Joshua Cohen
Joshua Cohen
novelists
Novelists can ask - they can ask for anything - but their books are their answers in advance.
break govern inventing novel rules
You write a novel by inventing a world and inventing the rules that govern that world. Then you break the rules when you want to.
aspect becomes commodity construct jewish jews knowledge longer people
When knowledge no longer becomes the commodity of the few, but in a sense becomes equalized by everyone having access, you lose some aspect of Jewish particularity, or at least a Jewish particularity that is fundamental to the construct of Jews as people of the book, which was always interesting.
beneficial gold higher mining obviously price
Obviously the higher gold price is going to be beneficial for the mining industry.
What do I want from a book? Something protean, something always on-the-move-or-make - shape-shifting, semantically-and-syntactically-shifting.
against answer card chat late middle people
I have a credit card and a phone. I answer emails; I answer questions on chat in the middle of the day. Then, late at night, I write against other people who do just that.
approving endless truly writer
I first read Dostoyevsky when I was 14 years old and was entranced. Dostoyevsky truly is a writer for 14-year-olds, and I mean that in the most approving way - approving of his energy, and rage, his endless pessimism, and endless innocence.
classic consciousness warning
There are so many classic Big Brother warning books: the Internet is a horrible, controlling thing, as if it has a consciousness or political agenda.
argued claim gesture novelist
In mid-20th-century America, it could be argued that the novelist still had the most claim of anyone to omniscience. Whatever he/she couldn't prove, he/she could gesture at.
becoming demands enslaved entirely feeling forced general life machine prevents rage resentful technology time victimized
I don't like being victimized by a machine or by other people's demands on my time. I become resentful by feeling forced or incentivized to live a life I don't want to live. That rage in general prevents me from entirely becoming enslaved by technology.
clicked cultural function movement remove technology text turn
I do think that once you remove the limitations of the page, once you turn text transitive, meaning it can be clicked away from, the forward movement of text can be interrupted. But I don't think this is just a function of technology. It's also a function of cultural preference.
afternoon again buy close cup fantasy heaven mine pure
I don't think any book of mine will ever come as close to pure fantasy as 'A Heaven of Others.' I'll never again set a book in a world or after-world in which it's impossible to buy a cup of coffee or take an undisturbed afternoon nap.
technology
All technology does is give us back to ourselves. So to be anti-technology in a sense is to be anti-human.
caught harder internet repeating work writer
The Internet makes the writer work harder - I have to say things here I've never said before, or else be caught out in repeating myself.