Brandon Taylor on the Sally Rooney Phenomenon

The Book Review

The New York Times

Books, Arts

4.2 • 3.7K Ratings

🗓️ 10 September 2021

⏱️ 66 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Taylor talks about Rooney’s “Beautiful World, Where Are You,” and David Rooney discusses “About Time: A History of Civilization in Twelve Clocks.”

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This week's podcast, Two Roonies. First up, is Sally Rooney the ultimate millennial novelist?
0:15.6	Writer and critic Brandon Taylor joins us to talk about Rooney's latest novel, Beautiful
0:20.3	World Where Are You. And Rooney number two, how does the way we tell time and form the way
0:26.3	we live? David Rooney will be here to talk about his book About Time, A History of Civilization
0:32.5	in 12 Clocks. Alexander Alter will tell us what's new in publishing news. Plus, our critics will
0:38.6	join us to talk about the latest and literary criticism. This is the Book of View Podcasts for
0:44.6	the New York Times. It's September 10th. I'm Pamela Paul.
0:48.0	Brandon Taylor joins us now. He is the author of Real Life and Filthy Animals. And he joins us to
1:00.2	talk this week about Sally Rooney and her latest novel, Beautiful World Where Are You,
1:05.2	which he reviews on the cover of the New York Times Book Review. Brandon, thanks for being here.
1:09.8	Thanks so much for having me. All right, so I'm going to ask a really basic question. The answer,
1:16.1	which will be 100% obvious to all of those Sally Rooney accolades and fans out there. And we'll be
1:24.1	enlightening to those who are not yet converted to the cult of Sally Rooney. Who is she?
1:30.2	Oh, well, I mean, that is the question of the moment it feels like. Sally Rooney is a young Irish
1:37.2	writer who burst onto the scene with her debut novel, Conversations with Friends,
1:42.8	a few years ago now. And then she followed it up with a mega bestseller, Normal People,
1:47.9	which was made into a very successful television show. And she was hailed as, you know, the first
1:52.8	great millennial writer and cold salinger for the Snapchat generation. And she writes about
2:00.1	millennial. She writes about young people. People in their mid to late 20s who are struggling with
2:04.2	coming of aid. And she also writes about sex crazed Irish teenager. And she writes about a lot of
2:10.7	the questions that I think young people today are facing, such as who am I, who do I want to be in
2:15.6	the world? How do I fall in love? How do I navigate, fraught social relationships? And so she's
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in -1299 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The New York Times, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The New York Times and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.