92. Elif Batuman (Writer) – The Worst Appetizer in America

Think Again - a Big Think Podcast

Big Think / Panoply

Arts, Society & Culture

4.6 • 594 Ratings

🗓️ 1 April 2017

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Since 2008, Big Think has been sharing big ideas from creative and curious minds. The Think Again podcast takes us out of our comfort zone, surprising our guests and Jason Gots, your host, with unexpected conversation starters from Big Think’s interview archives. Elif Batuman has written articles for the New Yorker on everything from the horrible-smelling "corpse flower" to the complex politics of present day Turkey, her parents' native country. Her first book, The Possessed, was a series of "comic, interconnected essays about Russian Literature." Her latest, "The Idiot", is a lucid, disarmingly funny coming of age novel set in 1995. Jason calls it "one of the most delightful books" he's read in years. Surprise conversation starter clips in this episode: Maria Popova on an Unsung Hero of Children's Literature and Salman Rushdie on the Left's Taboo Against Criticizing Islam Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hey there, I'm Jason Gots, and you're listening to Think Again, a Big Think podcast.
0:09.7	Started in 2008, Big Think is a kind of online think tank of big ideas from some of the most creative thinkers on the planet.
0:17.4	On the podcast, we revisit these ideas in new ways.
0:20.7	Our producers surprised me and my guests
0:22.6	with short interview clips from Big Things Archives, ideas that we didn't necessarily come here
0:27.5	expecting to discuss. I'm very, very happy to be here today with the writer Elif Batuman.
0:33.7	Elif has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2010. Her first book, The Possessed, Adventures with Russian Books and the people who read them,
0:41.8	was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award.
0:45.3	Her new book, The Idiot, is her first novel.
0:48.3	The main character's consciousness was such a funny, lucid place to dwell for a while
0:53.3	that I spent the whole book wishing I'd
0:55.0	never have to leave it. That character is Selin, a Turkish-American Harvard undergrad in 1995,
1:02.0	and the novel's the story of her figuring out how to navigate relationships and life in the
1:06.5	semi-grown-up world. Welcome to think again, Aylith. Thanks so much, so happy to be here.
1:10.8	Yeah, I'm so so happy to be here.
1:10.8	Yeah, I'm so glad to have you here.
1:13.4	I think let's start, if you don't mind,
1:15.6	with a short reading from the book as an entry point
1:18.3	into the conversation.
1:21.4	So this is a moment in the book where Selin and her friend Ralph are like just wandering around and it
1:32.5	begins right there. We spent the next two hours doing the kind of pointless
1:37.9	things we always did. We walked back to the river and when it did finally
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Big Think / Panoply, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Big Think / Panoply and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.