Virtual Memoirs
This one's got my new conversation with Benjamin Dreyer, MOAR INSTAX, and a shocking question from a reporter that has me thinking of Another Big Project
The Virtual Memories Show News
A 2x/week email about a podcast about books & life
Podcastery
This week I posted Episode 604 of The Virtual Memories Show, feat. Benjamin Dreyer on the joy of good writing! We talk about his career as managing editor and copy chief of the Random House, his post-retirement perspective on that role, the authors he enjoyed working with, the success of his first book, DREYER’S ENGLISH: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style (Random House), and his plans for the followup, DREYER’S FICTION (!). We get into why he’s leaving NYC and looking forward to Santa Monica (and talk about the books that he can leave behind and those he can’t), the way that writing a Substack newsletter has made him a better writer, how the copy-editor’s role is to enhance the writer’s work, not to reshape it, whether his online persona changed after retirement, his love of digressive footnotes, how he feels about “weird” catching on this election season, whether the success of Dreyer’s English surprised him, the moment he KNEW it was a hit, and what his authors had to teach him about the process of writing his first book. We also discuss the tension within the pronoun section of DE (c.2019), how he hopes to revise it, and why the mind needs to catch up with the soul sometimes: all this & a lot more, so give it a listen! And go read DREYER’S ENGLISH!
Last week I posted Episode 603 of The Virtual Memories Show, feat. the return of Nicholas Delbanco as we celebrate his 32nd book (!) and his first true foray into memoir (or ME-moir), STILL LIFE AT EIGHTY (Mandel Vilar Press)! We talk about how this project was sparked by the rediscovery of the 40-page history of art he wrote at eleven years old (!), how he built the book as a mosaic, why he centers it around the homes, totem-objects, and writers in his life, and why he wanted his first memoir to be an act of gratitude rather than a list of gripes. We get into the books he regrets selling, his long-term interest in literary and artistic reputation and how its study helped him navigate the transition from “promising” to “distinguished” writer, what he learned when revising a series of his early novels, and plenty more. Give it a listen (and go check out our 2017 and 2022 conversations)! And go read STILL LIFE AT EIGHTY!
Recent episodes: Dash Shaw • Jess Ruliffson • Joe Coleman • Mirana Comstock • Anita Kunz • Shalom Auslander • Maurice Vellekoop
Virtual Memoirs
[I also talk about this in the intro to this week’s episode.]
A reporter called yesterday to ask me some questions about a late pod-guest he’s trying to write about. He had listened to our conversation and wanted to know about the circumstances of our get-together.
I shared some reminiscences about that pod-session & the process of setting it up. We talked about that guest’s health at the time, some of the articles that came out after their death, and a few other topics that had me digging through my 2015 emails. He asked about some of my other guests, and I told some stories that maybe got winding & literary, as is my wont. One in particular went into all sorts of subtext about another guest’s marriage, veiled in a conversation about a figure in a piece of classical literature. Vague & literary, as I said, but I think the reporter picked up on some of the threads.
And then he asked me, “Have you ever thought about writing your memoirs?”
Reader, I was flabbergasted.
I laughed nervously and told him how Milton Glaser gave me a great idea for how to structure a book about the podcast around the recurring themes, using various guests’ quotes, but the reporter said I had so many experiences in making the show that it’d be a shame not to tell that story. He went on about the importance of my archives, as well as the “monastic” dedication I put into these newsletters.
I told him that another listener/potential guest wrote me a few weeks ago to tell me he’s working on an essay about Virtual Memories, after listening to 80 or so comics-related episodes of the show. I think that’ll be more about the themes of the podcast than about me, but we’ll see. (I will share that with you guys whenever he sends it, if the writer’s okay with that.)
I fell back on my line that the podcast & the newsletter are my memoir, not just the personal stuff — intros, monologue episodes, these emails — but that the conversations are a sort of coded version of who I am and who I’ve become over the years. So who needs a book when I’ve got this Virtual Memoir, right?*
Of course, that’s more of my Lazy-Ass Bullshit™. The show & these emails reflect aspects of who I am, but that’s not the same thing as writing a narrative of (this part of) my life. And no one’s going to crack that aforementioned code; who has the time or inclination?
At the same moment of deflecting his question, I thought that my mid-50s might be the right time for a project like this. I wondered what it would really be like to reflect on (and write about) the past 12+ years of making the show, the friendships that have come and gone, the places I’ve traveled for a session, the way I learned to listen, the people who’ve reached out to me after hearing an episode, the moments in my life where the show managed to keep me going, my wife’s podcast-widowhood, the frustrations, the driving-anxiety, the lost power-cords, the pitches that went nowhere, the secrets they told me, the guests who revealed themselves to themselves, the guest who cancelled on me after I read 1,500 pages of their work to prep, the guest who was DOA, the recurring guests and how we measure ourselves against who we were last time we recorded, the life I lived in making this show week after week.
In this week’s episode with Benjamin Dreyer, I asked him about finding the tone for Dreyer’s English. Now I’m thinking about what it would be like to start writing these stories of the podcast, how I’d find my voice, and what I’d learn about myself in the process of recounting and shaping it all.
Or maybe this’ll just go on the pile of ideas that I never follow through on, a sacrifice on the altar of ~50 episodes & ~100 newsletters a year.
* Yes, I plan on making a book from all those Instax photos I've taken during shows this year, but the writing won’t exactly be memoiristic. At least, not all of it.
Instaxery
Speaking of, I shot a couple of Instax for my book project during last week’s podcast sessions. The bottom two are both from one session, but I don’t know which one to pick for the book.
Artistry
I’m sorry, but I didn’t draw or paint anything this week. I did take my sketchpad and pencils/pens with me on Sunday to Charlottesville, but never took them out of my backpack. It was a rough day, which I’ll tell you about sometime (maybe Sunday), and I’ve been crazy busy with work, so that’s my excuse. Maybe I’ll draw something this week. You should go to the Flickr album of most of the art I’ve made & find something you like.
But here’s an artsy picture of me grinding my morning coffee
Postcardery
Let me know if you want to be on my postcard-a-day list. (Financial supporters of the podcast get a hand-drawn/painted postcard as a thank-you.)
Until Next Time
Thanks for reading this far! I’ll be back on Sunday with links, books, & workouts, and on Wednesday with a new episode, and maybe some art & an Instax.
Tell me, what did the riddle say to the song? / The Devil, he’s blowing Reveille, and we ain’t got long,