I tell him that interviewing him can be extremely difficult - like climbing an iceberg without clothes on.
"Well, I wasn't put on this earth to make your life easy. Ha!" His laughter is like a proclamation - no smile, just "Ha!"
"Maybe we shouldn't be talking about literature at all," I say.
"Ha, ha," he says. "Now you're talking! I would be wonderful with a 100-year moratorium on literature talk, if you shut down all literature departments, close the book reviews, ban the critics. The readers should be alone with the books, and if anyone dared to say anything about them, they would be shot or imprisoned right on the spot. Yes, shot.
Funny, that’s what Chetan Bhagat says too, though in less fancy language.
There’s also a bit about Roth’s latest book, Everyman. (HOW is the man so prolific at this age??) Full interview here - read it, it's fun.
[And darn, just realised that Prufrock Two beat me to this.]
Just read the interview, and I love the way he answers those stock questions: 'where does Philip Roth end and the character in the book begin', the political standpoint of the book etc. So many times you ask these questions and realize they are really silly, but you've got to ask them anyway, but I've never had an interviewee author reply with such candour, somebody who made it clear they thought these questions are silly. The prospect is quite intimidating, really.
ReplyDeleteShrabonti: with due respect, you’ve never interviewed a Philip Roth :) More to the point, there are some authors here who’d want to give similar replies to dumb stock questions - but the culture of honest irreverence that would permit such an exchange to be published in a mainstream paper just doesn’t exist in India. Hence the Delhi Times template:
ReplyDelete“What is da book all about?”
“Where do you get your ideas from?”
“What is da next book going to be all about?”
(Weigh in, Samit.)
"It was the interests in life and the attempt to get life down on the pages which made me a writer - and then I discovered that, in many ways, I am standing on the outside of life".
ReplyDeleteI am not sure if I want to interview the guy, but I would certainly like to have a tete-a-tete with Roth. He's brutal.I guess some folks would grudgingly love the guy, or maybe love to hate him.
IS IT STILL THE EXISTING STATE OF AFFAIRS? NAIVE Q I KNOW.....
More to the point, there are some authors here who’d want to give similar replies to dumb stock questions - but the culture of honest irreverence that would permit such an exchange to be published in a mainstream paper just doesn’t exist in India.
Love the Chetan Bhagat comment :)
ReplyDelete"Do you ever smile at all?"
ReplyDeleteHe looks at me. "Yes, when I'm hiding in a corner and no one sees it."
Found this to be the only telling comment...and, surprisingly, not-so surprising after all. The rest of the interview is plain old attitude; doesn't say much. If you have a problem with stock questions and newspaper cliches and you are older/experienced enough than the interviewer, you are perfectly capable of leading the interview in the direction that you would like it to take...let the interviewer just sit there taking notes. I am sure he is intelligent and humane ( in connection with his comments about being human :) enough to do so, if he so desired.
I have read most of his early works in my twenties, when I was an avowed Roth afficionado. I suppose I outgrew him. There isn't much that he did with he did with his works following Portnoy's Complaint ( which was interesting ), Goodbye Columbus ( which I identified with, for some time ), The Professor of Desire and Letting Go. Lost a copy of Our Gang as soon as I had got it from Daryaganj ( you did find a lot of his stuff there ). That was the last. Got myself a copy of Operation Shylock but could not read it beyond the initial few pages. It is still gathering dust somewhere...
Have seen The Human Stain though. It was bleak...and held the attention in a lazy ruminant manner, that's about all.