Noah Counte

Jill Krements is the author of a number of children's books, but the subject of the discussion tonight was The Writer's Desk. The show was taped in 1997, but it wasn't dated or stale.

Krementz is a photographer. She worked for Life Magazine in the 60s as a writer, and became a photographer by virtue of her proximity to good advice, and famous writers. She photographs authors. Over 1500 of them at the time of the writing of the book, and no doubt many more by now. The book is a series of pictures of authors at their desks. In some cases, the author wrote some text to go along with the picture. In other cases, the author had already died, and Krementz wrote the text. The pictures are stunning - all black and white - depicting some of my heros as they live, in clutter or in pristine neatness.

Two things struck me about the interview. First, she was sent to photograph Kurt Vonnegut Jr. in 1970, and then they got married. I had never really thought about it before, but the fact that someone lived with Vonnegut every day strikes me as bizarre. Did you know that he never wrote without first completing the NY Times Crossword in pen?

The other striking thing she said also had to do with the habits of authors, and in particular, one of my heroes, Georges Simenon. Simenon was a prolific author, and the sole reason I would contemplate learning French. I would like to read every Maigret novel in it's original language. His pre-writing habits struck me as fantastic, because I have been trying to write, and I cannot manage to spend more than ten minutes at a time doing it. What did Simenon do?

He went to the doctor. He had a full physical: blood pressure, heart tests, the whole nine yards. Then, when given a clean bill of health, he locked himself away for eleven days and talked to no one until, at the end of the eleventh day, he emerged with a novel.

I highly recommend checking the listings - you may find an author who fascinates you, talking intimately about his or her work.