Double Awe

"Well, one of the tricks is to maintain your sense of awe at what you're experiencing. And one of the ways you do that is—I think André Gide said, The only way to write about Africa is to go there for ten days or ten years—so I'm one of those ten day, big-eyed guys...The other thing is to be a little afraid of what you're doing 'cause terror keeps you slender. If you feel like,  I don't know if I can capture this, that means you're going to bring everything to the table. And so it's a double awe: one is I can't believe I'm seeing this, the other one is I don't know if I have the chops to capture this. It's not as easy as it looks, I promise you that. It's a hummingbird that starts flying like a frigate-bird, but at the end it looks pretty quick."

~ Richard Price, discussing his most recent novel, Lush Life, with Michael Silverblatt on KCRW's Bookworm (6.12.08).

Authors@Google (3.27.08)