The Bronze Medal

home  |  July 24th, 2012

Lately, he has been consumed with Russian fiction. “It’s compensatory—what you missed the first time around,” he said. “I’m sixty-some, and I think, There are a lot of these Russian guys! What’s all the fuss about? So I was just curious. That was an incredible book: ‘The Brothers Karamazov.’ Then I read ‘The Gambler.’ The social play in the first half was less interesting to me, but the second half, about obsession, was fun. That could speak to me. I was a big John Cheever fan, and so when I got into Chekhov I could see where Cheever was coming from. And I was a big Philip Roth fan, so I got into Saul Bellow, ‘Augie March.’ These are all new connections for me. It’d be like finding out now that the Stones covered Chuck Berry!

— Bruce Springsteen at 62, in the New Yorker

  1. picaresquity said: Oh god haha I love finding out that people famous for one thing (e.g. music) are, in addition, avid and intelligent readers. Did you know that Art Garfunkel keeps a list of every book he’s read since the 70s? That man is (surprisingly) well-rounded!
  2. thebronzemedal posted this