Steve McCauley on Barbara Pym: The Comic Novel Explored and Adored (JP)

New Books Network

Back in 2019, John spoke with the celebrated comic novelist Stephen McCauley. Nobody knows more about the comic novel than Steve--his latest is You Only Call When You're in Trouble, but John still holds a candle for his 1987 debut, Object of My Affection, made into a charming Jennifer Aniston Paul Rudd movie. And there is no comic novelist Steve loves better than Barbara Pym, a mid-century British comic genius who found herself forgotten and unpublishable in middle age, only to roar back into print in her sixties with A Quartet in Autumn. Steve and John’s friendship over the years has been sealed by the favorite Pym lines they text back and forth to one another, so they are particularly keen to investigate why her career went in this way.

In the episode, they talk about some of these favorite sentences from Pym, and then turn to the comic novel as a genre. They talk about the difference between humorous and comic writing, the earthiness of comedy, whether comic novels should have happy or sad endings, and whether the comic novel is a precursor to, or an amoral relief from, the sitcom. They also discuss some of Steve’s fiction, including his Rain Mitchell yoga novels. In Recallable Books John recommends Pictures from an Institution by Randall Jarrell and Steve recommends After Claude by Iris Owens.

Discussed in this episode:

• The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, Laurence Sterne
• Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray
• Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
• Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy
• “The Beast in the Jungle,” Henry James
• The Thurber Carnival, James Thurber
• The Group, Mary McCarthy
• After Claude, Iris Owens
• Pictures from an Institution, Randall Jarrell
• An Unsuitable Attachment, Barbara Pym
• Less than Angels, Barbara Pym
• The Sweet Dove Died, Barbara Pym
• Portnoy’s Complaint, Philip Roth
• The Sellout, Paul Beatty
• My Ex-Life, Stephen McCauley

You can listen here or read here.

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