Once a week, Black Balloon's editorial assistant Kate Gavino chooses the best Q and the best A from one of New York's literary in-store events. Here, she draws from Gary Shteyngart and Jonathan Safran Foer's discussion at the New Yorker Festival on October 5.
Do you plan to teach your children your native tongue?
Gary Shteyngart: I don't have children but I have a dachshund, and he's sort of Croatian … But if I did have a child, I don't think I would teach him or her Russian. I would put it on the menu. My wife is from a different culture as well; she's Korean. We could put some cabbage and some kimchi on the table and say, “What would you like to eat?” These things happen much later in life, too, which is interesting. I spent so much of my childhood when I was in Hebrew school trying to repress the fact that I was Russian, and I'd tell kids that I was German. Better to be German than being Russian during the evil Ronald Reagan empire. But then I went to this Marxist college in Ohio, Oberlin, and all of a sudden, being Russian was the best thing you can do … That's how it happens. A child rediscovers his or her roots, but it can never be forced. You should never tell a child, “You must learn the Cyrillic alphabet.”
Jonathan Safran Foer: I actually disagree. I think you won't learn [another language] unless you're forced to learn it. It's nice, the idea, to take a trip every now and then and learn three words. But I have two kids, and in my experience, if he chooses that he wants to play piano but never plays piano, then he won't be a young person who has any kind of musical proficiency ... I went to Hebrew school as well, but this one was really informal and there was no chance of learning language. But now we have Hebrew speaking baby sitters, and [the kids] take lessons as well. Do they always like it? Not really, but the goal of a parent isn't to give a life that the kid likes all of the time. You hope that can be the case, but it's not the only incentive. Otherwise they wouldn't go to school. They would eat mac and cheese all day long.
Gary Shteyngart: A child should be taught, but in my case, it's accounting or Excel. Something useful.
Image: Kate Gavino
Last week, all eyes were on Stockholm as the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to ... the European Union?
Greece's Ekathimerini, reporting in the midst of austerity measures and full-monty rebellions, remarks that "Crisis-hit Europeans see cruel joke in EU Nobel."
But Germany's Die Zeit, representing the country that has steered Europe through these measures, insists that "Ja, das macht Sinn" ("Yes, it Makes Sense").
Right or wrong, the prize raises another dilemma, probed by the UK's Guardian: "Who will collect the Nobel peace prize for the EU?"
Image: europapress.es
Colonel Hellstache — Maverick Jetpants in the City of Quality is here! To celebrate, we'll be running sneak-peeks at the book and its author, Bill Peters, over the next couple of weeks. Here's part 1 of the Black Balloon interview, in which Peters sets the record straight on regional piss-beer and generally proves to be the funniest guy we've met in ages.
Your protagonist, Nate, is a wayward teenager whose slang-loaded vocabulary is almost like another language. How did you keep track of all those terms and expressions (check out all 146 of them in the Maverick Jetpants glossary)?
Keeping track of the terminology was somehow never a problem. I never kept a list with definitions. Although I did make a list of maybe 50 different terms for sex.
In the book, Nate talks about words that he finds inherently funny, like "pants" and "cheese." Is there a flipside? Are there words that you and/or your characters find repugnant?
Most corporate concept-reduction and noun-verbing is a bit like accidentally brushing your teeth with Bengay. The most recent word that has aggravated me is "onpass." As in, "to pass on." As in: “Would you onpass this item to Terrence?” The word is amazing in its total pointless efficiency. As if anyone has so little time that you could begin to tell them “I’m passing this on” and they would cut you off, throw their hands up and say “WHOA! GET TO THE POINT ‘WAR AND PEACE!’” I hope "onpass" represents some endpoint to brevity-worship, but it probably doesn’t.
You grew up in Rochester, which is also the setting of your book. But now you live in Gainesville, FL, where I imagine Genesee is hard to come by. What do you drink down there?
I have no problem whatsoever with cheap beer — I often prefer it. But sadly, and with utmost Whole-Foodsy whiteness, when I moved to Gainesville, I worried: would I get my Saison Dupont? My Reissdorf Kolsch? The answer: Yes, Bill, you will get your Saison Dupont and your Reissdorf Kolsch. Gainesville has lots to drink. There’s been no change. And looking at the country with red state / blue state anxiety? That’s no way to live.
Have you picked up any Gainesville slang?
In terms of local-speak — and I’ve only heard this within my friends — the blocks of bars and restaurants along University that are east of 13th Street have been referred to, half-seriously, as "Downtown." Downtown has more shows, more elven indie-rock beards, more tattoos, more sustainable-type things — Dwight Garner in a New York Times book review last year called these folks “Bleu collar.” Just getting that out there.
The other Gainesville slang I know relates to school spirit. Gainesville’s population is roughly 125,000, and Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, where the Florida Gators play, seats almost 90,000. "Tebowing" is the most obvious slang, although the phrase wasn’t coined, I don’t think, until after Tim Tebow left UF. Another term might be "jorts." That is, jean shorts. The term, according to at least one Gator sports website, is rooted in the Florida / Georgia rivalry, and supposedly became popular after a Georgia fan, desperate for a good insult, yelled to a Gator fan: “Gator fans wear jeans shorts!”
Did your predictions for the 2012 Nobel prize winner come true? Chances are, probably not.
Or better yet, do your picks live up to Italo Calvino's standards for what constitutes a classic.
Next year, why not let your mom or dad help with your predictions. After all, family influences are always helpful.
Even if you come from a family of nerds, you know something good will come out of it in the end.
And if all else fails, just remember that the streets are paved (literally) with gold.
So why not write a song about it? It could end up being the next "Hey Jude."
Though just coming up with a new word is satisfying for most people, no matter the lexicon.
Haruki Murakami, there's always next year.
This year's Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded to Mo Yan, a Chinese writer whose pen name — in English, "Don't Speak" — is a nod to the censorship under which he writes his books.
Read MoreDisusage presents the contradictions and foibles of usage manuals, style guides, and the quirky folks who love them. This week: bullshit (or, if you will, "malarkey") slang.
Read MoreFive of us are on our way back from a cabin upstate, in a Dodge van with cushy captains' chairs and a back bench that electronically folds into a squeaky leatherette bed. We're all musicians, and even before I insert Grizzly Bear 's new album, Shields, into the CD player, opinions start clashing.
Read More
A Black Balloon Publication ©