What a wonderful interview! Amongst other gems I particularly appreciated "...it’s been my artist’s nature since early childhood to dwell in them, to try to create something out of loss and the evanescence of the past that memory represent"
What a magnificent interview. Jay has shaped a creative mission that draws on a swirling brew of influences, from his ancestral roots in Ukraine to New York in its “funhouse of experience” era to Route 66 and beyond. He is relentlessly himself in everything he writes, regardless of who tastemakers—or even his readers—want him to be. I’d like more family memoir and no Heidegger, who drove me out of an existential philosophy course in 1970 but whose presence in Jay’s stack is an unlikely gift. I don’t have to read everything Jay writes to feel expanded and heartened by the knowledge that he’s writing it.
Your comments are very generous, Rona, and Heidegger is beyond offense, which I'm certainly not taking for him. You keep giving me potential bywords I can't use to title a memoir (*Pow! Right in the Eye*) and now "relentlessly himself," which I can't put on the tombstone I won't have. It's even more perfect because I know people who would voice it as a complaint!
The image of Homo Vitruvius "I ... label “a renascent light against the darkness.” What’s the darkness? It's descending now, from all sides, on the light of reason, humanism, the spirit of free inquiry, and artistic insight. Forces from the reactionary right around the world want to return us to a pre-modern state of nonrational, blood and land religious enchantment and piety. Totalitarian ideologies on the far left attack the ideas and values of the Englightment as merely ruling ideologies that defend and advance institutions of oppressive power. My entire intellectual and creative life has been lived in opposition to those distorted polarities."
I'll sit down with a demitasse any time! Wonderful, wonderful interview, as I knew it would be, Jay and Matthew. Such excellent questions, Matthew and, as I've noted in my own interviews, it's so helpful to have an interviewee who is as articulate and learned as Jay is. I've been a loyal Jay follower since the early 2000s and am still hoping to meet him in person one day.
You know the admiration is mutual, Maureen. I'm hoping the same. It is extraordinary to know someone for such a length of time and never have met, yet I suspect there have been many and longer over the years. I think there's a volume for someone to compile on that.
One of the best interviews I've read in a long time. Congratulations on the excellent research and searching quesitons, Matthew. And thank you, Jay, for giving so generously of yourself. I will want to read this inspirational conversation again, as there's a lot to reflect on. Jay, the way you describe your life, it comes over as in some way exemplary. I don't mean it's a model, template or roadmap to be followed, but rather an inspiring beacon of commitment to language and a rich life. As I say, lots to think about in this wonderful profile.
Thank you also for the kind mention, Jay. I hope one day you suffer less "troubled midnight" and more of "the noon's repose".
Jeffrey, I'm almost at a loss for words (though you know I'm not) for such very generous words from you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm fortunate to have readers like you and others who've commented here, and like Matthew, all gifts of Substack. I may be a little too past the possibility of a noon's repose, but if I stretch time a bit maybe I can still earn what Henry James called "the two most beautiful words in the English language": a "summer afternoon."
I know you're not at a loss for words, Jay, but even if you were, you'd infallibly find the appropriate words elsewhere, and where better to find them than in Henry James' magnificent cathedrals of language? That summer afternoon is well deserved.
What a beautiful piece of writing, for both the interviewer and the one interviewed! I love reading about people, because no two are the same! I cherish each one's differences, and thoroughly enjoy learning of their path in life...and I'm even more intrigued when the one interviewed is not famous! (I am also a 'people watcher', because I am constantly amazed at how unique each person is.) "I hope it will represent the spirit of humanism, a humanism that recognizes its roots...
Thank you, Matthew and Jay for enlightening me today!!
Thank you, Theresa, for your beautiful comment. That sentence you begin to quote articulates an important idea for me, and I imagine you, too, about the importance of evolving in life but also of understanding where and what we've evolved from. Thanks for calling attention to it.
What a grand interview! Matthew, your preparation, formidable and rare. Jay, I agree with virtually everything you say here and we are lovers of so many of the same artists--seems remarkable to me..
Your work, particularly in _Waiting for Word_ that I own, that I've heard you read from reminds me of something Héléne Cixous has said: “The only book that is worth writing is the one we don’t have the courage or strength to write. The book that hurts us (we who are writing), that makes us tremble, redden, bleed. It is combat against ourselves, the author; one of us must be vanquished or die.”
Thank you so much, dear friend. I so agree with the Cixous passage you quote. I know that we both have that kind of commitment to our work, that we give of ourselves to our writing in that way.
What a wonderful interview! Amongst other gems I particularly appreciated "...it’s been my artist’s nature since early childhood to dwell in them, to try to create something out of loss and the evanescence of the past that memory represent"
Thank for you kind words and your appreciation, Melanie.
What a magnificent interview. Jay has shaped a creative mission that draws on a swirling brew of influences, from his ancestral roots in Ukraine to New York in its “funhouse of experience” era to Route 66 and beyond. He is relentlessly himself in everything he writes, regardless of who tastemakers—or even his readers—want him to be. I’d like more family memoir and no Heidegger, who drove me out of an existential philosophy course in 1970 but whose presence in Jay’s stack is an unlikely gift. I don’t have to read everything Jay writes to feel expanded and heartened by the knowledge that he’s writing it.
Your comments are very generous, Rona, and Heidegger is beyond offense, which I'm certainly not taking for him. You keep giving me potential bywords I can't use to title a memoir (*Pow! Right in the Eye*) and now "relentlessly himself," which I can't put on the tombstone I won't have. It's even more perfect because I know people who would voice it as a complaint!
Oh, I can imagine. Relentlessly oneself is often an unpopular way to be.
The image of Homo Vitruvius "I ... label “a renascent light against the darkness.” What’s the darkness? It's descending now, from all sides, on the light of reason, humanism, the spirit of free inquiry, and artistic insight. Forces from the reactionary right around the world want to return us to a pre-modern state of nonrational, blood and land religious enchantment and piety. Totalitarian ideologies on the far left attack the ideas and values of the Englightment as merely ruling ideologies that defend and advance institutions of oppressive power. My entire intellectual and creative life has been lived in opposition to those distorted polarities."
Powerful and empowering.
Thanks for that response, David. That's gratifying to hear. It's a hope!
I'll sit down with a demitasse any time! Wonderful, wonderful interview, as I knew it would be, Jay and Matthew. Such excellent questions, Matthew and, as I've noted in my own interviews, it's so helpful to have an interviewee who is as articulate and learned as Jay is. I've been a loyal Jay follower since the early 2000s and am still hoping to meet him in person one day.
You know the admiration is mutual, Maureen. I'm hoping the same. It is extraordinary to know someone for such a length of time and never have met, yet I suspect there have been many and longer over the years. I think there's a volume for someone to compile on that.
One of the best interviews I've read in a long time. Congratulations on the excellent research and searching quesitons, Matthew. And thank you, Jay, for giving so generously of yourself. I will want to read this inspirational conversation again, as there's a lot to reflect on. Jay, the way you describe your life, it comes over as in some way exemplary. I don't mean it's a model, template or roadmap to be followed, but rather an inspiring beacon of commitment to language and a rich life. As I say, lots to think about in this wonderful profile.
Thank you also for the kind mention, Jay. I hope one day you suffer less "troubled midnight" and more of "the noon's repose".
Jeffrey, I'm almost at a loss for words (though you know I'm not) for such very generous words from you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm fortunate to have readers like you and others who've commented here, and like Matthew, all gifts of Substack. I may be a little too past the possibility of a noon's repose, but if I stretch time a bit maybe I can still earn what Henry James called "the two most beautiful words in the English language": a "summer afternoon."
I know you're not at a loss for words, Jay, but even if you were, you'd infallibly find the appropriate words elsewhere, and where better to find them than in Henry James' magnificent cathedrals of language? That summer afternoon is well deserved.
What a beautiful piece of writing, for both the interviewer and the one interviewed! I love reading about people, because no two are the same! I cherish each one's differences, and thoroughly enjoy learning of their path in life...and I'm even more intrigued when the one interviewed is not famous! (I am also a 'people watcher', because I am constantly amazed at how unique each person is.) "I hope it will represent the spirit of humanism, a humanism that recognizes its roots...
Thank you, Matthew and Jay for enlightening me today!!
Thank you, Theresa, for your beautiful comment. That sentence you begin to quote articulates an important idea for me, and I imagine you, too, about the importance of evolving in life but also of understanding where and what we've evolved from. Thanks for calling attention to it.
What a grand interview! Matthew, your preparation, formidable and rare. Jay, I agree with virtually everything you say here and we are lovers of so many of the same artists--seems remarkable to me..
Your work, particularly in _Waiting for Word_ that I own, that I've heard you read from reminds me of something Héléne Cixous has said: “The only book that is worth writing is the one we don’t have the courage or strength to write. The book that hurts us (we who are writing), that makes us tremble, redden, bleed. It is combat against ourselves, the author; one of us must be vanquished or die.”
Thank you so much, dear friend. I so agree with the Cixous passage you quote. I know that we both have that kind of commitment to our work, that we give of ourselves to our writing in that way.
Matthew and Jay, for this extraordinarily generous interview, for your articulate questions and answers, as we say in France, 'chapeau'!
Merci mille fois, Susie!