>> From the Library of
Congress in Washington, D.C.
>> Leigh Haber: I'm Leigh Haber.
I'm Books Editor of
O, The Oprah Magazine.
And I have the great honor
of being the moderator
of this incredible pair of authors
who are very, very similar writers.
That's what we were
just talking about.
Jacqueline Woodson whose
new book, Another Brooklyn,
came out recently to rave reviews.
And Jay McInerney whose new
book Bright, Precious Days,
is also getting stellar coverage.
I read an interesting piece in the
New Yorker that you all might want
to look at, a really good
piece on Jay and his history.
So what I want to start
talking about is
like why did the National
Books Festival pair you guys?
It's like not exactly a no brainer.
But there is the New York thing.
>> Jay McInerney: We do
both write about New York.
>> Leigh: That's right.
So I'm guessing that was the thread.
So, Jackie, I'm going
to start with you.
You write about a New
York that's very different
from the one Jay writes about
in his trilogy and in this book.
Another Brooklyn, what does the
title Another Brooklyn suggest
to you?
>> Jacqueline Woodson: Well,
one thing it's definitely
from Jay's Manhattan.
>> Leigh: Or the Brooklyn of today.
>> Jacqueline: Of the
Brooklyn -- yeah, definitely --
>> Jay: Or Park Slope.
>> Jacqueline: Or Park Slope.
Well, Park Slope is its
own Another Brooklyn.
So I'm writing about a Brooklyn that
no longer exists, a neighborhood
that no longer exists as
it existed back in the day.
And that's one of the
threads of the title.
The other is, of course, the
girls wanting to find a way out of
that Brooklyn and the
many people trying
to find a way out of that Brooklyn.
It's also about all the different
lives that are being lived.
And so it has a lot of layers.
But really I wanted to put
Bushwick on the page in a way
that I think can easily
be forgotten.
I think a lot of times when
neighborhoods get, quote unquote,
discovered people forget
the history.
And that it had been a neighborhood
where people were thriving.
My daughter just started high school
at a high school called
Beacon in Manhattan.
And she came home and she was so mad
because she said her
social studies teacher said,
I lived in Bed-Stuy before
it was safe for anybody.
I'm like did you respond?
But just that idea that a
place where people of color are
where underserved people lived would
be considered a place that's not
inhabited because the people
living in it are not seen.
>> Leigh: And you are romantic
about Brooklyn in a way,
the Brooklyn of that day.
>> Jacqueline: Uh-huh.
>> Leigh: And that's something
I think you share with Jay.
Jay is very romantic
about Manhattan,
the Manhattan of the 80s,
the Manhattan of today.
So would you agree
with that assessment?
>> Jay: Well, yeah, I
still love Manhattan.
But I think I have a -- in the
book the characters have a certain
nostalgia for the New York of their
20s which is the 80s basically.
And my wife gives me a very
hard time for being nostalgic
about a period when, you know,
when one's apartment was
constantly broken into
and there was a heroin epidemic,
when there was crack vials popping
under foot like acorns in the forest
and graffiti covered every surface.
But, you know, it was a very
creative time in New York.
And also Manhattan hadn't
been thoroughly gentrified
at that point which I think --
>> Leigh: Yeah, it's hard to
remember that, but you're right.
>> Jay: Yeah, which was
in some ways a good thing.
>> Leigh: Well, I asked
Jackie about her title.
And I'm interested in your love
for the word bright, Bright Lights,
Big City, the previous novel
that starts the trilogy
and now this one [inaudible].
>> Leigh: I know it's become
a tick on my part I think.
It's funny I came up with this
title, and for me it was kind
of a mash up of me and Yeats.
For some reason I actually
thought that Yeats had this phrase
in his poetry, and it
turns out he doesn't.
But by the time I realized that
I was kind of fond of the title.
And the title in this case,
in the case of this book,
really refers to basically,
you know,
the days that you don't
notice going by
and in retrospect are really
the most important ones,
the ones that make up
the bulk of our lives.
I don't know, I just think
in terms of bright --
I think my characters are attracted
to New York like moths to flame.
I think that's part of it.
I like the word in so far
as it denotes intelligence
and illumination.
I don't know.
I'm going to try and stay away
from it for the next few titles.
>> Leigh: Well, the other thing,
so as I was talking about - -
after I was invited to moderate
this panel I started thinking
about how dissimilar
these two writers are
in so many ways and their books.
So, Jackie, your book
is really about youth.
It's about people, girls who
it's before they have become
who they're going to become.
Wouldn't you say that?
>> Jacqueline: Uh-huh.
>> Leigh: And you do write a lot
for adolescents, about adolescence.
So can you tell us a little
bit about why you're drawn
to that period in a person's life?
>> Jacqueline: Yeah, I think
people tend to say you write
in the period you're stuck in.
So you write in the
age you're stuck in.
And I think for me it's
somewhere between 10 and 16.
And joining on that that's
another thing that Jay
and I echo is the memory, the
looking back with this kind
of melancholy and nostalgia
at the period.
And so in the case of Another
Brooklyn August is looking back
on that girlhood with that same
kind -- she says, you know,
I know now what's tragic isn't
the moment, it's the memory.
So looking back on it and
realizing that while you're
in it you're not aware exactly of
how quickly that time has passed,
right, and that one
day it will be past.
So I think one thing,
that's the thing for grown
up and adolescence, right?
We look back and it's like, wait,
I'm no longer that young person.
I'm no longer that girl
and so who am I now?
>> Leigh: And it's funny
that you cited that line
because right here I have what
is tragic isn't the moment it's
the memory.
And then I found something
you said somewhere,
a writer writes to hold on.
And I think you're right,
both of your books are --
you're still inhabiting youth
in some ways or, you know,
aching for it or aching
for a time or, you know,
looking back with a
kind of world weariness.
Jay, I think Adelle Waldman
in the New Yorker piece
that I cited before was
talking about malaise,
the middle age malaise with
which your characters are --
>> Jay: You know in an
otherwise very good essay
in a favorable [inaudible]
I think she emphasized
that malaise a little bit too much.
Russell Calloway, one of the
main characters in the book,
does go through a depression
basically.
I think it's largely
situational based on the fact
that he's made a really
stupid decision.
>> Leigh: A business decision.
>> Jay: In his publishing
business which possibly is going
to bring his publishing house down.
I mean I was a little - - I don't
know, I mean I don't think really
that this is a book about middle
age malaise in the sense that most
of these characters
are pretty animated.
Like most New Yorkers --
>> Leigh: Right, well middle
age malaise is a cliche.
>> Jay: It is a cliche.
But most of these characters
are pretty obsessed
with like what's next --
>> Leigh: Right.
>> Jay: -- in their life as
parents, as the professionals.
So I --
>> Leigh: And also trying to
hold onto a marriage that is --
>> Jay: Yeah, and in their marriage.
>> Leigh: -- stable and
steady in some ways though
with people sometimes going
in different directions.
But people still trying
to be engaged
with each other in the world, right?
>> Jay: Marriage is tough.
That's one of the main subjects.
>> Leigh: And you begin the book
with the Richard Held [phonetic]
quote about marriage that's so good.
Let's see if I can find it
somewhere, about mystery.
Oh, here, every marriage
is its own culture and even
within it mystery is
the environment.
And I think you capture
that so beautifully
about Corrine and Russell's
marriage.
>> Jay: Interesting quote from the
sort of founder of New York punk.
But that sort of captures two
of the poles in this book.
I mean it does look back to the
days of these characters' youth
when there punk music
was being invented
at CBGBs on the lower east side.
But it's also about people who
are now turning 50 and dealing
with middle aged problems and
crises and marital dilemmas.
>> Leigh: Well, since
you mentioned music,
there's a lot of music
in your book, Jackie.
And in some ways it's kind
of an ode to jazz, right?
>> Jacqueline: Uh-huh.
>> Leigh: Even the way
the book is structured.
>> Jacqueline: Yeah.
>> Leigh: Its riffs.
>> Jacqueline: Uh-huh.
Yeah, it's an ode to jazz and
kind of a thumb to 70s music.
While at the same time it's
celebrating it because I bring a lot
of that music back
into the narrative.
>> Jay: A lot of great 70s music.
>> Jacqueline: Rock the Boat.
>> Leigh: I know, Rock the Boat,
that kept going through
my head today.
Do you want to give us a rendition?
>> Jacqueline: You so don't
want me to give you a rendition.
But Nina Simone's Tom Thumb's
Blues which is a beautiful song,
but the girls couldn't
understand what it was saying.
And I think that is, I think
about adolescence we think
the music is speaking to us,
and we think we understand
what it's saying.
And then we realize later
on that maybe not so much.
I just loved being able to put on
my headphones and revisit that music
and just remember it and remember
how important it was to me
as an adolescent, and then look
at it from an adult perspective
and realize not a whole lot was
being said in a lot of those songs.
>> Leigh: Well, you know,
there's that one moment
where August see's Jerome
[assumed spelling], her love,
her teenage love with
one of her best friends.
>> Jacqueline: With Sylvia, uh-huh.
>> Leigh: And I'm not quoting,
you may remember the exact line,
but the world just falls apart
as only 15 year old worlds can
fall apart that way, right?
>> Jacqueline: Yeah.
I don't remember the line.
But, yeah, it shatters it for her.
I mean for her it's the moment
of coming into adulthood.
And when I was writing
it one thing I was trying
to investigate is how women grow
up to not have women friends.
And I think that for me
as a mom, as a partner,
my village is what grounds
me, the women in my life.
And the men are the people who help
me raise my children, who ground me,
who help me get my
books into the world.
And all these ways in
which I need those women.
And I meet women who say, you know,
I can't have women
friends, I don't trust them.
>> Leigh: Well, in August's
case, your main character --
>> Jay: The mother in
the book doesn't --
>> Leigh: That's what
I was going to say.
>> Jacqueline: Say it again.
>> Jay: The mother in your book
doesn't believe in female friends.
>> Jacqueline: That
was me trying to --
>> Leigh: She says
don't trust women,
even the ugly ones will take
what you thought was yours.
[Laughter]
>> Jacqueline: Was yours, yeah.
But it is that thing of how do you
get from this very intimate place
of girlhood friendships to
having no female friends?
And I wanted to investigate it
because I didn't understand it.
And I always say I write because
I have all these questions,
not answers.
And what breaks us, what causes
us to move away from each other
in this way that could be very
detrimental to our own humanity?
So, I don't know, it's
a big question for me.
Every time I meet a
women who is like, no,
I don't have female
friends I'm just like, wow,
that's heartbreaking to me.
>> Leigh: And I think
it is the way August
and her circle start together.
August sees these three girls,
and she just for some inexplicable
reason she's just drawn to them.
>> Jacqueline: Mm-hmm.
>> Leigh: And, you know, Jay,
similarly I mean I
think I was thinking
about similarities
between your books.
It's obvious to me anyway that male
friendships have been so important
to you in your writings
life, in your career.
I don't know whether Russell
is drawn directly from someone
like Morgan Entrekin, but you have
a very close circle it seems to me
of male friend who perhaps enable
you to really do a good job
of capturing that sense of bonding.
>> Jay: Well, I should mention that
Russell Calloway, the protagonist
of this novel, is an editor,
and actually when we meet him
in this book he's also
the publisher of a small,
independent literary
publishing house.
And I actually have a couple
of close friends in my life
who are editors and
publishers and I have had
for I guess more than 30 years now.
And inevitably I do draw
on these people in my life
when I'm shaping my characters.
Although I have to say that
this is actually a third book
in what is now obviously a trilogy.
And at this point I can't
really remember what I took
from whom including myself.
Russell Calloway to
me seems like sort
of a real character
out there in the world.
And I'm sure I owe parts of
him to my various friends.
>> Leigh: And there's I think
one of the things about the two
of you together, New York I
think we feel as if it is a kind
of community, a literary
community in some ways.
So there is that insularity
or that community of writers.
But then we're writing about two
very different kinds of communities.
I just want to switch a
little bit to influences.
And, Jackie, I'll start
with you because I know
that for you James
Baldwin was an influence.
Virginia Hamilton was
very much of an influence,
another wonderful young
adult writer.
And Nikki Giovanni.
So can you tell us a little bit
about the influence of those writers
on your work and how
that feeds what you do?
>> Jacqueline: I think
one of the biggest parts
of the influence was that,
of course, they were writing
about people I really cared about
and could see reflections
of myself inside of.
And they were also -- I think
the thing that I was figuring
out was the context of
myself in the bigger world.
And I knew that the writer
couldn't just be navel gazing.
That I had to look at myself
as being here now or look
at my characters as being here now
and the impact they were having
the world and the world was having
on them when you look at something
like James Baldwin's
Another Country.
It's a huge book that really gets us
into the head of talking about race,
of talking about economic class,
of talking about sexuality
and all these things that would
eventually be very important to me.
Nikki Giovanni the same
thing listening to her
because I heard her before I read
her during the whole Black Power
Movement was really important to me.
Not only in figuring out who I was
becoming but in giving me license
to write about what I cared
about writing on the page.
And the same with eventually even
Raymond Carver in terms of looking
at a writer that was minimalist.
>> Leigh: Something
you guys really share.
>> Jacqueline: But
also he was writing
about underserved white folks
which was my first meeting people
who were struggling that way.
So I think those writers
definitely gave me license to kind
of tell the stories I
would eventually tell.
>> Leigh: Jay, your character
Russell loved Raymond Carver.
Did you share that love?
>> Jay: Well, Raymond Carver was my
teacher and in some ways my mentor.
>> Jacqueline: Where
was he your teacher?
>> Jay: I studied great writing
in Syracuse in the early 80s,
and I was very lucky
to have not only Carver
but Tobias Wolff as
my teachers, too.
Very different teachers.
>> Leigh: Anybody who hasn't read
Raymond Carver's short stories he's
one of the best.
>> Jay: When I was thinking
about going to graduate school
in the early 80s Carver was probably
the most imitated, the most admired
and imitated short story
writer in the country.
And we were all trying to
write stories like Carver.
And we were trying
to imitate his titles
like what do you think of this?
And for someone like me who did
not grow up in a trailer park
in the western states it was
kind of ridiculous the fact
that I was trying to write
about characters like this.
>> Leigh: You group
up in Hartford, right?
>> Jay: No, no, I grew
up all over the country.
But it was always suburb or another.
So it was pretty inauthentic
trying to imitate Carver.
And yet I think that that's
one of the ways that writers --
you were talking about influence,
I think that's one of the ways
that writers find their own
voices is to borrow Carver's,
one of this titles, Putting
Yourself in Someone Else's Shoes.
And in my case imitating
Carver, imitating Hemingway,
imitating DeLillo,
imitating Ann [inaudible].
And eventually outgrowing
those imitations.
But it's like trying on your
parents clothes and shoes.
Carver was extremely influential
in many ways to me, although I gave
up trying to imitate his
subject matter and his titles.
And he taught me an
awful lot about economy
and concision and storytelling.
One of my favorite incidents
with him was he used to go
over my short stories in
the office after class.
And at one point he said to me,
he said why do you use
the word dirt here?
Or why do you use the word earth
here, what you really mean is dirt.
You're trying to a kind of
grandiosity that you don't need.
>> Leigh: That's so interesting.
>> Jay: That that was always --
he sort of made me
really think very hard
about my word choices
and what they meant.
And I think for a long time I felt
him sort of standing on my shoulder
when I sat down to write.
>> Leigh: And yet you
became a novelist.
>> Jay: You know, I did.
And in fact, I always -- I don't
know, my first love was poetry.
And then I read Portrait of the
Artist as a young man and I thought,
wow, prose can be very
lyrical and musical as well.
And about the same time I read
Hemingway's the Sun Also Rises.
So I wanted to be a novelist.
And yet it's hard to just
sit down and write a novel.
I think for me as for
many apprentice writers --
>> Leigh: What do you
mean, it's easy, right?
>> Jay: For most fiction
writers I think we start
out with short stories.
And some people stay with them
and some people choose novels.
There's a very few
people who do both well.
Not too many.
John Updike I think did.
But Carver wanted to write
a novel and never succeeded.
And yet who would have --
I don't think it in any way
lessens his achievement.
>> Leigh: So, Jackie, you're known
primarily as a young adult novelist.
That's where you made most
of your mark up until now.
So does one sit down and say I'm
going to write a young adult novel?
And then how is Another Brooklyn
different from a young adult novel?
>> Jacqueline: Yeah,
I definitely I think
after Brown Girl Dreaming got the
National Book Award I was kind
of like I want to try
something else now.
I don't want to paint a
story night again, right?
I want to really sit down
and just kind of refocus
for a little while just to do it.
And I knew I wanted
to play with time more
which is something you can do
when you're writing for adults.
When you're writing for young people
you stay within a certain space
and time, so maybe a year, maybe
a weekend, maybe a school year.
And there's not that
adult perspective.
So when I'm writing a novel
where the adult is the main
character I can look back in time,
have them look back on their
adolescence, then come back
into their adult perspective.
And I wanted to do that.
I wanted the writing
to be more implicit.
And my young adult writing
can be very implicit.
But I just wanted to go a little
bit deeper into that adult's gaze.
In terms of the depth of the
narrative I think there are
so many young adult novels
that really go to a lot
of really important
and implicit places.
But I wanted to do
it just differently.
And I wanted to, you know,
throw some sex in there.
I don't really put a whole lot
of sex in young adult novels.
Not like they're not having it,
not like it's not happening.
But it happens off the
page more in my book.
That's my own religious upbringing.
But I definitely wanted
to challenge myself.
And it's a case for when I wrote
Brown Girl Dreaming I wanted to see
if I could write a memoir in verse.
When I wrote If You Come Softly I
wanted to rewrite Romeo and Juliet
but tell it from an
interracial perspective.
So I always try to do something
differently when I write.
And this was where I felt like after
Brown Girl Dreaming was the right
place to go.
>> Leigh: Well, since we're talking
a little bit about process, Jay,
I was wondering -- this is the
third in the trilogy for you.
What was your -- and when you
began the trilogy did you say
to yourself I'm going
to write a trilogy?
>> Jay: No.
I definitely had no notion
that I was writing a trilogy.
This series started with a
book called Brightness Falls --
>> Leigh: Wonderful
book if you have not --
>> Jay: Published in 92.
And that book started out I had
written two very tightly focused
sort of Manhattan novels that
were very narrow in terms
of time frame and point of view.
And I was --
>> Leigh: And also page count.
>> Jay: Yeah, and page count.
I was reading Zachary and Balzac,
and I wanted to write a bigger,
more panoramic kind
of New York novel.
And I was standing on
Fifth Avenue one day.
And there was right
across the street
from me a homeless man
with a bag of cans.
And Ronald Perelman, the corporate
raider billionaire, and I only knew
who he was because he'd been on the
cover of some magazine recently.
And I suddenly thought, hey, I
want to write a novel that has both
of those characters in it.
But the whole sort of scope
of New York, in other words.
Eventually I realized I needed
somebody, something in the middle,
and I came up with this couple,
Russell and Corrine Calloway
who was sort of one of those couples
everybody kind of looks up to.
They go married early,
they give cocktail parties.
>> Leigh: They meet in college.
>> Jay: Yeah, they're kind of cool.
And the first novel was
set in the late 80s.
And I certainly didn't think of
it as being part of a series.
If I had I wouldn't have killed
off one of the main characters.
>> Leigh: Right, part
of the love triangle.
>> Jay: There's a sort of
Jay McInerney character,
a successful writer names Jeff
Pierce who is Russell's best friend.
>> Leigh: And Russell is his editor.
>> Jay: And Russell is his editor.
And he actually comes to AIDS.
And I think that if I had realized
I was writing a series I might not
have done that.
It was kind of me trying to
kill off the bad part of myself,
this sort of bad boy
80s writer character.
So when September 11th
befell New York,
when the World Trade
Towers collapsed,
like many fiction writers I think
I at first couldn't imagine how
to address this catastrophe.
And eventually I decided to kind of
bring it down to a domestic scale
and see how Russell
and Corrine Calloway
and their friends would
react to this event.
And suddenly I went back to them.
>> Leigh: Now that we're seeing a
trilogy does that mean you're done
with those characters, or
will we have a quartet?
>> Jay: Well, it's funny, both daily
and Sunday New York Times
reviewers sort of asked me
to write another one in the series.
Although the guy in the Sunday Times
said that he had mixed feelings
about it because they always had a
huge catastrophe as their backdrop.
And he wasn't sure whether
he wanted to invite another.
In this case it was the
financial crisis of 2008
that was the backdrop
of the current book.
>> Leigh: So, Jackie, Jay is
talking about how big events kind
of infuse the characters or help
shape plots or characters' lives.
Is that a factor when
you're creating a character?
>> Jacqueline: Not always.
As writers, of course, it's
an emotional factor, right?
So something big happens,
and the emotion
of it goes into the narrative.
Like when I wrote Behind
You it was to place --
9/11 is not mentioned in it at all,
but it's all about loss and grieving
and when people die suddenly and
what do you do with that emotion.
So I think that it's hard for us to
kind of separate our emotional lives
from the lives of our characters but
not necessarily physically putting
that stuff into the narrative.
>> Leigh: And August,
your background
and August you share some
similarities, Brooklyn.
>> Jacqueline: Yeah,
Brooklyn, Bushwick, definitely.
>> Leigh: South Carolina.
>> Jacqueline: She's from Tennessee.
But there are some
references in South Carolina.
>> Jacqueline: She comes from
[inaudible] gentry basically.
She comes from a family
that had a lot of land
and then couldn't hold onto it.
I didn't come from that.
And definitely my uncle had
converted to the Nation of Islam,
but we were raised
Jehovah's Witnesses.
But when he came home from prison
and he was part of the Nation
of Islam then my family I guess
thinking there wasn't enough
religion in the house we
became part of the Nation
of Islam as well as Witnesses.
>> Leigh: Wow.
That is a lot of religion.
>> Jacqueline: Hence the no
sex in the young adult books.
But the great thing about having
grown up with being both Muslin
and Christian is I'm a firm believer
of Walt Whitman's argument
not concerning God.
There's no argument there.
But having known a
lot about the Nation
of Islam I decided I wanted
to explore it further.
So I did end up having to do a
lot of research on the religion
because there was a lot of
stuff I didn't know about it.
I'm not a big fan of research.
But I also had to go back
and research Bushwick.
Because I knew about the white
flight, I knew about the blackout.
I knew about free lunch
programs and some of that stuff.
But there was a lot of
stuff I didn't remember.
And the music.
>> Jay: You know it's funny
because in your book all the
white people are fleeing Bushwick,
and now they're all
going back to Bushwick.
>> Jacqueline: I know, which is
part of the reason I wrote it
because I think those
white people coming
to Bushwick don't realize it
was a neighborhood inhabited
by people who were thriving there.
And that's why I dedicated
it for Bushwick 1970 to 1990
because I think there is a way in
which people like to forget history
and forget that this
was once a neighborhood
that their ancestors were from,
and here they're coming
back and discovering it.
>> Leigh: Well, we don't have
that much more time
before we go to questions.
But there's another similarity
that I think you both share,
and that is that you both -- Jay,
in your case you shot to fame
when you were, what, 29 with
Bright Lights, Big City.
And in your case, Jackie --
and received tons of critical
praises and prizes and so on.
And in Jackie's case winning
some really wonderful awards,
the Caldecott, the National
Book Award, Coretta Scott King.
So you've had, you know, sort of
benchmarks in your career that a lot
of writers never get to, right?
>> Jacqueline: Mm-hmm.
>> Leigh: So let's start with you.
What did it mean to you to begin
to receive that kind of accolade?
>> Jacqueline: I always
thing of the awards, I mean,
as something that is
for that book, right?
Even the Lifetime Achievement Award
they're for that body of work,
but it's not necessarily for
anything I'm going forth to do.
And I think that's the
thing that keeps me writing.
I think I am very grateful that
I didn't get my first Newbery
until about my seventh book I think.
And that kind of -- it definitely
helped me keep a perspective
on why I was doing
the work I was doing.
I was grateful for the awards.
I like the metals, I like
putting the stickers on my book.
But I think it did give
me this kind of faith
to be able to keep doing the work.
But you know writers are introverts.
So one thing that comes
with the awards is this.
>> Leigh: Out facing a sea of faces.
And, Jay, you've --
>> Jay: Well, Jacqueline has won far
more awards than I have and prizes.
Most of mine came from
France and Italy actually.
I did have a very large success
of my first novel, though,
and no one could have
more surprised than I was.
I was kind of hoping to
get a few good reviews
so I could get a teaching job
or a newspaper job out of it.
And that seemed like the only
reasonable expectation at the time.
I had worked at Random House
reading manuscripts as kind
of an underpaid assistant.
And I had seen lots
of books published
with no fanfare, no
acclaim whatsoever.
And the vice president
of Random House took me
out for lunch shortly before
publication and he said, look,
the novel is dying, nobody in
your generation reads anymore.
You wrote a nice book
but don't expect much.
>> Leigh: And that
was way before Kindle.
>> Jacqueline: Wow.
>> Jay: And it turned
out that for a variety
of reasons the book became
extremely successful.
And I think the main thing it
did was it gave me a career
because I was able to then
go on and write full time.
I didn't end up taking a
teaching job or a newspaper job,
and I'm really grateful for that.
And I'm still writing.
>> Leigh: And you're still writing.
You're both such wonderful writers.
>> Jacqueline: Thanks, Leigh.
>> Leigh: We have to
wind it down a little bit
so we can begin to take questions.
We have ten minutes for questions
or should we keep talking up here?
Okay. All right, so who would like
to start with the first question?
>> So I have a question
for Jacqueline Woodson.
I read your children's books
to my students all the time.
I loved The Other Side.
Each Kindness, they're
just such powerful books.
And I was wondering how is writing
a children's book which is something
that I'm trying to do different
than writing a young adult book,
and what pointers do you
have for someone like me?
>> Jacqueline: Well,
thanks for sharing them.
Writing a picture book is the
absolute hardest thing you
can write.
When you think of the attention
span you're working with,
how you have to get
in there immediately
and take it line by line.
And if you lose them by the
third line they're gone.
So I think it's important to read
a lot of poetry if you're thinking
about writing books
for the very young.
I didn't come to picture books until
I had written about eight or nine --
no, it was actually my twelfth
young adult middle grade book
and then I wrote a picture book.
But I think that that's really hard.
And the only way you can do it
is really reading a lot of poetry
and reading a lot of picture books.
I've probably -- young adult writing
is a little bit easier for me
than writing picture books.
>> Leigh: Can I just ask --
>> Jacqueline: Sure.
>> Leigh: I've always been
curious about the process
between the illustrator
and the writer.
What is that like?
>> Jacqueline: So I get
to choose my illustrators.
But once I choose them I'm not
allowed to talk to them at all.
>> Leigh: Wow.
>> Jacqueline: Except for Show
Way because that was a story
of my family, and I used
family photographs and stuff.
And so basically it's the
illustrated interpretation
of the narrative, and
then the two come together
to form this other thing.
And so with The Other Side I got
to see sketches and some paintings.
But you really are not
supposed to have a dialogue.
And with the picture book
the pictures should stand
on their own without the words.
And the words should stand on
their own without the pictures.
So when you submit a
book to a publisher
that story has to stand on its own.
And the publisher has to be able to
imagine what the illustrations --
what the book would
look like illustrated.
>> Thank you.
>> Leigh: Thanks for the question.
>> This is for Jay.
In addition to your fiction I've
always enjoyed your wine writing.
Do you plan on doing any
more of that in the future?
>> Jay: Yeah, I have a
kind of second career
as a wine writer and wine critic.
It started almost 20 years ago when
a friend of mine took over House
and Garden Magazine and
wanted a wine column.
And she thought as a reader
and consumer she found most wine
writing to be pretty boring.
And she asked me if I
would be interested.
And I protested that I
didn't really know enough.
But she felt that, you know,
just to be a passionate amateur
who had some writing chops
might be a good place to start.
And it's become strange -- I
agreed to do it for six months,
and I'm still doing it 20 years
later, although I moved from House
and Garden to the Wall
Street Journal.
I'm still writing about wine
for Town & Country Magazine.
I've published three collections
of essays about wine for those
of you who are interested.
And I certainly try to write
from a perspective that is not
that of a specialist or an expert.
It's a great -- it's a great kind
of relaxation from writing fiction.
I find it a little
easier, a lot more fun,
and it gets me out of the house.
And, yeah, I'm going
to keep doing it.
>> Leigh: Thank you
for your question.
>> So I'm a Chicago girl, but
I love Greenpoint in Brooklyn,
I love Waynesburg in Queens.
As New York today [inaudible]
are the same as 20 years ago.
So when you're writing
about during the past
in your books how do you guard
against I'm trying to write history
but how do you guard against
writing about nostalgia?
They're two different things.
>> Jay: Well, I think
I write about both.
>> Jacqueline: Yeah, it's both.
I feel like it's both.
We're writing about
history nostalgically.
So it is a balance.
They're both in there.
>> Jay: I think my characters --
I mean this book is already somewhat
historical because it's about more
or less the financial
crisis of 2008.
And my characters in turn are
looking back often further
to the days of their youth.
And I think there's very
few of us who aren't prone
to nostalgia particularly
when we get a little older.
>> Leigh: Thank you.
Yes?
>> Hi, my question
is for Ms. Woodson.
I am a fourth grade teacher, I
teach reading and Virginia history.
And one of the biggest questions
that kinds of looms over my students
in their touch screen world
is why are books important,
why is reading important?
And I'm just wondering
what you would say to them.
>> Jacqueline: You know,
it's a good question.
I think as a teacher, of course,
we know you set the
tone in the room, right?
That's the power of teaching
is you get to decide everything
from letting the kids choose
their own preferred gender pronoun
to having big conversations
about race and economic classes.
All you. And I think in terms
of reading, I mean I think Jay
and I could both answer
this, reading is everywhere.
Reading is so necessary in
every single part of your life
from reading the directions for
the Pokemon app to reading the back
of a cereal box to reading a
really good book or a comic strip.
Words are everywhere, and
they're going to be with us
for the rest of our lives.
Even if the ways we read
change there's always going
to be the need for
that context, right?
So they're going to
need it in their lives.
>> Leigh: How do you respond to
your students when they ask you that
or when the question is in the air.
>> I respond by saying that books
helps us understand ourselves,
they help us understand
other people.
And through that understanding
they make us better people.
>> Leigh: Yeah, and I think
all of us probably share --
Jay was talking a little bit earlier
about being a passionate amateur.
When people ask like me, for
example, being a book editor
in my past or being the
books editor for a magazine,
is there some big industry.
Yes, there's an industry, but
I think we probably all started
by just being readers, like
being in love with reading,
addicted to reading, using books
as like a shield or a way in.
And it's so miraculous that
we're able to inhabit or travel
to someone else's mind or another
country just by sitting there
with something in front of us.
Pretty amazing.
Jay, do you have anything
to add on that subject?
>> Jay: Yeah, I couldn't agree more.
For me I was a great nomadic kid.
My dad changed jobs every seven
or eight months it seemed.
And reading became my
source of companionship
and also my window
onto the wider world.
>> Leigh: Yes?
>> I have a question
for Ms. Woodson.
How did you start your own
book and your own series?
>> Jacqueline: How did
I start my own book?
I've known I wanted to be
a writer since I was seven.
And I talk about it in
Brown Girl Dreaming.
I got in trouble for lying a lot,
and I had a teacher
who said write it down.
And it was such a strong -- I
was constantly making up stories,
but I was also bored a lot.
I think that's the difference
between my kids and
who is was as a kid.
We had commercials, television
went off at six o'clock
and then the news came on.
We had three channels.
So there were all these places.
I was in houses of worship a lot,
so there were a lot
of places to be bored.
[Laughter] And I would make
up stories and I would write.
And I just kept doing it.
I didn't know that it
would eventually be this.
But I knew that I needed to
do it for my own salvation.
>> Leigh: When did you
start writing it down?
>> Jacqueline: When I was seven.
When I learned how to write my name
from that point I realized how
powerful putting letters together
and words together and
words making sentences
and sentences making paragraphs.
Like that was mind blowing to
me that it was just that simple.
And that what was in my head
I could actually put on paper
and it could be something.
>> Leigh: Do you want
to be a writer?
>> Yes. [Applause]
>> Jay: Stick with it.
>> Hi, this is for Jay.
I know you're very renowned
as a Manhattan writer.
But I have to take issue with
the first thing you said.
>> Jay: Uh-oh.
>> Of your description
of Manhattan in the 80s.
I've lived in Manhattan all
through for about 40 years.
And I raised a child in the
80s on the upper west side,
and your description is
totally unrecognizable to me.
There were no crack vials
I was stepping over.
I mean a gross generalization of
what was a problem in New York.
>> Jay: Well, there
were these pockets --
>> Yes, of course.
>> Jay: There were these pockets of
civilization, the upper west side
and the upper east side were these
long- established residential areas
where families were raised.
But around the edges --
>> Of course, I wouldn't
disagree with that.
>> Jay: And for that matter
Amsterdam Avenue and Needle Park
on the upper west side
when I arrived in New York
in the early 80s it was
like Amsterdam Avenue
was almost uncrossable.
It was pretty dangerous.
>> I cross it every day.
>> Leigh: One little girl,
this is our last question.
>> Jay: Last question.
>> Can I make this shorter?
>> Leigh: Just bend
it down towards you.
What's your name?
>> My name is Margaret.
>> Leigh: Hi, Margaret.
>> And this is for Mrs. Woodson.
What's your favorite medium
like when you're writing.
>> Jacqueline: Thanks for
your question, Margaret.
And I love that you
adjusted the mic first.
I usually start writing by hand.
And when the ideas start coming
fast I move to the computer,
and then I go back
to writing by hand.
So I go back and forth.
Just because I always have
a pad and a pen somewhere,
and I write on my hand sometimes.
I don't have any today.
Today is a bust.
But, yeah, I have a
ton of pens right now.
So, yeah, by hand and then I have
a laptop that I carry everywhere.
Viking will be able
to tell you that.
So thank you.
Thanks, everyone.
>> Leigh: Thanks very much.
>> Jay: Thank you.
[Applause]
>> This has been a presentation
of the Library of Congress.
Visit us at loc.gov.