Garth’s a very smart thinker, and this is a really interesting conversation about the “point” of writing novels (to make you feel less alone?) and weaves off into discussions about the American character-driven aesthetic, and why we read at all.

(As an entertaining complement to this podcast, you should check out this post describing the very humorous battle I had with Skype just to be able to call Garth’s phone. It’s well worth it. I promise. And further proves that Chloë letter-writing skills are inherited.)

This week’s music is by Oberhofer, which has been getting some play on KCRW.

As always you can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes by clicking . To subscribe with other podcast downloading software, such as Google’s , copy the following link.

Not a lot about his fiction in this piece, but it does present a charming look at the octogenarian Nobel Prize winner, who, apparently, isn’t all that popular:

Yet Saramago also often appears to be disliked. In part this is the resentment of a country that has long been dominated by a small elite. In part, it is a matter of Saramago’s own unaccommodating personality. Everywhere I went in Lisbon in June, people described him as “cold,” “arrogant,” “unsympathetic.” When my interpreter inquired at a DVD store if a documentary about Saramago was in stock, the young salesman, startled by the request, replied, laughing, “I hope not!”