FT Weekend: Author Elif Batuman. Plus, our obsession with feedback
FT News Briefing
Forhecz Topher
4.4 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 6 August 2022
⏱️ 36 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, we talk to the author Elif Batuman about her new novel ‘Either / Or’. The book is set in the 1990s, and follows Elif’s fictionalised alter ego, Selin, as she navigates life as a Harvard student. Elif reflects on looking back at the ’90s from a contemporary perspective and talks about what we’ve learnt since. Then, we hear about feedback from deputy FT Magazine editor Esther Bintliff. We live in a culture obsessed with feedback. But what kind of feedback is actually effective?
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Want to stay in touch? We love hearing from you. We’re on Twitter @ftweekendpod, and Lilah is on Instagram and Twitter @lilahrap.
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Links and mentions from the episode:
– Either/Or by Elif Batuman is available in all good bookstores.
– Esther’s piece on feedback, https://www.ft.com/content/a681ac3c-73b8-459b-843c-0d796f15020e
– Bradley Whitford describing the three-step reaction on WTF with Marc Maron http://www.wtfpod.com/podcast/episode-909-bradley-whitford
– If you want to hear Kim Scott talking about Radical Candour at Inbound Bold Talks, 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yj9GLeNCgm4
– Elif Batuman is on Twitter @BananaKarenina. Esther is on Twitter @estherbintliff.
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Special offers for FT Weekend listeners, from 50% off a digital subscription to a $1/£1/€1 trial can be found here: http://ft.com/weekendpodcast
Want to join us at the FT Weekend festival in London on September 3rd? Buy a ticket at ft.com/ftwf. And here’s a special £20 off promo code, specifically for FT Weekend listeners: FTWFxPodcast22
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Original music by Metaphor Music. Mixing and sound design by Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco.
Silicon Valley clip in this episode is courtesy of HBO.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The FT News Briefing is supported by Equinole, the UK's energy partner. |
| 0:06.3 | Learn more at equinole.co.uk |
| 0:11.4 | It's summer, and you know what that means. |
| 0:14.1 | It's time for a Plymouth gin and tonic. |
| 0:16.9 | So grab yourself a glass and some ice. |
| 0:19.9 | Start with a pourer of Plymouth gin, |
| 0:22.8 | which is distilled using a blend of seven botanicals. |
| 0:26.0 | Add in some tonic, |
| 0:28.2 | then finish with a slice of orange. |
| 0:31.6 | Now that is the perfect gin and tonic. |
| 0:34.9 | Plymouth gin distilled with care and craft in England since 1793. |
| 0:41.2 | Just a note before we start, there is a little bit of cursing in this episode, so you've been warned. |
| 0:49.1 | Novelist Elif Batumin was still on book tour for her first novel, The Idiot, |
| 0:53.9 | when she started thinking about a sequel. |
| 0:56.6 | She kept getting this response from readers that bothered her. |
| 1:00.4 | People were mad that at the end of the book, |
| 1:02.9 | her protagonist hadn't had sex with the guy she was supposed to have sex with. |
| 1:07.7 | The idiot is a fictional account of Elif's first year in college. |
| 1:11.4 | Her stand-in in the book, Selin, follows this guy to Hungary. |
| 1:15.0 | She's kind of in love with him, but he's evasive. |
| 1:18.4 | This is actually something that happened to Elif when she was young too. |
| 1:21.9 | It was a very destabilizing feeling to be talking to people who had read The Idiot, |
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