Fresh Air - How Screenwriting Saved Novelist Richard Price

Episode Date: November 14, 2024

In Richard Price's new novel, Lazarus Man, a five-story building collapses, upending the lives of the building's residents. It's about second chances and finding the faith to carry on. Price has written for HBO's The Wire and The Deuce, and co-created HBO's The Night Of and The Outsider. Several of his novels, including Clockers, were adapted into films. He spoke with Terry Gross. Also, Maureen Corrigan shares two books that offer humor and beauty: Billy Collins' collection of poetry Water, Water, and The Dog Who Followed The Moon by James Norbury.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Joe Biden's on his way out and Donald Trump's on his way back. Want to know what's happening as the presidential transition is underway? The NPR Politics Podcast has you covered with the latest news and analysis. Listen to the NPR Politics Podcast. This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross. I always look forward to a new Richard Price novel. And after nearly 10 years of waiting, he has a new one called Lazarus Man. During those ten years, he co-created and wrote for the HBO series The Night Of and The Outsider and wrote for the HBO series The Deuce. Before that, he wrote for The Wire, one of the best TV series ever. Several of his earlier novels were adapted into films, including Clockers, Freedomland, and The Wanderers. He also wrote the screenplay

for the film Al Pacino considers his comeback film, Sea of Love. Price is considered one of the best writers of urban fiction and one of the best writers of dialogue, and I think that's true of his new novel, which is set in Harlem, where Price has lived since 2008, the same year that the novel is set. The story revolves around the collapse of a five-story building whose impact is like a very small-scale 9-11. It's devastating for the people in the neighborhood, including the survivors and the people grieving for loved ones who've died. The collapse changes the lives of each of the main characters, including a young street photographer, a police community affairs officer, a funeral director who can't keep up with the quota of bodies he needs to stay in business, and a 42-year-old man who has been feeling like

he's lost everything and has little to live for and is found buried in the rubble. It's remarkable that he's still alive, which is why the novel is called Lazarus Man. Reviewing the novel in the Washington Post, Ron Charles wrote, For a nation riven and terrified, Lazarus Man is the strangest of urban thrillers, a thoughtful, even peaceful story about stumbling into new life. Richard Price, welcome back to Fresh Air. Because I love your writing, I want to start with a reading from the very beginning of the book. All righty.

It was one of those nights for Anthony Carter, 42, two years unemployed, two years separated from his wife and stepdaughter, six months into cocaine sobriety, and recently moved into his late parents' apartment on Frederick Douglass Boulevard, went to be alone with his thoughts, alone with his losses, was not survivable. So he did what he always did. Hit the streets, meeting hit the bars on Lennox, one after the other, finding this one too ghetto, that one too Scandinavian tourist, this one too loud, that one too quiet. On and on, taking just a few sips of his drink and each one dropping dollars and heading out for the next establishment like like an 80-proof Goldilocks, thinking maybe

this next place, this next random conversation, would be the trigger for some kind of epiphany that would show him a new way to be. But it was all part of a routine that never led him anywhere but back to the apartment, this he knew, this he had learned, over and over, but maybe this time is a drug. You never know is a drug. So out the door he went. When we spoke in 1986 after your novel The Breaks, you said something that reminds me of something that you wrote in the paragraph that you read, this whole kind of like maybe this time, that the whole idea of maybe this time can be a drug. You were talking about your feeling of discontent when you were younger and feeling like you're

over here, but it's over there. And the minute you're over there, it's over here. This feeling of restlessness and discontent and maybe wanting to be someone else. Well, you know, it's just some people have like this constant state of low-key agitation that the thing, the very thing that's gonna make you whole is like one micro dot outside your fingertips. And then you can't find it at all and repeat if necessary. It was a level of dissatisfaction, I felt, but I don't feel that anymore. I grew

out of it. And now I'm kind of, I wouldn't say chill, I'll never be chill, but you know, at least I'm, you know, more relaxed and settled than I've ever been. You wrote this novel during the COVID shutdown, at least part of it during the COVID shutdown. And I'm wondering if you were feeling more vulnerable at that time. I mean, you live in Manhattan, which was a city that had like trucks that had been turned into morgues. Were you thinking a lot about mortality and the unpredictability of life? Well, everybody was, you know, the first wave. But on a writing level, what happened to me is I love to go out on the street, talk to people.

It's a lot more fun than writing. And I couldn't do that. I couldn't get fed. And it's called fiction, you know, you make things up. But I'm so addicted to that type of interaction in the service of a novel. You know, just because it happened doesn't make it art. But the trick is to go home and make it art. And I couldn't go out for years.

I mean, I could, but not to, like, meet people. Hi, how you doing? What's your name? Shake my hand. And that sort of messed me up. So you go out and talk to strangers? Just being on the street, it's just the random things that you're over here or the conversations you get into because so many people, Harlem is like a little different than the rest of New York in terms of people make eye contact, people nod, even if they don't know you. If you say something, they're going to say something back. And next thing you

know, you're standing there on a corner and you're talking. And I've never met a person who hasn't come up at least with one thunderbolt of offhand observation or commentary. Danielle Pletka You know, the book is called Lazarus Man. I'm wondering what the role of religion was in your life growing up. Richard S. Bauer I knew not to curse on Yom Kippur, so God wouldn't put me in the Book of Death. Danielle Pletka Did you fast? Richard S. Bauer I don't know. I went to Hebrew school until I was bar mitzvahed and then after that, my relationship

with being Jewish was pretty much, the only time I really felt Jewish is, besides Sandy Koufax, not pitching, is when there was an anti-Semitic moment, an incident. Then I felt very, you know, tight with my religion. Other than that, I was pretty much a humanist. I didn't raise my children to be, I made a deal with my wife. I won't circumcise them if you don't christen them. I mean, it was sort of like a humanistic relationship. Did you both keep that deal?

Yeah, I think. How would I know? Oh, I'm taking the kids out for a walk. I'll be back Why they all dressed up in white? Oh, it's a nice day. White looks good in April Who knows but I I imagined that we kept to that. Yes Your character of Anthony says this later when things go good, we say God is good But when things go south, that's apparently on us. Do you find a lot of truth in that?

Richard S. Cotter It was just my feeling. But it's a very complicated thing that he's setting up here, which is to say, it would be easiest for me if I could find in the book what he says. Sure, yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, he's a little bit of a celebrity because he is the Lazarus Man. He has survived 36 hours in the rubble when no one detected any kind of sign of life, and yet he was miraculously found. This is what he's saying to people to give them hope, you know, at this funeral for a

young kid who was shot trying to get in between two gangs to calm people down. As I said before, I've never been a deeply religious individual, and I still don't consider myself one, but I feel guided now, and my purpose in being here today is to deliver to you a message that just might make it possible to accept your aching hearts and continue to live the life that he has given you. For a brief moment he stood there speechless, amazed at what he was about to say. What I have learned since that day in the rubble is that whatever befalls you in life,

whatever appears to you as an impossible burden, an unbearable weight, in the end, if you persevere, if you hold hold fast will turn out to be a gift whatever befalls you no matter how heartbreaking or onerous will turn out to be the best thing the perfect thing because of what is to come out of it in fact it will be the best thing that could possibly happen to you. There is a fair amount of gratitude in the novel. And I think, you know, gratitude and a gratitude practice has sometimes come to seem like a cliche. On the other hand, gratitude is a really important thing

to have in your life and to be able to find gratitude in life. And I'm wondering for you as a writer, how do you take something that could be a cliché and turn it into something that's not? When I read my reviews and they say what has resonated with them, they'll use words like gratitude. But I wasn't thinking, oh, I'm going to really use gratitude as a theme. I mean, the guy just survived a miraculous thing, and you got to be grateful for that.

And all of a sudden, in that gratefulness, you see how precious life is because you almost were not here anymore. And if you're inspired, you want to spread that message, the getting of grace. He just says at some point, every minute of every day, everything is precious. When I was pulled out of that rubble and I could take my first undirt caked breath. All I want to do was to live and live and live. It just happened to me in a way that very low-key I feel like I am the person I was when I talked to you the last time but I'm not the person I was when they talked to you the last time and I'm not religious believe me. It's happiness. I just somehow discovered peace in my life.

Like my earlier books, there was always this propelling anxiety in me that I have to make it like dazzling and spectacular and blow people away. And it was very high-p pitched in me and not healthy. But I've settled down, you know, my heart has lowered the volume and deepened the base it feels like. And so I read a book like this where, you know, other than this calamitous event

of a five story tenement pancaking on itself, everything else is people's lives with that in the background of their experience on that day. That's all I need now. I want to talk with you a little bit about race, writing about race and race in this novel. Anthony, the character who was found under the rubble after the five-story building collapsed, he's biracial. His white father was kind of a race man. He taught African American history.

And you're right, what his father could never understand was how all of his righteous defiance in the end had cost him nothing because he could come and go in his angry white skin as he pleased. Despite marrying a black woman and having mixed race kids, because he could come and go in his angry white skin as he pleased. Despite marrying a black woman and having mixed-race kids, there was no such thing as an honorary brother, no matter how many times you raised your fist in solidarity or how many prison-writing workshops you conducted or how many

times you got up in some cop's face. And I'm wondering like when you write about biracial or black characters or Latino characters, as you've done, like, throughout your career, have you faced any pushback by people saying you're appropriating other people's stories and you have no right to tell them? No, I haven't. But even with Clockers, which I wrote in 1990, 89, 91, I was really aware of the whole notion of cultural piracy. And how dare I write about someone who, quote unquote,

you have no idea what it's like to be me. And my responsibility is to create a character that is as fully three-dimensional as I can make that character. And in terms of racial sensitivity, well, listen, if you're writing to the stereotype of a person of that race, then you deserve to be pilloried. You've always, to my knowledge, lived in multi-ethnic, multi-racial communities, including when you're growing up in the projects in the Bronx. I did, yeah. So that must be helpful in writing.

No, you know, I said that to somebody. Well, somebody, when I was writing writing Clockers and somebody said, well, how can you write about African Americans when you're not African American yourself? And when I said, well, I grew up in, you know, like housing project that was very mixed, schools that were very mixed. She said, you sound like a southerner who's saying, I was very close to those people, you know, trying to say, like, I know those people. And that struck me. I mean, the fact that you grow up with somebody just because it happened, like I said, doesn't

make it art. Just because someone exists doesn't make them an artist. And it just all comes back to be said, just do the best you can, do the best you can. You're not just hatched from an egg. You know, make everybody equally human, and then let it go. One of the characters founded a group called

Put the Guns Down. This is like an anti-youth violence group. And also founded a youth mentorship program, Young Scholars for the Future. And these are all former gang members, many of them who'd been in prison, who now want to be of service to young people and kind of convince them they don't want that life. So, you know, when they're in the park,

they're there and giving, you know, inspirational speeches from former gang members. And I just want to quote a little bit of it. Sure. So, the founder of the group says, in terms of, you know, mentoring young people, we'll become their surrogate fathers because that's what they need. Because in my experience, and no disrespect to you ladies, but in my experience, it takes a man to raise a man. I'm not leaving out the young girls.

We also have females in our organization who will work directly with the young girls to teach them mannerisms, etiquette, and how to be classy young ladies. You know, I have such respect for the people who, this is me talking, no longer quoting the book. I have such respect for people who do this kind of work, but there was this inherent sexism. Sure, I mean that's the whole point. That's one of the points. Yeah, so talk about that a little bit. Well, you know, people

can be for social justice. People could, you know, put their lives on the line. They could put in the hours to save, you know, youth from going down the wrong path. But that doesn't mean they're saints, that doesn't mean they get the whole picture. They could still be sexist, they can still be man comes first. And the priorities of this guy, he imagines these women, but he's like a woman like in the 1950s, let alone the 1250s. He's saying it in goodwill, but he's revealing where his enlightenment comes to a dead stop. Also, I know you love malaprops, like words used inappropriately. And this character says that we'll work directly

with the young girls to teach them mannerisms, etiquette, and how to be classy young ladies. I think he means manners, but he's saying mannerisms. See, but this is the thing, you know, I mean, that's the importance of dialogue to me. People say stuff, and it's like a fingerprint for that character. And you gotta hear it.

I mean, to correct it would be to kill it. I mean, this is the way people speak. This is the way people think. And that's gold because it tells you so much more than the information that's coming out of their mouth. This is just a small thing from the book that I just wanted to ask you. I'll read the sentence. The good thing about hooking up in a chain hotel as opposed to a one-off was that once

you got over the sterile layout of the appointments, you weren't as preoccupied with catching something that would permanently alter your biology. I have often wondered in hotels how many people have had affairs, how many people have had sex on this blanket that may or may not have been washed since, or the bedspread that may or may not have been washed since. Do you wonder about that when you're in hotels? Not if I can help it. I don't go to hot sheep motels. But what you don't know probably would stun you and horrify you.

The character in the book, it's in a fair, the Mary, the detective is having with another detective. They go to cheap motels were they go to like cheap hotels motels before they went to change and this guy gets gets a ultralight I forgot what it's called luminol it's something casts a blue light that brings out things that you can't see with the naked eye and they usually use it at crime scenes, you know to pick up blood patterns or

you know body fluids or god knows what and first time He brought it to Their motel and put it on the bedroom. It was like a psychedelic circus and that's when they you know, it's just God knows who's been here doing what. And you know, there's stuff here that could kill a horse that you can't see. And that's why they went to chain hotels. But who knows if they're any better.

Let's take another break here and then we'll talk some more. If you're just joining us, my guest is Richard Price. His new novel is called Lazarus Man. We'll be right back after a short break. I'm Terri Gross and this is Fresh Air. If you listen on the regular to the Fresh Air podcast, then I know you'll love some of the other NPR podcasts too. Here's why NPR Plus is worth your time and money.

You get perks like sponsor-free listening, bonus episodes, early access, shop discounts, and more for over 20 different NPR podcasts like this one. Support what you love and stop hearing promos like this one at plus.npr.org. Support for this podcast comes from the Neubauer Family Foundation, supporting WHYY's Fresh Air and its commitment to sharing ideas and encouraging meaningful conversation. This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross. Let's get back to my interview with Richard Price. His new novel, Lazarus Man, is set in Harlem, where he lives,

and follows the lives of several people whose lives are changed after the collapse of a five-story building, including one man who was found in the rubble. Price after the collapse of a five-story building, including one man who was found in the rubble. Price is the author of several novels that have been adapted into movies, including Clockers, Freedomland, and The Wanderers. He co-created and wrote for the HBO series The Night Of and The Outsider, and wrote for the HBO series The Wire and The Deuce.

There's a story in your book that I really love. It's the woman who's a postal worker. And her son was shot in the calf. He wasn't the target, but he was collateral damage. And she's sure of who did it. And he's a really large guy. And she goes up to him with her son and says, I have no idea who did this to him, but if you know,

can you tell him that my son's a really decent kid and he runs with some troublemakers, but he's a really good kid. Yes, yeah. I mean, basically her, you know, when the kids are in the hospital, she's at a graze room and the detective's, he won't talk because he knows better. And the detective's turned to her and she says, Mommy, can you do your mommy thing, get won't talk because he knows better. And the detectives turn to her and she says, mommy, can you do your mommy thing, get him to talk? And she doesn't, she says, I'll take care of this myself.

And her strategy, which is great, I think. I love that. Right up to the guy who shot him and just introduce yourself, have your son there, and talk to him indirectly. If you see, if you happen to know who did this, can you communicate to that person and you know just unmanned him and then make sure you you give him your name, your son's name and his and you have his name just so it all becomes personalized.

I mean, the cops say the best way of community policing is know the people that you're on the block. Know their names, let them know your name. And it's much harder to pop off when somebody has a name that you know. And so she introduces herself, she tells him what floor she lives on, and she says, look, now we know each other, if we pass each other, we should say hello and talk to each other.

Right, and she sort of makes him shake her hand. And I mean, that's brilliant. I think so too. I so admire people who have that ability to, instead of confronting somebody in anger, just kind of disarm them with humanity. You have to have that confidence. You have to have grown out of being a five-year-old in a 40-year-old body emotionally.

You have to not be a victim of arrested development. So you have your wits about you. You don't fly off the handle, you look at this and say, how am I going to peel this onion? You know, and there are people who do that, there are other people, you know, who'll shoot you in the back because you wrote a drill rap lyric that's offensive to them. And it's worth getting killed over. It's a whole world out there, you know? So there's a con in your book, and I'm wondering,

what are some of the most interesting street cons you've come across in your life? Well, that's, you know, I'll tell you one. It's like you're walking in the street and these couple of guys are walking the other way and all of a sudden it seems they went out of their way to bump into you and all of a sudden you see a paper bag and it's dropped. It says, hey man, you know, you made me drop this and it turns out what is this? It's a bottle of vodka and you broke it. And you know, they try to get

you to pay them. And you can't be, when it's a novelty, you can't think straight, so you believe it. And I said to her, well, what brand of vodka was it? Of course the guy has to come back and say Grey Goose. You know, so here's 40 bucks. You know, I just felt like, and the minute I paid him off, I just felt like smacking myself in the forehead, oh. You know, you have this delayed reaction to the con. But the second time somebody tried to pull that off on me,

he turned to me and I just said, listen man, somebody just pulled this on me two weeks ago. And the guy just smiled and he said, all right, I get it. You know, like I tried, you know, but it was kind of like cool about it. And I said, well, hell, hit five bucks just for, you know, you're just trying to make ends meet. And next to me was three young women, and this is up in Harlem. And it was so furious that I gave him money.

He said, he's trying to rob you. Why'd you give him that money for? gave him money. He said, he's trying to rob you. Why'd you give him that money for it? You know, and then it's like, it's another type of shock. Like, people in that area, you don't toss around money to somebody who, you know, you don't know and is actually kind of do something. And it was more of an education for me, their reaction. Let's take a short break here and then we'll talk some more. If you're just joining us, my guest is Richard Price. His new novel is called Lazarus Man. We'll be right back.

This is Fresh Air. This is Fresh Air. Let's get back to my interview with Richard Price. Price is the author of several novels that have been adapted into movies, including Clockers, Freedomland, and The Wanderers. He co-created and wrote for the HBO series The Night Of and The Outsider, and wrote for the HBO series The Wire and The Deuce. You got an award in 2020,

and said that screenwriting saved your life. You said, I was so ripe with despair, you could smell it on me. Screenwriting saved my life, my mental life I was so ripe with despair, you could smell it on me. Screenwriting saved my life, my mental life, my spiritual life, my financial life, and actually my physical life. So how did it change your life? What changed about your spiritual life from screenwriting? I don't know what I meant by spiritual, but I just felt lost because my first four novels were so self-referential

that I had nothing else to say. I mean, I have four novels, 32 years old, and they're all variations of me and my life. You know, I mean, my throat was parched. Um, I couldn't go on. The books were being written with more and more desperation trying to find a spark. But when... when The Wanders was published, a lot of people in Hollywood, because of the good dialogue, thought it'd be great writing screenplays, which is ridiculous because dialogue,

the actors don't give you good dialogue what a screenwriter needs to give you is shape the shape of the story has to go like a pyramid from the base at minute one to the tip of it in 120 minutes. I mean, it's more about architecture than a good ear. But what it gave me, it forced me out of myself. To write The Color of Money, I had to do ride-alongs with cops. And I realized, they always say write about what you know, but if what you know is not enough, learn something more, then that becomes what you know, and keep learning, and what you know

keeps expanding and expanding. And it's also, the success of what I wrote showed me that I could work with not all that much information that's, you know, journalistic, journalistically accurate. I can make stuff up. All I need is a little bit of a hamburger helper, a little bit of face-to-face, a little bit of observation, and I could bring it home and I can shape it up in a plausible way.

The other thing that happened, so I felt so lost as a novelist, and then I started having success as a screenwriter. I started making money for the first time. I got married. I had two children, have two children. And all of this happened because of screenwriting. I'm not, you know, screenwriting is like typing. You know, it's speed chess. It's not, a screenplay is nothing, it's a bunch of post-it notes to the director. There's no narrator. There's no voice. There's no sentences. A screenplay is nothing, it's a bunch of post-it notes to the director.

There's no narrator, there's no voice, there's no sentences. But it was proof to me that I could be so much more, I could know so much more in the world. I'm not trapped in a corner with myself in a one-room apartment. And that gave me a... it felt great. It felt great. And it was not for eight years. That's what I did. And then something, you know, the circumstances of Clockers came about and that resonated with me in such a way as I have to write this as a novel, knowing I can go out there and learn

and feel reinforced and not insecure. Of course, you're insecure because you're writing, but that's how screenplay writing saved me. When you say the circumstances around clockers changed or something along those lines, what do you mean? Well, what happened was I was doing research for Sea of Love and I was in Jersey City. That was about cops. Yeah. And I was with these cops and they had to go into this housing project to find either a witness to homicide.

to, you know, find either a witness to homicide. And I was shocked by the housing projects, but it was a madness. It was so chaotic and bedlam-like and felt dangerous. And cocaine was destroying, not sniffing cocaine, but rock, crack. And I had a cocaine problem for two years with sniffing coke. And I had three books under my belt. And I was doing like crappy coke, it was probably half dandruff. And it still ruined my life for that time.

half dandruff, and it still ruined my life for that time. And it wasn't until my wife's, we went to a trip to Italy for a month, and I felt like I am gonna stop now because I don't know how to get it. And I stopped, and it was great. It was like an AA, they call it the pink cloud, the euphoria of sobriety before the work gets hard. And I was terrified that when we got back to the city, I know how to get cocaine again. All I got to do is punch these numbers on telephone, and I'm back as a cokehead. And my wife came back with me, obviously, and said two words that changed everything.

And those two words were, well, it's three words, but constricted. I'm pregnant. And right there, it was like, that's it. That's it for coke. And that was the case. So when I went into this project, not only did I grow up in a housing project like this at a more when it was more functional working class,

but I was so haunted. I'm still haunted by my cocaine abuse, you know, in the early 80s, that it all came together for me. And I just wanted to understand what happened, what is it like to be in the projects this time, written by a guy who still had cocaine nightmares and still does. I had so much personal stuff going into the desire to write that book that I didn't want to like give it make a screenplay you know and let Hollywood you know say oh well this is too bummery this is you know can this character be a little more heroic I finally I found something after eight years that made me feel like okay this is a novel, I'm back.

You know, I'm not writing a book. I kept myself out of the book. I didn't need to be there. I just wanted to be the I that wrote the book. You're 75 now. Is there anything surprising you about getting older? It hurts. You know, all of a sudden it's like ouch this, ouch that. But not really. I feel like I'm still me. I look in the mirror and there I am. Probably not as good a shape as I want to be, but you know, I mean, my heart works. You know, I don't mean heart, like cardiac heart. I mean, you know, I... Everything that's important is there. This, the kind of age where you start having friends who are getting sick

or dying or, you know, having signs of dementia. And what's it like, assuming that's happening in your life, that you have friends to whom that's happening, how are you handling that? It's not easy, but most of the people I know or I knew who have passed in my life, I was not that close to. I feel like within a week of reading the obits in the New York Times, there's five people that I knew or I interacted with or I had history

with. And that's kind of scary. It's like whack-a-mole. You know, when's that mallet going to come down on your head, that dropping like flies? But it's not that much so far. I didn't even want to jinx it, so I'm not even going to continue talking about this stuff. But yeah, I mean, the older you get, some people go manically the other direction. I'm a spry, blah, blah, blah. I know I'm getting older. It doesn't stop me for anything, but it doesn't leave my consciousness as much as I would

like it to. Right. In your acknowledgments, you thank your children who raised you. What do you mean by that? I just feel having children molded me, remolded me. It wasn't all about myself. To finally have people in your life that you're more scared for than you're scared of anything for yourself. To finally have people in your life that you just surrender to and just educate you by just being who they are and evolving from year to year to year. They made me. Before my kids, I was just a guy. And it just reawakened something in me that I didn't really know, this profound keenness and tenderness towards them, where it wasn't all about me anymore. In fact, you know, I'm not saying

I became like not, you know, I surrendered to them, but it was such a rich and profound thing that they pulled up in me. That I was just so different. They raised me. They changed me. Did it relieve the burden of being trapped in yourself since you were responsible for others? Yeah, I love that. Not because it helped me escape from myself, because it was just natural. I mean, it's like

Anthony comes out and, you know, he just wants to be of service. You know, I've never made these connections to my life in the book before this interview, but I mean, the joy of thinking about somebody and they come out, they drop into your arms, and God says, go, you know, and you go. And it's a lifetime thing. I mean, before that, I think I was my own baby. Richard Price, it's always great to talk with you. Thank you so much, and congratulations on the novel. You're welcome. Richard Price's new novel is called Lazarus Man.

Coming up, Maureen Carrigan reviews what she describes as two much needed books. This is Fresh Air. This is Fresh Air. If you're in search of some inspiration, beauty, and leavening humor in what you read in the coming weeks, our book critic, Maureen Carrigan, thinks she may have just what you're looking for. Sometimes I do believe there is a book God who sends the book I need when I

need it. This week the book God sent a special delivery of not one but two much needed books. For years Billy Collins has been both blessed and burdened with the tagline that identifies him as one of America's favorite poets. I say burdened because if a poet is popular, the suspicion arises that they're a mere rhyme-ster, a step or two up from a hallmark assembly line troubadour. Even at this late stage in Collins' career, he's in his early 80s now, has served as poet laureate, and has published 12 earlier collections of poetry. His simplicity of language invites cynics to regard him as simplistic.

Those of us who've long read his work know better. Water, Water, Collins' collection of 60 new poems, takes its title from the romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge's ballad, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and its often misquoted lines, often misquoted lines, water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink. Coleridge is also the guy who talked about making the familiar strange and the strange familiar, which is an apt description of what Collins has always done in his own work. If anything has shifted in Collins' poems over the years, it's that the theme of aging is more prevalent, specifically the way aging makes a person estranged from their former selves and others. Take the poem called, When a Man Loves Something. Like most of Collins' work, it appears to be autobiographical, narrated in what Collins himself drolly calls the first-person selfish point of view.

Collins starts out remembering a night when he heard the blues singer Percy Sledge perform in a roadhouse on the edge of a California desert. A loopy interlude follows. Years later, Collins says, "'When I lived in Florida, we had a plumber whose name was Lynn Hammer. I liked to introduce people to one another, but Lynn Hammer said he had never heard of Percy Sledge and put his head back under the sink.

So many miscues like that these days. Near the poem's end, Collins imagines there's a planet called the past and he's on it orbiting the sun. Collins is his own most eloquent critic. In a poem bearing the stripped-down title of Your Poem, he suggests that one of the go-to emotions in his work is buoyant ease in the shadow of mortality. This whole collection is filled with poems that strike that rare attitude, and some of them, like Emily Dickinson in Space, which unfortunately

is too long to read here, are among the best poems that Collins has ever written. Now for something completely different. I usually hesitate to review graphic novels and illustrated books because it's hard to do justice to their visual power. But James Norbury's illustrated adult fable called The Dog Who Followed the Moon fell into my hands a few weeks ago and I've been under its spell ever since. Norbury, who's the best-selling author and illustrator of the philosophical Big Panda and Tiny Dragon books, is a practicing Buddhist. His books are not meant to comfort as much as they're meant to accompany readers on their own hard journeys. The dog who followed the

moon opens on a winter dawn in the mountains. Norbury's blue, white, and brown watercolors on the opening pages are influenced by Zen art. They make readers feel the stillness of this imaginary world. A puppy named Amaya, who's become separated from her parents, wanders into the snowy landscape. Starving and lonely, she mistakes a wolf pack for friendly dogs. The wolves circle her and attack. Just as Amaya is about to be torn apart, she's rescued by an old wolf, the former leader of the pack. Together they set off through a fantastic landscape of ancient ruins and despair and loss, always looking for the moon to lead them and that he spent 25 years with very little money, depressed, anxious, defeated, addicted, before coming out the other side. Inspirational

is a word that's become cheapened, but it's a fitting word for The Dog Who Followed the Moon, an inspirational and gorgeous book about not giving up. Maren Kargan is a professor of literature at Georgetown University. She reviewed Water, Water, the latest collection of poems by Billy Collins, and the illustrated adult fable The Dog Who Followed the Moon by James Norbury. If you'd like to catch up on fresh air interviews you missed, like this week's interview with journalist Annie Lowry about what scientists are learning about the causes of chronic maddening itch and how to treat it, or with Zanny Minton-Bettos, editor in chief of The Economist, about international reaction to Trump's agenda, check out our podcast. You'll find lots of Fresh Air interviews. And to find out what's happening behind the scenes of our show and get our producers recommendations for what to watch, read and listen to, subscribe to our free newsletter at whyyy.org slash Fresh Air.

Fresh Air's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director is Audrey Bentham. Our engineer is Adam Stanaszewski. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Phyllis Meyers, Roberta Shorrock, Anne-Marie Boudinotto, Sam Brigger, Lauren Krenzel, Theresa Madden, Monique Nazareth, Thea Challener, and Anna Bauman. Our digital media producers are Maui C.V. Nesbier and Sabrina Seewer. Susan Yakundi directed today's show. Our co-host is Tanya Mosley. I'm Terri Gross.