Wednesday, October 14, 2015

President Obama turns books journalist in Marilynne Robinson interview

In a lengthy piece for the New York Review of Books, the president talked about the moral roots of the Gilead author’s work 


President Barack Obama with Marilynne Robinson.
First in Obama’s queue ... the president with Marilynne Robinson. Photograph: Andrew Harnik/AP
Oprah Winfrey’s position as America’s most sought-after author interviewer may be under threat after a surprise new contender showed their hand in the New York Review of Books: Barack Obama.

The American president interviewed the Pulitzer-winning novelist Marilynne Robinson in a lengthy piece which has just been published by the literary magazine, taking the author of Gilead through topics from Christianity to democracy. He told Robinson, who he has known since 2012 when he presented her with the National Humanities Medal, that “one of the things that I don’t get a chance to do as often as I’d like is just to have a conversation with somebody who I enjoy and I’m interested in … and so we had this idea that why don’t I just have a conversation with somebody I really like and see how it turns out. And you were first in the queue.”  More

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