Dancing with Words in Decatur

Posted by Julie Hersh on 22 September 2010 | 0 Comments

Tags: book festival, Bruce Cohen, Georgia, Jonathan Frazen, Debbie Weiss, Mark Helprin

Over Labor Day weekend I attended the Decatur Book Festival in Decatur, GA. My friend Bruce Cohen, who I met at the Theater Communications Group conference this June in Chicago, kept expounding on the wonders of the festival. A book festival? Do people actually buy books this way? I figured there was one sure way to find out. I booked a trip to Atlanta.

The festival kicked off with a talk from Jonathan Frazen, reading from his new book Freedom. I went to the talk a bit downtrodden, after attending a workshop called “Saving the Blog” by an Atlanta columnist. After hearing what the columnist espoused as the new age writer, I was feeling all 50 of my 50 years. Blog every day for 30 days, then continue blogging at minimum three times a week, she advised. Facebook. Twitter. Meetup. A hip website. As I listened to her blather about her success, I wondered if anyone in the world still cares about content. Be specific as you can, she said. She pulled out a prime example of esteemed specificity with a Twitter account called “Shit my Dad says.” Apparently this twitter account has so many followers, the genius who wrote it has been asked to write a book. I wondered where my writing fit in this half-twit world.

Enter Franzen. Franzen hates Facebook, and took 9 years to write Freedom. I swooned. When asked about the impact of fame on his life he said  - and I am paraphrasing “don’t get me wrong, fame is great, speaking in front of a packed house of readers is wonderful, but there is some part of me that would rather be playing tennis with my wife.”  I refrained from throwing my bra on stage. I thought men like this died off in the last decade.

Good writers do still exist. Right now I’m reading Mark Helprin’s Winter’s Tale. Luscious words on the on the page. Words that take hours, thought and time. I want to write like Helprin, Franzen or Roth. Blogging be damned. I choose to blog when I actually have something worth saying as opposed to punching the blog clock to satisfy our ADHD world.

After the Decatur Book festival I met with Debbie Weiss – a blogger, but a thoughtful one. Debbie has a book club website and she wanted to interview me for her site. As opposed to some interviewers, Debbie had carefully read my book and had a thoughtful list of questions. She taped our conversation to make sure she got the facts right. She just posted her interview this week, check it out: http://www.womensbookreviews.com/authors/julie_hersh.htm.

Okay – so Debbie shows me that the internet is not all about one-upmanship and adults trying to outsmart each other with one liners like 13 year-olds. Thank you Debbie and thank you Decatur for bringing me Franzen. He made me want to drop the book tour, get back to my desk and write. I will. Soon.