But I would never urge anyone else to do that unless that person really wanted to. And then it's up to everybody to decide what he or she wants to do outside of the realm of the books that they write. I think reading novels is a way to participate in the inner lives of others. And by entering the inner lives of often the most ordinary kinds of people, we're giving them the full dignity of their humanity.

Because the novel always is about an individual or a set of individuals. My theory is this: that the novel, just by its very nature, is an act that enforces democracy. Think of a world without novels, or string quartets, or ballets, or plays, or movies. And there's value in novels, there's value in music, there's value in painting.

And I think making art, even in the age of Trump, is firmly - he doesn't own everything, you know? He taken over a lot, but he doesn't own it all. What you think a writer's role is in the age of Trump?įar be it from me to tell anybody what to do. The event was recorded by KUOW and will appear on Town Hall's site in its entirety, but for now we thought we'd share this timely exchange with our readers. We discussed topics ranging from his stellar new novel 4321 to the secret of writing convincing sex scenes to a harrowing high school basketball game. Interviewing Paul Auster is intimidating as hell he's one of the most widely translated American novelists of all time, he's produced a magnificent array of influential novels since the mid-1980s, and he's a world-class thinker on the topic of stories and storytelling. Last Thursday, I interviewed Paul Auster at Town Hall Seattle. #paulauster #townhallseattle #bookreading #author #books #novel #reading #makeamericareadagain #dumptrump #glisteningocherousamoeba photo posted by Barry Malone on at 10:21pm PST Astonishing that that insight now applies in the United States. Part of the q&a dealt with Auster's work with he offered the thought that, in authoritarian regimes, the 'act of novel-writing enforces democracy'.

4321 paul auster review