or whether you're just rearranging twigs
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    on the ground because it pleases you,
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    people who do that are artists. And because we live
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    in a world in which you have to have a job and in which
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    it's expected that you will grow within your job
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    and because we like to have an answer to the question
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    'What is it that you do?'
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    You meet someone at a party.
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    They say ''What do you do?''
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    It makes us uncomfortable not to have an answer.
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    But the truth is, the different art forms are much, much
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    more similar than they are different.
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    When I'm not working on a book, I am somebody
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    who just moves through the world and sees nice things
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    and tries to remember them, but usually doesn't,
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    and hears jokes and tries to remember them but usually
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    doesn't and so on and has ideas that disappear,
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    But when I'm writing, I save those things
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    so that I can use them, rearrange them.
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    Nothing comes from nothing. I think that there's an
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    impression that books or art, making art is a much more
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    romantically creative act than it is, as if inspiration
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    strikes and suddenly, something appears
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    but that hasn't been my experience at all. It's much more
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    about being attentive to what's around and starting to
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    get to know what you like and what you find useful
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    and then collecting those things instead of everything.
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    Collecting those things and then figuring out what
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    what the most pleasing arrangement of them is for you.
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    There's nothing objective about it. It's not the case that
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    someone else will necessarily like it
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    but it really does feel like making collages with the
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    whole world as your cupboard of things to arrange.
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    Certainly in art, the most important things happen
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    on a subconscious level. When I approach a writing
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    project, I don't think of it like that. In fact, and I say this
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    not as a joke or to disparage myself, I really don't think about much at all.
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    about much at all. I'm just very open to what do I feel like
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    working on, what's interesting to me right now,
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    what am I curious about? But I never think about
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    what the potential use of something would be.
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    Like I was saying before, there's a quality of art
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    that is useless in the very, very best way.
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    That is the very highest compliment I can pay.
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    And if I started thinking about what I would achieve
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    for myself psychologically or in search of meaning
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    or in search of meaning or catharsis,
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    that's just another kind of use. Just in almost the same
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    way that trying to make something you could sell
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    for money is a kind of use. It's not to say that those two
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    thing might wouldn't be good in your life but I don't think
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    that they make a good work of art. They're not a good
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    starting point.
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    John [Delulo?] once said,"Nobody writes his first book.
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    It just happens. At a certain point, you find
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    that a printer is ... all these pages are coming out.
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    Oh my God, I can't believe I did this! I believe that.
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    Maybe it's a little different if you start late in life
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    incubating an idea for a long time but most people
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    when they write their first book, at a certain point,
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    they realize they have a book on their hands.
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    And the second book is different because then,
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    you have something that you're responding to,
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    you have your own expectations -- 'if you published
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    your first book, you have the world' expectations.
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    So I found the second book somewhat more difficult
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    because of that but I started the second book
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    before my first book was published so in a way,
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    I was able to escape some of those traps. But
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    then after I have written two novels, I wrote a work
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    of non-fiction about eating animals,about animal
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    farming. I think this is not a coincidence
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    that I decided to move in a different direction
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    because I was starting to feel the weight
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    of momentum. I didn't want to do a third thing
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    because I've done two previous things. I didn't want
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    to make a choice about tomorrow because of what
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    I did yesterday. So maybe even to a fault,
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    I resisted that and decided to move off
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    and try something else.
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    There are a lot of ways of talking about
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    choices in art. It's a mistake to think that
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    the way we talk about it retrospectively
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    as critics, which is very useful and interesting
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    but it's a mistake that that's the same language
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    of creation. Somebody once said, I can't remember
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    who, maybe it was Oscar Wilde, I can't remember.
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    He said, "There are only two kinds of objects
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    in the world: those that charm us and those that don't
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    charm us." Something can be charming in the most
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    completely simple way and for whatever reason,
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    it speaks to us. We like it. It is for us.
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    If it isn't charming, it's mundane. It's not that
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    we hate it, it's just that it has no great effect on us.
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    And each person, of course, has his own or her own
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    sense of what is charming. In a way, writing just
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    boils down to asking that question again and again
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    because it's charming or not. Something charming
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    can mean that it's very painful. It doesn't mean
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    that it's happy and beautiful. It can mean it's very
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    ugly, that it is funny. It can mean that it is serious.
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    It can be tragic. It can be comic.
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    Charming just means in a certain way,
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    that it's authentic and exceptional to you.
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    People often ask me, why don't I write about family
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    so often. I find that such a weird question.
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    I don't even know how to answer because the answer
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    feels so obvious to me. Nobody asks J.K. Rowling
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    why she writes about wizards so much.
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    That, to me, is weird. That's a weird choice she made
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    that requires some explanation because nobody
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    knows wizards. Nobody interacts with wizards.
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    Nobody can't fall asleep at night because of their
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    relationship to wizards but everyone has a family.
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    Even people whose families are absent.
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    Maybe especially people whose families are absent.
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    These are the main themes of life
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    and the main themes of literature since Genesis
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    so I assume I will always write about family.
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    Families is also especially important to me but
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    whatever will take the form of fathers
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    and sons-in-laws. Or it will take the form of
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    a married couple in a comedy. That I don't know.
Title:
Jonathan Safran Foer: Novels can learn from poetry
Description:

Interview with American writer Jonathan Safran Foer, in which he reflects on the power of literature in general and poetry in particular. Foer also argues that art always has a personal point of departure, where the artist confronts the world and rearranges it.

In this interview Jonathan Safran Foer (born 1977) reflects on various media and cultural activities. Personally, he is fascinated by film, but at all the critical moments of life Foer has been drawn to the unique power of literature, and especially poetry. However, all true art and culture has a common ground, Foer says. Unlike most other activities in society, art and culture are produced without a direct function and solely for their own sake. Foer argues that every work of art -- whether it is a painting, a book, a film or a piece of music -- is highly subjective at heart. Foer further explains why his novels often revolve around the theme of the family. "How can you not write about it," he asks, "since everybody is confronted with the subject, even those who have lost their family or grew up without it?" It would be much more relevant, he claims, to ask J.K. Rowling why she writes about wizards.

Jonathan Safran Foer was interviewed by Synne Rifbjerg.

Camera: Troels Kahl and Martin Kogi

Produced by: Kamilla Bruus and Synne Rifbjerg, 2012

Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art.

Meet more artists at http://channel.louisiana.dk

Louisiana Channel is a non-profit video channel for the Internet launched by the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in November 2012. Each week Louisiana Channel will publish videos about and with artists in visual art, literature, architecture, design etc.

Read more:
http://channel.louisiana.dk/about

Supported by Nordea-fonden.

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Video Language:
English
Team:
Louisiana Channel
Duration:
12:08

English subtitles

Incomplete

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