COLUMNS
Talk Show 23: with Jenna Blum, Julia Glass, Nellie Hermann and Matthew Pearl
/ Jaime Clarke
04.04.09
TALK SHOW 23: Overrated
Jenna Blum’s debut novel, Those Who Save Us, was published by Harcourt in 2004; in October 2007, it jumped onto the New York Times Bestseller List and has been there ever since. Jenna is currently working on her second novel, The Stormchasers, forthcoming from Penguin, and she's teaching novel workshops at Grub Street Writers in Boston. Please visit Jenna's website at www.jennablum.com and send her some text messages.
Julia Glass is the author of the novels Three Junes (winner of the National Book Award) and The Whole World Over, as well as I See You Everywhere. Her personal essays have been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. A past recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Julia lives in Massachusetts with her two sons and their father.
Nellie Hermann grew up in Newton, Massachusetts, and has an MFA from Columbia University. Her first novel, The Cure for Grief, was published by Scribner in August. She lives in Brooklyn, NY. Visit Nellie at www.nelliehermann.com.
Matthew Pearl is the author of the novels The Dante Club, The Poe Shadow, and The Last Dickens (forthcoming, March 2009). His nonfiction writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, the London Telegraph, and Legal Affairs. He has also taught literature and creative writing at Harvard University and Emerson College. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Visit Matthew at www.matthewpearl.com.
––Name something you think is over-rated
Blum: Text messaging.
Glass: Leaving aside the obvious political suspects—like, say, diamond rings and blogging—I was tempted to write about caviar or Quentin Tarantino . . . but I’ll go with yoga.
Hermann: Facebook. If by "over-rated" you mean insanely ubiquitous. I'm not sure I've ever heard anyone say how great they think Facebook is with the exception of how great it is that they get to play Scrabulous (and I admit, this is a good feature) and I wonder, if given the chance to rate it, people would even rate it so highly? That's the thing—people seem to be using it all the time no matter how they feel about it. Which makes me nervous.
Pearl: Everyone will be angry with me, all my friends, every other writer. But I'd say Apple, the Apple Store, i-Phone, i-things.
Jenna Blum’s debut novel, Those Who Save Us, was published by Harcourt in 2004; in October 2007, it jumped onto the New York Times Bestseller List and has been there ever since. Jenna is currently working on her second novel, The Stormchasers, forthcoming from Penguin, and she's teaching novel workshops at Grub Street Writers in Boston. Please visit Jenna's website at www.jennablum.com and send her some text messages.
Julia Glass is the author of the novels Three Junes (winner of the National Book Award) and The Whole World Over, as well as I See You Everywhere. Her personal essays have been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. A past recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Julia lives in Massachusetts with her two sons and their father.
Nellie Hermann grew up in Newton, Massachusetts, and has an MFA from Columbia University. Her first novel, The Cure for Grief, was published by Scribner in August. She lives in Brooklyn, NY. Visit Nellie at www.nelliehermann.com.
Matthew Pearl is the author of the novels The Dante Club, The Poe Shadow, and The Last Dickens (forthcoming, March 2009). His nonfiction writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, the London Telegraph, and Legal Affairs. He has also taught literature and creative writing at Harvard University and Emerson College. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Visit Matthew at www.matthewpearl.com.
––Name something you think is over-rated
Blum: Text messaging.
Glass: Leaving aside the obvious political suspects—like, say, diamond rings and blogging—I was tempted to write about caviar or Quentin Tarantino . . . but I’ll go with yoga.
Hermann: Facebook. If by "over-rated" you mean insanely ubiquitous. I'm not sure I've ever heard anyone say how great they think Facebook is with the exception of how great it is that they get to play Scrabulous (and I admit, this is a good feature) and I wonder, if given the chance to rate it, people would even rate it so highly? That's the thing—people seem to be using it all the time no matter how they feel about it. Which makes me nervous.
Pearl: Everyone will be angry with me, all my friends, every other writer. But I'd say Apple, the Apple Store, i-Phone, i-things.
