Reading, Writing, and Fighting (with Mark Helprin)

EconTalk

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4.7 • 4.3K Ratings

🗓️ 8 July 2024

⏱️ 94 minutes

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Summary

For many men, surviving the test of battle intensifies the joy of being alive. A provocative claim, perhaps, but to novelist Mark Helprin, simply a fact, and one that drives his new book about men who commit themselves fully both to service during wartime and to the women they love. Listen as Helprin tells EconTalk's Russ Roberts how his service in the Israeli and American militaries, his decades of journalism and outdoor adventure, and his long career in defense and foreign policy enabled him to write The Oceans and the Stars, a lyrical and thrilling look at leadership in the crucible of war--and at sea. They also discuss Helprin's writing routine and sources of inspiration, his analysis of Israel's real-life war against Iran and its proxies, and his thoughts on the state of American culture today.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:08.0	I'm your host Russ Roberts of Shalem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Go to Econ Talk. in to today's conversation. You'll also find our archives with every episode we've done
0:24.5	going back to 2006. Our email address is mail at econ talk.org we'd love to hear from you. Today is June 9th, my guest is novelist and writer Mark Halbren. I think I have read every book that he has written,
0:45.6	every word that he has put between two covers of any book. Mark was here on
0:50.9	June of 2009 talking about his book Digital Barberism.
0:55.0	Our topic for today, among other things, is his latest book, The Oceans and the Stars,
0:59.6	a Sea Story, a War Story, a Love Story.
1:02.3	Mark, welcome back to Econ Talk. Thank you, Russ.
1:05.0	We'll get to your book but I want to start by talking about reading and writing.
1:10.0	When you were growing up as a boy and a young man, did you have favorite authors, people you read intensely that affected you?
1:18.0	Yes, you see what's behind me?
1:22.0	Yeah, it's beautiful.
1:23.0	Radio audience can't see that, but there's 7,000 books there.
1:28.0	And it's a very barbaric thing for you to ask me to choose my favorites from those. The answer is I read everything.
1:38.0	For example, when I was a boy of 13. My father who had been in and really was on and
1:47.0	on and really was on and off in American intelligence and military was sent to Jamaica because there was a
1:56.0	the Rastafarians made a rebellion against the British.
1:59.0	It was Jamaica was still a British colony at a time
2:02.0	and the Rastafarians killed six
2:05.1	British troops but these days you know he killed six troops big deal no one cares
2:09.3	about anything but there was a big scandal then and and Britain thought that it was unable to handle it, particularly because it was the Cubans, this is a year after the Cuban Revolution, who had stirred all this up.
2:23.0	And we sent, America sent, I guess a bunch of people down there,
	...

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