Richard Price ALOUD (the Anti-Roth)
By Tom Teicholz at 26 March, 2008, 5:52 pm
Photo of Richard Price signing books with Louise Steinman of Aloud by his side:
Here’s the main thing: In the pictures of Price, surrounding the publication of his new novel, “Lush Life”, Price looks like a guy who’s sober and several years into his 12 steps and not so happy about it — a depressed, deflated affect — but I am here to report that the man can riff (and I have no idea about his sobriety or lack thereof).
Price is funnier, quicker, wiser (and I mean that as deriving from the expression “wiseass”) than most of us are in our heads after working up a comeback for days.
“Is there anyone here from my eighth grade home room?” is how Price began, saying that LA was a weird town for him.
Price read a couple of bits, and was in conversation with Scott Timberg from the LA Times. Timberg realized early on that his job was to tee up Price and let him go and Timberg did a good job of getting out of the way and then handing Price back the ball when necessary……
So what did Price have to say?
“Fuck ‘Call it Sleep’” he said, by way of explaining that although he wanted to write about the Lower East Side and its immigrant heritage, he decided he wasn’t going to write a historical novel. “I wasn’t there” He didn’t want to try and top Henry Roth. So he started hanging out — with restaurant owners, and with cops.
Price described how one can look at the ocean and see the light glimmering on the surface, but that hanging out with cops was like putting on a mask and snorkel and seeing what was going on under the waves.
Price said that he first wanted to be a writer at age 8 when he was visiting his grandfather who was a Russian immigrant and worked at some sort of plant (I can’t quite remember exactly what Price’s grandfather did –plating metal?) — ANYHOW — the grandfather wrote poetry that appeared in a mimeographed YMHA publication. Price said that when he saw how his father looked up to his grandfather for being published. “I wanted some of that.”Price said.
In his teenage years, he played the role of being a writer. Price said that in the hope of attracting girls, he posed with a pained pinched face, his fingers to his forehead. “Sinusitis,” he said, explaining that mostly it looked like he had sinus problems.
The book that mattered most to his development as a writer was Hubert Selby, Jr.s “Last Exit to Brooklyn” because, as Price said, quite movingly, it was the first time he read something that made him imagine that the world he knew and experienced could be the stuff of literature. Price also gave a shout out to Richard Brautigan saying that when he read his work, he thought: if this can get published…..
It wasn’t until Price started writing “the Wanderers,” in his early 20s that he really felt like a writer because it was the first time he found a subject that was his.
And that, he said, was what he told the students in his writing classes, to find subjects that were theirs.
By contrast, Price also advised that there was plenty of material out there, and it was sometimes a matter of getting away to find out who you are and what you have to say……
Which brings me to my realization: Price is the Anti-Roth.
Philip Roth in recent interviews has talked about how a writer starts by having to say things about life, and then over the years, he becomes a writing machine that never experiences life.
Price, by contrast, heads out to do research, to get inspiration, to put himself in places where love might happen (Price said writing a novel is like falling in love). And over the years Price has gotten out there to write movies and write for “The Wire” (which was in part inspired by “Clockers”).
Price called hanging out “hamburger helper for your imagination.”
And let me leave with you another quote from Price to chew over:
“The secret of good dialogue is the illusion of authority.”
Yes, siree, the Price is right (ouch!–sorry couldn’t help it). Price can riff..
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