Anyone who has ever been in a workshop with me, or whom I've cornered into conversation about books, writing, writers, or, you know, cake recipes or the industrial revolution, probably knows that I have a superlative celebrity crush on Michael Chabon. It's almost embarrassing. My cheeks redden at the mention of his name. I downright gush over his two short story collections and The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. The man is undeniably sexy (have you seen his dust jacket photos? That hair!), but looks aside, the way he crafts a sentence just melts the little pieces in my brain that string my dignity together. In introducing my future husband Mr. Chabon for his keynote address at the recent AWP conference in Denver, poet (and Lighthouse instructor) Jake Adam York pointed out his own luck to be writing in the only genre Chabon hasn't (yet) mastered, citing his accomplishments in the essay, graphic novel, young adult writing, and of course fiction. He seems to have perfectly bridged that tricky gap between "literary" and "entertaining" writing. (Not that those two terms, when speaking of writing, are mutually exclusive, but they are often euphemistic for high-brow vs. low-brow, art vs. pop, etc. etc.) And on top of all that, Chabon is a writer's writer. Which has never been so apparent to me as it was that fateful evening a couple of Thursdays ago, when I saw my crush in person for the first time.
I knew I was in trouble when he started by citing a moment from Wonder Boys, the film based on his novel (which if you haven't seen: do, it's great), in which Rip Torn's character, an author addressing a university audience, says with a very pretentious and stuffy air: "My name is Q, and I am a Writer." The tone of it doesn't quite translate to the blogosphere, but Chabon's impression was spot-on, and threw a clever light on the idea of writer as celebrity/role model. He was of course quick to discredit himself for that particular line: it was added by the screenwriter. All that talent and he's modest too? Oh, the swooning.
But wait, there's more: he's charming too. Chabon's presentation consisted entirely of him acting out his own "Audience Q&A," playing the roles of both audience member and himself, and asking himself the types of loathsome questions that inevitably pop up at readings and signings. Questions like "What is your book about?" and "Where do you get your ideas?" And Michael Chabon, Writer, brilliantly playing the role of himself, answered these questions with the graceful yet humorous insight one would expect from someone so gosh-darn-good with words. He touched on craft, reminding us that "ideas are the least interesting aspect" of writing: "the hard part is sticking with them when they lose their luster." He gave us a suggested reading list of titles that he particularly likes, a couple of my own favorites, Love in the Time of Cholera, and Lolita among them (See! we like the same books! I knew we were meant for each other!)He even dared address that tricky, unanswerable-yet-persistent question: can writing be taught?, crediting his own MFA experience with giving him a "seriousness of purpose" in his writing. Be still, my heart. And though he's probably nowhere near inciting the kind of treachery that Justin Bieber's crowds experience, repeatedly, I wouldn't be surprised if every person in attendance didn't walk out of that grand ballroom in the Denver Hyatt with his or her own little crush on my Michael.
