You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed,

for you are the only animal,

who can think, who can reason, who can read.

Hello and welcome to Bookworm.

Today my guest is Grace Paley, whose collected stories recently came out in paperback from Fras Strauss and Giroux.

Those comprise three unforgettable volumes, the little disturbances of man, enormous changes at the last minute, later the same day.

She is the author, two of books of poetry and sketches,

leaning forward, long walks and intimate talks, new and collected poems. I can't tell you how

many times I've read the stories of Grace Paley, but it begins in ignominy.

I was in college. Donald Barthelme said to me, have you read Grace Paley? I said,

too many Jewish writers. It embarrasses me. It's where I come from. I know it all already.

No, no, it's true. I believe you. I was afraid of it, you know.

Yeah, sure.

And then one day I had a small paperback.

I started to read it, and my mouth fell open because in story after story, she reinvents the language.

She makes it possible to be whoever you are as an artist.

The language, while taken from the street, is condensed in some unimaginable way about which I mean to talk there.

And figure out a little bit of how she did it.

But these things, they seem simultaneously fragments of every day and built to last.

And I wonder, you know, does that have a special knowledge of forethought on your part?

Well, it's a funny question.

...