A Word on Words; 2908; Alan Lightman

oh i'm john so you know once again welcome to word on words the book the new book a diagnosis welcome alan lightman there's a bigger sharing regulations about it and i don't believe that there is in the book that scott and so the rage that einstein strange receive a main selling rushdie's words which are all of the second darren ms rogers rich rich and read in a digital bookstore to read what's on rush to show up a book and new york times' reviews were stunning but now the diagnosis a new book on an m look that will shake you to your shoes if you ever had any sort of a stranger watch and motionless and add something that they worried about the flu already show our room our heart palpitations our

sense of numbness in the fingers is that can it made a very low and bill for bill that happened to where in the world of the story come from well i think this story came after the idea of my original idea was not want to trade the modern mouse from that we live under them always obsession with with information and speed and money that is our modern society an answer of a spiritual loss that's underneath that moe ways is the cause of it and so the story came out of it is art to take an average person and in the face of

all three obliviousness that we that we most of us have to our modern lifestyle given a person a little bit of awareness and see what would happen to him follow him would you put bill who is a successful mid career and executive you put a law somewhere one morning out of harvard square this year three of us begin with what's that phenomenon and doesn't happen in distress do that to people traveling stress can do it to people i hadn't heard of like years ago i heard about the story of a man having a nervous breakdown on the subway and it sort of stuck in my mind the way novels like to collect stories that listen to the resonance and then years later when i began writing this book that story of the nurse prepped on the subway which was actually happened to someone

seemed to me the jeep just the right place to start this book he thought the nehemiah has an information glut that that is almost bound for a fully write beautifully too it's not just a job and some declared funds the arrival of the reloading elephants elegance that is joy to follow but i was struck while you're while you're injecting a look online emails that are right out of the computer and it reminds us that we are headed in this new age of technology away from literature

the elegance of letter writing and half years for mayans is with great human beings have lost their relatives or even a lost art now not just the title of view what which you are very faithful inn in an email so but let me just say it also plays email plays a dramatic role eiffel bill he's not aware of the lowest reading infidelity his wife but is there has there was email us is symptomatic of our fast food culture that it's it's it's a perfect reflection of the frantic pace in which we live course email can be used to well just like any other object of technology on ice or we wouldn't condemn the malthus that's how we use of whether we use it well or whether we and there's a button for many of us i think the e mail has come to

change our ideas of relationships and intimacy bill's wife does have as you said is having a clandestine affair an email she'd never met her email lover but she and some ways views this relationship on e mail is as unequal anthem a serious relationship with her reflection what has been their son alex who lives in the house with them communicates with his mother father by email rather than opening his door walking down the hall to their bedroom thought it really email really has come to be bought an allusion of a wheel why should show and another thing about email wasn't about the cellphone also where we see so many people now in restaurants talking on cell phones that radio cartoon man woman ryan a convertible pulled each other on cellphones that spent so it does want a caricature is wonderful exactly what you said and you know im in

it for her you said has this relationship is virtual reality she feels a sense of betrayal shannon one point late dr to tell him she draws its element in a book they will listen he doesn't want to hear it doesn't remember of that time his life so his physical like missile destroyer now so you know on this subway goes to get annoyed at all the millions and it goes all in the end always backing off looking at stations armed and for east room below to collapse but it has had a mini breakdown kitty shoes off at sheriff's officer it all falls in a fetal position with telephone class cell phone which will work on the subway cars to address an finally that it was plural and there that his are the crimes committed will never be known that these doctors

experiment on their revenue they have a new piece of technology there so that their mind is that i knew one of them on video and they take a biopsy and now i'm assuming that the paralysis that follows is a direct result of that well i don't really know what i was not i'm assuming well i'm not going to say no a lot but by those who get it will only go to monitor now for was so were the causes paralysis or not of course the very first line of the book to say thats that something is wrong with the drummers so something whether or not those doctors cause a peripheral says there's already

something amiss and the main character the da da limit american medical association it's not gonna love you father's book now about the patchwork of a dr pepper i'll give him a man that you know we must begin by deciding when it's not it might not be leprosy and it may not be much in the us my god that he loves to conduct tests isn't a wonderful to us that they can conduct an argument for the conduct us in and collect more information in wichita innocents abroad in a lot of my friends are physicians and other brothers of i didn't that lawyers on the market well either a lot is in the air not quite as deeply but got it nonetheless and the business associates tom come on the owner was all men firing him and they knew the guy

was in real trouble for susan events than his legs is joseph reviews but he's in a wheelchair is not performing is not productive now is outgoing foreign well well it also gives commentary on soda callousness that new information asia's most of them but i think that that all of them mean it's really bills into our society that that lives this word and it's not just the doctors and the lawyers in the business people it's it's everyone is living in the milder mouth from that we all of them let me just tell those viewers tuned in a little late that were going out like one about his book a diagnosis which is a terrific story this story was

in a world where a professionalism is so from walking over itself an interest of money and efficiency and a nick kallas is the people get hurt and build home of america let's talk about the story within the story the clothes if you look at the cover of the book and either there is on screen lets loesser followed about him off as the sock to an m and it sort of makes the way bring that aspect to historians who makes the whole thing more only play but talk a little bit about that because it's a it's a summer rush to

stretch it's a stretch that had my conceived of the book right from the beginning i conceived of having a and m better than of the law the fictitious story of the execution of socrates amen i was it was whiskey at the time but i thought that it would give an extra dimension to the book i think that i am neville like that within a marvel can give congress says is absolutely no basis france innocence on or antennas was a historical character that actually was the man who brought that your house prosecutor yes but but the story about between acheson socrates in the sun is as fictitious notices unfaithful and white fans also dog as all that ismael ahmed up as a wife a counterbalance to the main narrative to offset that the norway's in this speed with with the silences and the slowness of another time also i'm

i want to contrast the modern tragedy that that we live in today in and build chalmers experiences personally with with an ancient tragedy and i think that the execution of socrates is one of them the most tragic stories in the ancient world or a man could be executed for his ideas and then today is the awfulness of a bank increases so much and in contrast with the thoughtlessness of our modern russia the scene that this thing they are a lot of counterpoint and indiana for fun and this as a son than that and that relationship has certain resonance is with was that also the election but ellison bill in at times an ant build that than a farce without us and other times the dose of them cross with socrates especially the end of his so there i don't want to make the connections to direct because that would be trite and would trivialize it i want them to be subtle and i

think different readers will respond differently to the portion of the book it is alex bill's son as a facilitator to get the story that story and about online us in the book and into into those interior that knows that were melissa an election both reading different sides of the story in him comes over the internet and one hours for storing the book and i had the idea for that there's the embedded story i spent about a year are trying to figure out how all to get an end of the book an unnatural way in and he had come over the internet with metropolitan college online where if you didn't read the whole by law you could be pro rated if you read only half of that you might only pay seventeen dollars in pre sentencing to be at just the right irony and sarcasm to sit with the themes of the book doesn't villa

speaking of irony and sarcasm last october about the lawyers we've talked about the doctors and this diagnosis really know about the psychiatrist that he was is it's pretty cryptic uses of the immediate days is a noted now practices and as pat love i think although i guess that's what some forgotten outlets or understand i'm not consulted a psychologist friend of mine the s word creepy might do actually win and for one visit to this reminder britain of like i was built chalmers and set the whole hour now have session actually paid him a a nasa just pretend like i'm you know normally and i came in with bills sometimes wishes of the drug to duplicate his first visit and integrity and just remembered what well i guess what's and what makes that that therapy scene

so it's strange when you when you guys better of just looking around anywhere you can and calling on every specialist he can find in every field that might touch on mosul assault on our lives and your logical problem and of course every specialist talley sits in her this apparent torture the front end and again use email as a means of communicating to a man who has got a real problem is about spend rest of a short lived in a wheelchair to tell him there was john myers i've talked about so and so i do and here's what she says in that series and the email design a phone call that night even voicemails about which does which does raise questions about whether newer technology could take us to another lawyers were goes they also reflect the same

sort of insensitivity don't seem to care much well they knew they'd tell goal that is going to need a definite diagnosis in order pursue the case for that they listen to historian they're not sure whether he's going to be able to to bring a valid say that they know that he's going to need a diagnosis which is the one thing that the metro won't give in and next eleven deadline that are what finally that you come out and say well it looks like your employers are employers there are look like they're going off for both manila mind not nearly enough help your family i think as i went through this story i was hoping that open against hope that somehow bill was going to be it accurately diagnosed i was hoping that you maybe go back to those two

people to the bosnian find that there was i hope that peter his friend headen in this a job for distinguished medical institution would come in and rescue and then when you had a room where i thought you know maybe there'll be something here that alan i mean alan is maybe the thought of bone and say will build from the inevitable but now it turns out leave it to our readers to get the book and find out the cause because it's only those in some ways you leave this without knowing what we suspect lawyer minna was as lichen and kafka's the trial today that the protagonists never finds out exactly what the charges are and actually never comes the

trolley i believe that there is life is destroyed his life and i think that sometimes when you have a very complicated situation that doesn't have easy answers that this is the real and then on again without saying exactly what the ending is i didn't want any easy and then yeah it's it is it's unresolved his mother also is so cheers and his mother and has the visit of his best friend from high school i think for the first time it comes rather late in the book show a somewhat his life was before the book opens we don't really see much of his early life after the national anthem on the train until his mother and his friends visit they give us and they give us a glimpse of of what he was growing up and part of what he's lost

let me go back a minute and most because of st germain that while a great wallie great human dramas in history is the deathbed scene well sovereignty is which has been recorded nintendo star wars in the knowledge with some hope some accuracy in appealing including the dismissal of his wife because she was irritating him so he could die in peace that was in my mind when you introduce that scene was in my mind and i'll tell your employers i felt well this was going to get thrown out there so that solar at us where you're going to win when you add melissa trying to confess to live online romance and i thought you know and he was saying

no don't tell me don't tell me i the next word out of his mouth and be out to be gone away take her away but he didn't do that the liquor dealer you might what occurred to neighborhood from that the engines start your show story but it wouldn't have been right for word bill was at that point and his evolution he hears saddam he sees the world nor clearly by the end of the book he was is that he's wasted his life but he wants to know that there is some love somewhere and all we want to know from was says though she loved him he sees making one last a temporary shelter her and she's made it clear i think but i'm loving care because he does really love he does shoes she's she's done the best that she can i mean she's had a lot of complicate reactions to hamed world down one hand resentment on the other but she's done the best that

she can on his struggle with his son and their affection is tested too by his frustration and anger in anna's hustling and then you know you get a sense of that really goes to a party while he still able to pour their own every year about a an anxious to follow his oath to get as a man intent on bum then so anger boiled over the boy he doesn't know he exactly who these aggregate readout is i ruin everything and of course it when you're angry and sometimes it comes out and you're the people were closest to the us were you worried about but the outburst of anger perhaps growing closer i think i don't know so it

is a tragedy you with some center division that a plane that i think that there are there are there are still some alleviating factors there than there are indeed i well i'm i must say that the as i read the book and i began by thinking how humans owl awed silence early on including those from federal it just chuckle out of even though it's a very serious story an antidote to cops coming through jesus or something as well i'm very sad and very shoddy and and and very young and very green for more than eighty percent of other guy and hit on every reason say that no shoes no

shirt clutching his cellphone to adjust and in both of them and why would you make one of them carrying a law that goes up to a point was carrying and very ethical and so throughout you create conflicts was in good humor is especially important on and in the book it as a tragedy overall but that humor support of trash but i mean we we laughing as a part of life even more art darkest moments we tried to find something to laugh at and thats thats life affirming and i think that the tragedies need to have a comic relief and that's that's part wife i usually as porters heller i attended a how long do you stay out eventually jam it isn't it is i consider that pretty much that women are about at least four days a week when i'm teaching kids about in the summertime it's every day like to write in the morning and early afternoon when i can

oh you mean you can't write when your son will come up and go for loughner play the piano or and working out or so more sticky about a woman born in a book it's never leaves come on i think that's the course of writing a writing life you're always worried what would you think about today's generation of students typically those who are interested in nature many people say this online world those years we've known that if a nonbeliever us a lot of evidence for serious interests in literature i think that what are what i would say to the young students and young people and is that they need to question the un question

assumptions that that that faster is better but that they needed to have to slow down life a little bit think about where they're going to lower the primetime know what her next book i have some ideas but i haven't i'm gonna wait at least a year or in my mind slowly fill up again and feels empty right now bought it online for joining us and i wanna thank all of you for joining us too listen to allen lite and talk about his new book the diagnosis or thank you for watching or own words on john single or keep reading no no no