Posts Tagged ‘Turow’
Questions for Scott Turow from Dave Barry
Dave Barry
We reached Dave Barry who recently spoke at Live Talks Los Angeles, and he had these questions for Scott Turow.
Barry: Which is more fictional: Kindle County, or Chicago?
Turow: At the moment, in the federal courthouse, Rod Blagojevich is on trial for selling every governmental act in his power in exchange for campaign contributions. Rumor has it that in his idle hours, Blago worked the highway toll booths and wouldn’t lift the gate unless a driver chipped in a buck or two for Friends of Rob. In another, courtroom former Police Lieutenant Jon Burge is on trial for torturing confessions out of a bunch of alleged murderers, a few of whom hadn’t killed anyone—or at least not who Burge thought. As always, all of this would seem a little ham-handed in a novel.
Barry: Do you, or do you not, have a spleen, and why?
Turow: That is for me to know and you to find out. Hint: I have chronic hereditary spherocytosis. Google that one, Funny Boy!
Questions for Scott Turow from Amy Tan
Amy Tan
We reached Amy Tan, who along with Scott Turow is in the all author rock band, The Rock Bottom Remainders, and asked her for a couple questions for Scott Turow.
Tan: Apart from legal and procedural kind of research, what kind of preparatory work or thinking do you do, .e.g, writing ideas in a journal, googling facts and figures, noting everyday details of life? Do you fall into the common writer trap these days of Googling every little thing and over-researching as you write?
Turow: I don’t over-Google. I always bear in mind Robert Parker’s statement when we did a panel together years ago and someone asked Parker about the research behind the verisimilitude of his work. “I’m just a good typist,” Parker said, meaning, I think, it is, after all, fiction. The most peculiar thing I do in terms of preparation is that I sort of think at the keyboard. For about a year, I get up and just write, discovering characters, settings, histories, dialogue without a particular agenda. Anything that moves me that morning. Eventually something seems to be coming to form.
Tan: What is the question people never ask that you wish they would ask?
Turow: Mr. Turow, what do you have to say about the Swedish Academy’s shocking announcement this morning that you have won the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Questions for Scott Turow from Abraham Verghese
Abraham Verghese
Abraham Verghese is author of, most recently, the wonderful book, Cutting for Stone, now in paperback. If you’re looking for a great summer read, we strongly recommend it.
Verghese: Are you someone who plots out the whole book and knows it all, or do you follow a voice and see where it leads you?
Turow: I tend to follow voice and character to see where they lead. Plot and character, especially, seem intertwined so that a character’s nature, as I am discovering it, seems to spell the actions s/he will take. After a year of this kind of exploration, I then tend to have a sense of the overall story arc of a book and can begin a front-to-back draft.
Verghese: Please name a book or two that you reread and keep handy for inspiration or because you admire the craft.
Turow: I’m not sure that it’s that short a list. I find it useful to re-read Hemingway, Bellow and, always, Graham Greene for different reasons: Hemingway to remind myself how simply it can all be; Bellow for the completely opposite reason, that is, to recall how far voice and prose can take you; and Greene for the sheer elegance.