Went to a reading at Duttons in Santa Monica last night to hear Jonathan Safran Foer. I didn’t expect him to be so nice, so calm and so soft-spoken. It would have been convenient if he had been a prick, since then I could have hated him (him, his books and all his accolades) but no – he was ineffably courteous, not stuck up in the slightest. He handled offensive and/or stupid questions with grace, and gave incredibly insightful answers to many of the good questions. So, despite all feeling of jealousy, I have to say he’s a decent guy with mind-numbing talent.
Postscript: One thing I keep on remembering from his talk is that he didn’t believe he had to be a writer. He could have been anyone that builds something. He just believes that for now (for now!), he enjoys building things with words. Well, build on. Because he’d probably suck as an architect.
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This article suggests that he doesn’t/didn’t have such an easy life, after all.