I left work in a hurry last Friday to rush over (and this was no easy feat given the Balloon Glow in Forrest Park and the resultant bumper to bumper traffic) to the St. Louis County Library Headquarters on Lindbergh to hear (stare at, drool over) author Jonathon Franzen. A St. Louis native, in 2001 Franzen garnered success with his novel, The Corrections, and infamy with his rebuff of Oprah Winfrey's seal of approval. I got the book from the St. Louis Public Library as soon as the hoopla over Franzen had died down and one of the five copies available was actually, well available. I liked it, I mean what's not to like? It is a story about a middle-class Midwestern white family with issues. The characters are full-bodied and anything but sweet. The prose is very well written. (You know, the sentence structure varies. The vocabulary is rich when necessary, simple and realistic in dialogue. The words flow when read aloud.) But these people don't have any real problems, just issues. There's a healthy amount of lack of communication and selfishness and immaturity in the characters. Discomfort is present; and yet discomfort makes the book interesting not, in my opinion, compelling. (Forgive me but I am not a huge fan of John Updike, either.) So although I enjoyed The Corrections I was not enthralled and I would not have driven from city to county on a Friday evening to experience a chronicler of unexceptional people with uninspirational lives. 

I drove from the city determined to hear a writer originally from Webster Groves because of his book of essays that I picked up at Value Village one month ago. The collection was culled from previously published work from The New Yorker, Harper's and other publications. The essays are searing and contemptuous. Franzen has got his angry on. He words lash left and right (but mostly left) against marketing and prisons and tobacco companies and so much more. This is a verbal roller coaster ride with thrills (and laughter, his prose is also funny!) that I haven't enjoyed in a long, long time. I devoured the essays hungrily and was devastated when the meal ended. I continue to crave this Franzen food-for-thought. So, I went to the library across from Plaza Frontenac to see just what he would dish out face-to-face.

I arrived about five after seven, and almost every seat was taken. The audience was mostly gray haired, well-dressed, and white. I sat down near the entrance along the wall in the back. After a quick introduction, Franzen rose and very slowly thanked the audience. He then rolled up his sleeve while acknowledging by name several familiar faces in the audience. He announced that he would read for twenty minutes and then respond to questions, if there were any, for ten or fifteen minutes. He added humbly, and with humor, that if there weren't any questions (from lack of interest?) he would read again to fill the remaining time. Franzen then began to read from his new book The Discomfort Zone. This time the story actually takes place here in St. Louis. The text is riddled with absurdities of family life and elicited giggles and laughter from the audience. As I listened, I noted again the enchanting vocabulary. The prose was a delight to hear read aloud. But I was anxious I would have liked to proceed to the questions and answers session immediately. I craved an intellectual discussion of his world, our world. I wanted to witness his biting opinions.

After his reading, one or two audience members questioned his bird watching hobby and other (trivial) non-literary interests and activities. Several middle-aged women stood and gushed over his writing abilities and his (stictly their opinion) acting potential.  Then a young woman, with wildly curly red hair and a very short straight skirt, popped up to inquire about his writing process. How long does it take him to get it right? The "it" was a line, a page, a chapter. And although this was not the polemic discussion that I sought, I realized that in this comfortable, well-lit room in a county of St. Louis it was the best, most thoughtful conversation to be served. I listened to Franzen explain his efforts at achieving a certain deliberateness--in tone, in his characters, in his plot. His speaking voice was deep and firm and his opinions were strong and passionate, and then I imagined just how he, an author from a background of comfort and only some suburban issues, could write with anger and force. And then with rush hour long over, I drove home with ease.