The Write Stuff

ANDERSEN: Elizabeth, you told me recently that you made Olive Kitteridge a series of stories rather than a novel about her because you thought the readers would get sick of the voice of that one character.

STROUT: That's because I believe the story of Olive Kitteridge is one that should be told, but I also believe you have to serve this in a way that, you know, people are going to be able to digest. It's a constant juggling of how can I tell something that I feel so intensely but that can be received with, not joy every minute or anything like that, but in a way that's truthful to you.

Do you find that the public ascribes to you wisdom about the world beyond what's normal?
CARO: I'm constantly being asked at dinner parties to explain something that's happened that day, and often I don't know what's happened that day. [Laughter]

GORDON-REED: I was down in Australia a month and a half ago. I went down to do a symposium about Jefferson; the University of Sydney was sponsoring this with Monticello. And it was all fine and good about the symposium, but they wanted me to do a public talk. And what they wanted me to talk about was Barack and Michelle Obama. [Laughter] And I'm like, I know who they are, they came to law school a few years after I graduated, but I've not met them. But because I'm black and American and they're Down Under …cI thought, OK, so I'll give this lecture. I'm down in Australia and nobody will ever see this. But I forgot about podcasts, which they put up. It's everywhere, you know? So yes, I get questions about tangential stuff all the time. Anything about race, obviously.

'What would Jefferson do about Iran?'
GORDON-REED: Yeah, exactly. The Barbary pirates. You know, what would Jefferson do about all kinds of things. I get asked that all the time. As if I would know.

As if he would know.
GORDON-REED: Exactly.

BLOCK: I think signings and appearances and all of that are sometimes a bad idea in that if I really like somebody's work a whole lot, I'm probably going to regret meeting them, which is very often the case.

STROUT: I've thought of that so many times.

GORDON-REED: But do you think people regret meeting you?

BLOCK: I think they must regret meeting me.

STROUT: I know they do. The very first time when Amy and Isabelle was published I went for an interview with somebody and she said to me, you're not at all what I expected. And I was furious.

BLOCK: A fault of yours, clearly.