Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. And today, I want that to play you a conversation from the podcast. It's been a minute. It's between NPR Sam Sanders and author Rax King, who's out with a new essay collection, titled Tacky. It's both a critical examination of and a love letter to quote unquote low culture.

And it's an unexpectedly touching interview.

At least for me, as a recovering snob, it's illuminating to hear them wrestle with how taste can get so entangled with class and shame.

Give it a listen.

In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily light. so entangled with class and shame. Give it a listen.

In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.

Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors.

On our new show, Sources and Methods.

NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people,

helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.

Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.

First question for you, how do you define that word?

So I did read Susan Sontag's Notes on Camp. I think I reference it in one of the essays in Tacky.

And to me, it's a hugely foundational text about tastes, specifically types of tastes that people recognize as bad. But I didn't recognize my own relationship with quote unquote bad taste in Notes on Camp

because she leans so heavily on this idea that Camp Taste means looking at something

and recognizing it as bad but finding your own private, joyful experience in it anyway,

like usually heavily tinged with irony,

that wasn't me.

You know, I'll look at something and I'll recognize that other people are telling me it's bad.

I don't know that I could offer a really satisfying dictionary definition, but I could

point to stuff on the street and say people are going to call that

tacky, you know?

...