Here and Now

Description

“[A] civilized discourse between two cultivated and sophisticated men. . . . It’s a pleasure to be in their company.”—Michael Dirda, The Washington Post

“An extended meditation on the processes of friendship, [Here and Now] has something substantive to offer.”—The New York Times Book Review

After a meeting at an Australian literary festival brought them together in 2008, novelists Paul Auster and J. M. Coetzee began exchanging letters on a regular basis with the hope they might “strike sparks off each other.” Here and Now is the result: a three-year epistolary dialogue that touches on nearly every subject from sports to fatherhood, literature to film, philosophy to politics, from the financial crisis to art, death, marriage, friendship, and love. Their high-spirited and luminous correspondence offers an intimate and often amusing portrait of these two men as they explore the complexities of the here and now and reveal their delight in each other’s friendship on every page.“[A] civilized discourse between two cultivated and sophisticated men . . . A pleasure to be in their company.”—Michael Dirda, The Washington Post

“These two famous writers might seem at first an unlikely pairing . . . [but] as a series of collaborative inquiries and an extended meditation on the processes of friendship, the book has something substantive to offer.”—The New York Times Book Review

”Here and Now is akin to eavesdropping on a dazzling, extended dinner conversation between two intelligent and substantive minds. . . . A very appealing, human portrait of these two writers.”—Bookpage “A genial, often riveting exchange. Amiable and revealing missives from two remarkable minds.”—Kirkus Reviews

“A striking portrait of two great friends . . . the result of Auster and Coetzee’s exchange is nothing short of witty, sharp and thought-provoking, and offers a fascinating look into the minds of two of the twentieth century’s greatest writers.”—Malibu Magazine
Praise for J. M. Coetzee

“Many, this reviewer among them, would consider [Coetzee] the greatest living novelist in English.”—The New York Times Book Review“Coetzee may turn out to be one of the last great novelists, exalted by the intensity of his self-awareness and his willingness to make his home in a spiritual and intellectual impasse of which few of his contemporaries were even aware.”—The Nation

“South Africa’s most brilliant novelist . . . challenges us to doubt our preconceived notions not only of love but of truth itself.”—The Seattle Times

“Coetzee’s signature brilliance . . . A mixture of penetrating insight and brittle wit that forces our attention on common terrors we don’t want to think about.”—The Washington Post


Praise for Paul Auster

“A writer of lean, genre-tinged novels whose unaffected prose belies their philosophical complexity . . . He’s also one of our most playful novelists, a lover of narrative labyrinths on par with Borges, to whom he has often been compared.”—The Washington Post“Paul Auster is one of those sages with confounding talent—confounding for one because he’s simply that good. . . . He belongs among Vonnegut, Roth, and DeLillo.”—The Daily BeastPaul Auster was the bestselling author of 4 3 2 1, Sunset Park, The Book of Illusions, Moon Palace, and The New York Trilogy, among many other works. In 2006, he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature. His other honors include the Prix Médicis étranger for Leviathan, the Independent Spirit Award for the screenplay of Smoke, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Burning Boy, and the Carlos Fuentes Prize for his body of work. His novel 4 3 2 1 was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was a Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. His work has been translated into more than forty languages. Paul Auster died in 2024. 

J. M. Coetzee is the first author to be awarded the Booker Prize twice. The author of Disgrace and Life & Times of Michael K, among many other works, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2003. He lives in Adelaide, Australia.US

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