{"id":908,"date":"2008-09-15T12:18:22","date_gmt":"2008-09-15T19:18:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2008\/09\/this-much-i-know-interview-with-james-frey\/"},"modified":"2008-09-15T12:18:54","modified_gmt":"2008-09-15T19:18:54","slug":"this-much-i-know-interview-with-james-frey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2008\/09\/15\/this-much-i-know-interview-with-james-frey\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;This Much I Know&#8221; interview with James Frey"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-style: italic\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/lifeandstyle\/2008\/sep\/14\/2\" target=\"_blank\">from the Guardian UK<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; font-family: arial; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px\"><\/span><\/p>\n<h1 style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 2.2em; line-height: 1.2em; font-weight: normal; width: 460px; border-color: #ffc202; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">This much I know<\/h1>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; color: #666666; font-family: arial; line-height: 19px\">James Frey, writer, 38, London<\/span>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; font-family: arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px\"><\/span><\/p>\n<ul class=\"article-attributes\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; list-style-type: none; padding-right: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 1px; border-top-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: solid; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding-top: 2px; padding-bottom: 12px; position: relative; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; min-height: 54px; border-color: #ffc202\">\n<li class=\"byline\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; font-weight: normal; display: block; border-color: #999999; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">Interview by\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/profile\/stephaniemerritt\" title=\"&amp;lid={contentTypeByline}{Stephanie Merritt}&amp;lpos={contentTypeByline}{1}\" name=\"&amp;lid={contentTypeByline}{Stephanie Merritt}&amp;lpos={contentTypeByline}{1}\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; text-decoration: none; color: #005689; font-weight: bold; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" target=\"_blank\">Stephanie Merritt<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"publication\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; display: inline; font-weight: normal; border-color: #999999; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><a href=\"http:\/\/observer.guardian.co.uk\/\" title=\"&amp;lid={contentTypeByline}{The Observer}&amp;lpos={contentTypeByline}{2}\" name=\"&amp;lid={contentTypeByline}{The Observer}&amp;lpos={contentTypeByline}{2}\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; text-decoration: none; color: #005689; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" target=\"_blank\">The Observer<\/a>,\u00a0<\/li>\n<li class=\"date\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; display: inline; font-weight: normal; border-color: #999999; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">Sunday September 14 2008<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p id=\"article-wrapper\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; position: relative; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p class=\"image\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/static.guim.co.uk\/sys-images\/Observer\/Pix\/pictures\/2008\/09\/11\/frey460x276.jpg\" width=\"460\" height=\"276\" alt=\"James Frey\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; color: #666666; margin-bottom: 13px; font-size: 0.857em; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.25; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px\">American author James Frey now lives in London. Photograph: Antonio Olmos<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">Since I was 24 or so, my goal has always been to be a great writer,<\/strong>to be one of the most influential, most controversial, most widely read literary figures of my time. The only ambition I have is to write great books or fail absolutely trying.<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">I&#8217;ve been in conflict with everything for my whole life.<\/strong>\u00a0That&#8217;s the rule, not the exception. Conflict with myself over ideas of how to live and think, what to think, what to believe. My wife laughs and says I&#8217;m only comfortable when there&#8217;s a fight.<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/>I&#8217;ve been sober for 15 years,<\/strong>\u00a0so I&#8217;m pretty used to it. There are days I wish I could drink. You drink so you don&#8217;t have to feel something, and when you feel something deeply it can be difficult. Every day going through the Oprah scandal [Frey admitted fabricating sections of his memoir A Million Little Pieces on Oprah] I just wanted to make it go away, but if I started drinking or using again I would lose a whole lot else.<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">A Million Little Pieces is the most investigated book<\/strong>\u00a0in American history. No other work of literature has been put under the microscope in the way that was \u2013 it was shocking.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">I don&#8217;t believe in God or a higher power.<\/strong>\u00a0I believe that you shouldn&#8217;t be allowed to impose morality on people because a book written several thousand years ago says so. My next book is about a secular Jew in New York who comes to believe he&#8217;s the Messiah. It&#8217;s my idea of what\u00a0<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/>the Messiah would be like if he were alive today. It&#8217;s a very serious, very heavy book.\u00a0<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/>During the Oprah stuff I called Brett Easton Ellis<\/strong>\u00a0and said: &#8216;Dude, what do I do?&#8217;, and he laughed and said: &#8216;You have so far exceeded any of the messes I made that I can no longer give you advice.&#8217;\u00a0<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/>I don&#8217;t have any real interest in drinking in moderation.<\/strong><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/>I don&#8217;t think of Bright Shiny Morning as my starting out as a novelist.\u00a0<\/strong>I would be naive to think that the past will be forgotten, but I hope it will eventually be seen as part of a larger body of work that explores questions of fact and fiction and do they matter.<br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\"><br style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\" \/>I walk down the street in America<\/strong>\u00a0and I get stopped all the time; I get recognised a lot. I talk to readers on the street, and I&#8217;ve never had one say anything bad to me or attack me.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">I think the problem is with the genre.<\/strong>\u00a0Memoir is a corrupt genre \u2013 there are no rules, there&#8217;s no definition. People want great readable literary experiences, and it can be difficult to provide that and stay focused on perfect factual truth.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">I&#8217;m definitely more humble<\/strong>\u00a0now than I have been at other times in my life. I think success can humble you as much as failure, because success is as empty as failure.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">That life I lived: people end up dying young.<\/strong>\u00a0There&#8217;s no happy ending to a life of addiction.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">If my daughter is going to drink when she&#8217;s older,<\/strong>\u00a0I&#8217;m just going to say: &#8216;Look, Daddy had a lot of problems with it. Be very careful: if you ever have any questions, come talk to me.&#8217; But the idea that my children are going to go through life without ever drinking is incredibly naive and ridiculous. But I don&#8217;t sit and worry about things that haven&#8217;t happened yet.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">My intentions were always literary and artistic.<\/strong>\u00a0I never intended A Million Little Pieces to be a self-help book \u2013 if anything, it was intended to be an insult to the self-help industry, but at some point it became part of it.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; margin-bottom: 13px; padding: 0px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">If I&#8217;m the guy who destroyed the memoir genre,<\/strong>\u00a0I&#8217;m not unhappy about that.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; font-family: arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px\"><strong style=\"border-collapse: collapse; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 0px; margin: 0px\">\u00b7<\/strong>\u00a0Bright Shiny Morning is published by John Murray at \u00a312.99<\/span><\/p>\n<p>[ <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/lifeandstyle\/2008\/sep\/14\/2\" target=\"_blank\">click to read interview at the Guardian<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>from the Guardian UK\u00a0 This much I know James Frey, writer, 38, London\u00a0 Interview by\u00a0Stephanie Merritt The Observer,\u00a0 Sunday September 14 2008 &nbsp; American author James Frey now lives in London. Photograph: Antonio Olmos Since I was 24 or so, my goal has always been to be a great writer,to be one of the most [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conversation-information"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}