2016-08-01
59 分钟Alice Mattison reads "The First American" by Lore Segal.
This is the New Yorker fiction podcast from the New Yorker magazine.
I'm Deborah Treisman, fiction editor at the New Yorker.
Each month we invite a writer to choose a story from the magazine's archives to read and discuss.
This month we're going to hear the first American by Laurie Siegel, which was published in the New Yorker in May of 1983.
Ilkel looked at fish couple.
Only a persevering spirit could have parlayed that pure skin and wonderful black hair and those sweet, clever eyes into such dowdiness.
The story was chosen by Alice Madison, who's the author of four story collections and six novels.
Her nonfiction book, the Kite and the String, how to write with spontaneity and control and live to tell the tale, comes out this month.
Hi, Alice.
Welcome.
Hi, Deborah.
Thank you.
So what made you pick Laurie Siegels, the first American to read today?
As soon as I was asked, I knew I wanted to read that story.
I think I remember reading it in the magazine in 1983 and then shortly after that, read the novel that it's a part of.
I always loved the story.
I just, I think it's marvelous.
I didn't really remember why I loved it until I reread it, but I knew that I did.
And did you reread the novel?
I did, yes.