The Highbrow Trickle-Down Theory

There’s this totally deliciously delivered monologue in the 2006 movie The Devil Wears Prada, given by Meryl Streep’s Miranda Priestly. Horrified by her assistant’s attitude (as exuded by Anne Hathaway) that she is somehow above the vanities and self indulgences of fashion, Priestly explains to her that while she may not give a shit about couture, the trends that are set on the runway trickle all the way down to “whatever discount bin” Hathaway buys her clothes from. Try as you can to escape the influences of high art, they’ll find you.

Catching up on my backlog of Grey’s Anatomy episodes last night (I am ashamed and horrified by the fact that this is my second in twenty-eight posts to reference this show, but whatever; even Achilles had his weakness), this little theory came to mind as the plot from the February 2nd episode unwound. In it, an Alzheimer’s patient, in his compromised lucidity, has fallen for a fellow patient in his nursing home, leaving his loving wife—who has stood by his side throughout the course of his illness—heartbroken. Knowing she’s no match for the disease’s sneaky punches, and that arguing with her husband’s invented reality will only upset him, the wife swallows her own feelings and humors his new romance as it is conducted right in front of her.

This was Streep/Devil reminiscent because that plot was strangely familiar to me. It's the same one that lies at the heart of the slightly more—well, at the right of sounding snobby—artistic narrative, the Alice Munro short story, “The Bear Came Over the Mountain,” which was eventually adapted into the equally heart wrenching film Away from Her, starring Julie Christie.

When I first realized this parallel, I was a little pissed, truth be told. “Bear” is one of my all time favorite short stories, and I’m a proud owner of the DVD of that movie, despite the fact that it wasn’t widely released. (After being blown away by an early screening of it I tried to drag friends along to see it in theatres, but we couldn’t find one playing it, and in New York, no less!) Though I’m clearly a Grey’s fan, I didn’t feel like humoring their obvious attempt at ripping of one of my favorite pieces of art—dumbing it down and dramatizing it up. I had little doubt that one of the show’s producers was one of the few people who had seen that movie.

But after some thought, it occurred to me: the plot of that story moved me and stuck with me. That was, in fact, one of the reasons that I was so disappointed that more people didn’t have the opportunity to see it. And here it was, presented in a forum that does reach millions of viewers. It wasn’t quite as subtle and was a hell of a lot cornier, but the heart and the soul of the message was still there.

Now wait, before you go saying it, I’m not advocating plagiarism. The details, contexts and formats had changed (Munro’s version had a lot of buried demons wrestling below the plot, as any good short story does), and certainly no lines had been lifted. (I know because I love that story enough to know it by heart!) What I am saying is that as someone who is often quite frustrated that literary fiction doesn’t find as many consumers as commercial or genre fiction, or shows like Grey’s Anatomy, it’s nice to know that it's influencing pop art all the same.

In the end, Miranda Priestly didn’t turn out to be as wildly villainous as she first seemed—she maybe even had some points—and maybe literary fiction reaches the masses after all?

Match me a book, find me a find

The thought of blogging sort of gives me the creeps.

Someone told me you should write blogs like you’re talking to a friend but when I talk to my friends, I see their faces, their reaction, and they answer back. Blogging is like writing a letter, rolling it up in a bottle, and throwing it in the ocean. Your thoughts are exposed but you don’t know who will read it. Too bad blogging is not as romantic as a letter in a floating bottle.

I should just get with it. Everyone does it. Put hesitations aside and just write what I want to write about.

Well, last week my younger sister asked me for a book recommendation. I sat at my desk and began to brainstorm what new book she might like. I had to keep up my good track record with her.

She had been staying with me for a few weeks in New York. The first night, when I noticed she was going to bed without a book, I gave her a copy of Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld. It’s about a prep school. My sister attended a prep school. I figured she might like it. That night, the light stayed on much longer than I wanted, as she paged through the book.

A few days later, I asked her if she liked the book. She said yes. She said yes! It’s like successfully matching up your single friends.

When you work in publishing, people ask you for book suggestions. And I enjoy pairing up a book with a person but along with it, comes a grave responsibility. Recommending a book is not like recommending a song, where the track lasts four minutes and it’s over. A book is commitment, it’s a nightly dialogue between you and this thing propped up on your lap.

I had recently read Alice Munro’s beautiful collection of stories, Too Much Happiness. I enjoyed listening to the sound of her sentences in my head. Her words echoed with truth and simplicity. So, when my friend, an overworked grad student, asked for a recommendation I thought of Alice Munro. I had loved it and I figured short stories were perfect for her—ideal for someone with limited reading time.

A couple of months later, she came to visit and there was the small book, shoved in her backpack. I almost forgot that I had ever given it to her.

It wasn’t a good sign. After a couple of months, books you haven’t finished go stale. In fact, they should come with an expiration date, or else it becomes the homework assignment you keep avoiding.

I meekly asked her if she was enjoying the book.

She smiled, and said yes, but said, she didn’t really get the stories. They were a little arcane and a little weird.

I couldn’t help but feel bad. She was carrying the book around because she felt she owed it to me to finish it. But the book just wasn’t her thing. She likes a well-written book with a strong plot and relatable characters. She doesn’t want to guess what the author is trying to say, or try to find some hidden meaning—that’s too fussy and useless. It was a good reminder that there are different kinds of readers. A good recommendation has the reader in mind, and I forgot that.

I felt bad because when a busy person seeks your advice, and finds the time to begin a new book, you want them to be reading something they quickly connect with… or else they’ll just turn to their iPod the next time they have a few minutes to spare.

Anyone can toss a book aside if it’s not their cup of tea but like any good match-maker, you want minimal mismatches, or else you’ll end up with no patronage.

Ten Questions for Carol Carson

I don’t know about the rest of you, but as I much as I love a good story, I sometimes find myself loving books as physical objects in almost equal measure—the smell of the paper, the sound of a book spine being cracked, and, perhaps most importantly, the arresting and thought-provoking images on the jacket that ends up wrapped around a particular book. Sometimes I’ll be so taken by a particular jacket that calls to me from across a Barnes and Noble or the Community Bookstore in Park Slope that I’ll end up purchasing the book even if the jacket copy is relatively unpromising. When I first started working in book publishing, I was awed by our jacket design department’s stunning ability to find the perfect image, concept, or type for manuscript after manuscript. And, while I caught myself thinking of manuscripts as fully-realized stories or projects long before a jacket was finalized, I quickly learned that a good book jacket can take the reading experience to a new level.

I was thrilled, then, when Carol Carson, the legendary head of Knopf’s art department, agreed to answer a few questions about the art of jacket design. I hope you’ll be as intrigued by her answers as I was!

Have you always been a book lover, or was it originally the artistic aspect of the profession that drew you to it? Luckily, my parents bought a lot of books for us. You have to start early. I still have a book of Poems of Childhood with illustrations by Maxfield Parrish. Then I went on to the great orange binding biographies in the school library. So reading has always been a big part of my life—unless I was drawing!

Are there any book designers whose work inspired you when you first started in this line of work? Louise Fili and Carin Goldberg for sure. And earlier designers like Dwiggins, George Salter, E. McKnight Kauffer, and Paul Rand.

Are there any particular sources you look to for inspiration when you feel “stuck” on a design? Love the Czech typography from the 20s and 30s. German type in the latter 19th c. Old scrapbooks, random art on the internet.

Are there any images you hold very close to your heart that you hope to one day use for a book jacket that you’re kind of hanging on to for the perfect manuscript match? I have a great photograph by Victor Schrager of a small plaster of Paris deer head with blue glass eyes that I tried to use years ago that was rejected. Perhaps he has a second life awaiting him. And I found a 1930s scrapbook of movie star postcards that are lovely.

If you had to guess, how many book jackets would you say you’ve designed over the years? Feels like millions but actually it’s close to a thousand (not counting the multiple versions that are so popular these days).

Do you have a favorite jacket that you’ve designed? Joan Didion’s last book, The Year of Magical Thinking, and some poetry, W. S. di Piero’s Chinese Apples. And a few of the Alice Munro jackets. Maybe the oldest one at Knopf was Scott Bradfield’s The History of Luminous Motion that Barbara and I worked on.

Do you have a favorite jacket designed by someone else? Still think that the first Donna Tartt book that we published is pretty smashing. The Secret History designed by Barbara de Wilde and Chip Kidd. Peter Mendelsund’s A Monster’s Notes by Laurie Sheck. All my designers have done great work.

I know there are many variations of the beloved Knopf borzoi icon that appears on all Knopf books. How many different options are there? Over a hundred and fifty.

Do you have a favorite? Paul Rand’s stick Borzoi is a good one. But the Dwiggins dogs are classic.

Did you always want to be a jacket designer? It’s a great job. Just wanted to make things, collages, paintings, etc. Maybe I’ll get back to it one day if that’s not too big a cliché