Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
oh, excuse me -- Renshin, not Rensin!
  

    
No prob and thank you. Interesting that Medium paid you, great too,
I'd thought we were supposed to pay Medium to publish there or use
it to get our friends to pay us or something. I've been online for
decades, starting here at the Well, am still active here and on
Facebook, and occasionally wonder whether all of this time and
energy could have been better spent. But then how do we know, spend
it here, don't spend it there, it's like the joke about the little
boy digging through a pile of shit and when someone asks him what
he's doing, he says "There must be a pony in here somewhere."
  

    
This discussion and Jonathan's commitment were formally scheduled
September 10-23, but if he's up for it it's fine to continue. We
don't have a new discussion scheduled immediately, and I can still
feel the energy in the (virtual) room.

But this is also time to thank Jonathan, Linda, and all others
who've joined the conversation so far. 

And a reminder that this discussion is readable by the general
public, you don't have to be a member of the WELL to access it. For
non-members, here's a short link for easy access:
<https://tinyurl.com/jonathan-lethem>.

The full link is:
<https://people.well.com/conf/inkwell.vue/topics/549/Jonathan-Lethem-Brooklyn-C
rime-N-page01.html>.
  

    
Many thanks, Jonathan. I enjoyed the exchange, learned a lot (in the
most pleasant way possible), and came away with two books I look
forward to reading--Brooklyn Crime Novel and The Last Good Kiss,
which I haven't read since the 1980s. Linda, thanks for a great job
as host.  
  

    
Thank you, Jonathan, and I'm happy to have a copy of your latest,
"Brooklyn Crime Novel," though prior reading commitments kept me from
getting far into it. So I haven't yet learned why you've decided to do
without character names!
  

    
Me, I'm freaking thrilled to have a chance to chat with an author
who I admire. Thanks!
  

    
>>I haven't yet learned why you've decided to do
without character names!

I'm curious about that, too.

And, who is talking?  When I started re-reading I noticed that I had
missed the answer to that question which is the second sentence of
the first paragraph.  It wasn't until Chapter 97, titled "I" that he
gets around to saying more about himself.  I kind of liked that I
missed the original introduction,  it kept me engaged and curious,
and I admired it as a literary device.
  

    
Thanks, Pete!  
  

    
Hey, everyone, thanks for all the thanks! I'll keep my eye on things
here for another day or two, though I'm now in London and so the
time zones have probably made it seem like I already faded out. But
if there are a few last questions I'm delighted to handle them. It's
been nice visiting with you. And I'm glad this might have led a few
of you to Brooklyn Crime Novel -- which, incidentally, came out in
paperback just yesterday, officially -- since I'm so proud of it.

I'm not sure I can exactly "explain" the decisions around the
character names and the narrator, which were discoveries I made
along the way in that very unusual compositional journey. I think in
the broadest sense the book was one where I felt the need to
destabilize and reinvent all the usual terms of storytelling -- to
make narrative itself one of the problems the book was trying to
describe.

I hope that doesn't sound too wonky! It's also a book full of
voices, stories, urban legends, and outright gags. I hope you love
it.
  

    
I think we live for the wonk here. Thanks again.
  

    
Just posting to say I bought a copy of "Cellophane Bricks: A Life in
Visual Culture," Lethem's beautifully illustrated 2024 book.

To quote pulisher Ze Books's blurb, "the surreal and form-defying panoply
of his stories, essays, and novels celebrates--and mourns--this forsaken
world of the visual and plastic arts. That leap, between the cellophane
ephemerality of language and the brick-like tangibility of visual art,
which operates as a sublimated wellspring for Lethem’s writing, is
the subject of this book."
  

    

dang, i was off-Well during quite a good Inkwell.vue month. i missed Erin
and i missed Jonathan Lethem! nice to read it later, though.

if you're still here... i too had some early gigs at HotWired back in the
day, and hung out at your house near the bakery, Buttercup Bakery? near
Safeway? in N. Oakland or Berkeley. my good friend Andrew's partner was
your housemate. so: hello again after many years.