Monkey Sri reports on the Book Festival:
Last night I attended a book festival presentation entitled Wayward Sons – it featured two authors whose latests books explore the parent/child relationship. One of them was a young Israeli with a head full of political commentary and a terrible reading voice. One was an older Irishman who, during the Q&A, mentioned to a suddenly-silent audience that he was gay. I was having a good time and laughing at inappropriate moments (as I do) when a bald man in last year’s festival t-shirt stood up to say…
Click over to read the rest of the story. Suffice it to say that it’s a lesson in ethnocentrism.
Filed under: authors, charlottesville, VABook08, virginia Tagged: | Biological Imperative, ethnocentrism, Monkey Sri, VABook08
[...] on culture and literature Posted on March 27, 2008 by Elizabeth Wistar expands on the assumptions we make about culture and literature: Under the gun, we all have to admit that our culture informs who we are and how we write. The [...]
Uh—Nathan Englander is not an Israeli. He said he LIVED in Israel for a while, which does not automatically cause his American citizenship to be revoked.
I also beg to differ with the characterization of the audience as “suddenly-silent” when Colm Toibin talked about being gay.
Which event did this person attend?
You’re right, he’s not Israeli, Wistar clears that up on her blog.
What was your take on the controversial question? or did you think it was controversial?
I’m still mulling it all over (not even having attended the session in question, though a certain friend urged me to!). So many of the Book Festival sessions are about writing from a particular culture or about a particular culture. So I don’t think that’s the problem — I think the problem stems from where we stand when we ask questions about culture/race/ethnicity/sexuality, etc.