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Speaker 1: Pushkin, Oh my god, this you know what this is?

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Speaker 1: This is I printed out and sent it chapter by

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Speaker 1: chapter to my parents and they're My mother saved it

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Speaker 1: and she put them in a three ring binder. M

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Speaker 1: amazing and it would just like it says M and P,

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Speaker 1: Mom and pop to follow what you've got. This is

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Speaker 1: chapter seven, um, and it's the whole book and she

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Speaker 1: just saved it as I sent it to them in

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Speaker 1: a kind of serialized fashion. And I think my father

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Speaker 1: function as a kind of editor for me. That's so

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Speaker 1: important to have that. I mean, whether it's as explicit

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Speaker 1: as that or this implied audience, someone that you feel okay, yep,

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Speaker 1: like kind of being yourself with so you're not trying

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Speaker 1: to impress them, right, I don't know. I think it's

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Speaker 1: like an overlooked part of writing life. You know who

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Speaker 1: you're writing for that you want to say something to

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Speaker 1: somebody is where it all starts, right, Yeah, I'm Michael Lewis.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to other People's Money, A liar's poker companion. This

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Speaker 1: is episode four and we're gonna call it, well, let's

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Speaker 1: call it spell Bond, which is one of the many

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Speaker 1: titles that I considered for the book that became Liars Poker.

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Speaker 1: All Right, we're rolling, let's get We're gonna need a

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Speaker 1: lot of throat coat tea. All right, Liars Poker, Rising

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Speaker 1: through the Wreckage on Wall Street? Do I say this?

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Speaker 1: Written and read by Michael Lewis. Chapter one Liars Poker

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Speaker 1: Chapter two never mentioned money. I gotta say that when

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Speaker 1: I was reading Liars Poker for the first time in

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Speaker 1: thirty years, it was not entirely pleasant. It wasn't entirely painful,

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Speaker 1: but it wasn't entirely pleasant because I was watching someone

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Speaker 1: learned how to write by doing, and watching myself kind

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Speaker 1: of become myself on the page. I was determined when

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Speaker 1: I read it not to succumb to the temptation of

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Speaker 1: trying to rewrite it on the fly. But I swear

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Speaker 1: I would have rewritten every third sentence. Man was I

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Speaker 1: tempted to? So today I want to dig around a

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Speaker 1: little bit in the whole subject of how someone is

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Speaker 1: trying to say something finds the voice in which to

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Speaker 1: say it. Yes, I'm recording. I met Ira Glass back

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Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety six when I was covering the presidential

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Speaker 1: campaign for the New Republic and he was starting an

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Speaker 1: unknown radio program called This American Life, and he asked

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Speaker 1: me to come and read some of my pieces for

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Speaker 1: a show, just right off the page. And I loved

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Speaker 1: what he was doing. He was sort of experimenting with

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Speaker 1: narrative in radio, and of course, like everybody else in

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Speaker 1: the world, watched his career not just blossom, but change

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Speaker 1: and podcasting and an entire generation's approach to telling stories

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Speaker 1: on the radio. But Ira wasn't always Ira. He started

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Speaker 1: out sounding something like this. Some analysts say sorghum is

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Speaker 1: representative of a much larger problem in the world economy.

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Speaker 1: As poor rural areas become linked to national and international markets, investors,

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Speaker 1: farmers and big companies choose understandably to produce the foods

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Speaker 1: that will make the most money in the national and

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Speaker 1: international economy. You actually think more about your work than

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Speaker 1: I think about my work. You are more articulate about it.

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Speaker 1: You have a theory of your work, you have you're

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Speaker 1: able to teach it. I've done none of that, so

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Speaker 1: I thought I will save myself a lot of trouble

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Speaker 1: by having in the studio you with me, talking about

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Speaker 1: both of our earlier works, and you'll help me understand

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Speaker 1: the reaction I had. But we're gonna spend at least

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Speaker 1: as much time talking about your early work as my

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Speaker 1: early work. So that's the reason we're talking. Okay, I

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Speaker 1: listened to you sent me six or seven pieces, and

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Speaker 1: I listen to all of them. But I'm kind of

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Speaker 1: curious when you go back and listen to your early

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Speaker 1: narrative pieces, what's your reaction to them. I mean it's

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Speaker 1: a mix of things, like, like, partly the way I'm

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Speaker 1: performing in them is killing most of what's good about them,

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Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like, I just I don't

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Speaker 1: understand how it is. I ended up like I really

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Speaker 1: was like in my mid thirties before I figured out

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Speaker 1: how to perform on the radio where I could sound

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Speaker 1: like a person talking like like, I'm just so stilted

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Speaker 1: the way I'm reading. So that's really hard to get through.

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Speaker 1: Most Americans aren't aware of it, but every time they

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Speaker 1: set foot in the produce aisle of the local supermarket,

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Speaker 1: they're benefiting from some controversial economic policies. I did a

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Speaker 1: whole series called Supermarket Stories. It was the first thing

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Speaker 1: I ever got grant money to do. Every story begins

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Speaker 1: and ends in a supermarket to a scene where I

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Speaker 1: just like I'm pointing out specific products and saying, when

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Speaker 1: we buy these, we're screwing somebody over. You may be

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Speaker 1: familiar with some of these international grain companies from their

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Speaker 1: products in your local grocery store. Roston Purina makes corn

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Speaker 1: wheat and rice Check Cereal, Anderson Clayton manufactures wishbone salad dressing.

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Speaker 1: CPC International is behind Hellman's Mayonnaise and Skippy Peanut butter,

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Speaker 1: and Cargill is one of our country's largest beef packers.

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Speaker 1: It's like didactic, it's like do gooderie. It's trying to

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Speaker 1: teach a lesson. How did this even end up on

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Speaker 1: the air. It raised a question in my mind, And

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Speaker 1: the question it raised in my mind was why did

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Speaker 1: you get into this racket in the first place. What

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Speaker 1: do you think you want to do when you start

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Speaker 1: doing radio? I mean, I really stumbled into it. When

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Speaker 1: I started off in radio, it was really just a fluke.

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Speaker 1: I was just looking for some summer job in the

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Speaker 1: media somewhere, and I applied at ad agencies and radio

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Speaker 1: stations and TV stations, and I talked my way into

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Speaker 1: like an internship in the promo department at NPR, which

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Speaker 1: at that point was less than five years old, and

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Speaker 1: you could just walk in the door. So like I

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Speaker 1: was just like I was just out for fun. And

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Speaker 1: then it's so funny because what it doesn't sound like

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Speaker 1: in the Mexican supermarkets it's fun. No, it doesn't at all.

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Speaker 1: It really it's really not fun. I mean, it's it's

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Speaker 1: it's it's deeply unfun. Today though, thanks in part to

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Speaker 1: loan Mexican wages, the tomatoes and cucumbers are cheap for

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Speaker 1: national public radio in the Produce Aisle, i'm Ira Glass.

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Speaker 1: I really was filled with a righteous sense of people

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Speaker 1: must know and and and at the beginning, like that's

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Speaker 1: a lot of the journalism I was doing was like

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Speaker 1: the kind of like people need to know that people

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Speaker 1: must know and then and so that was like one

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Speaker 1: whole trend of what I was doing. So in the beginning,

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Speaker 1: you have no confidence at all. And how you sound, yes,

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Speaker 1: which is odd because what you're now maybe most known

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Speaker 1: for is how you sound. That is really weird. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean, when I was reading Liars Poker, I thought

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Speaker 1: one of the things that embarrassed me was in addition

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Speaker 1: to like just like the ham handedness at the level

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Speaker 1: of the sentence and my kind of ineptitude with the pacing,

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Speaker 1: and there were a bunch of things they were just

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Speaker 1: technical problems. Is that I sensed I wasn't completely me

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Speaker 1: and for long stretches that I was like, I could

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Speaker 1: see I was reading like The Education of Henry Adams

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Speaker 1: when I was writing this, or I was thinking about

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Speaker 1: Tom Wolfe when I was writing this, or that I

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Speaker 1: was imitating other voices rather than just being me. And

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Speaker 1: I could actually spot the point in the book where

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Speaker 1: I thought, that is me. Now it's me. Could we

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Speaker 1: just pause, like what is that moment? I'm very curious,

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Speaker 1: like what's the turn? The turn where I become very

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Speaker 1: comfortably men but then I go out again. It's like

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Speaker 1: a bad radio signal. But the first time I say yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's me is when I'm actually on the trading floor

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Speaker 1: of Solomon Brothers ripping someone off for the first time,

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Speaker 1: and I'm in the middle of a scene that I

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Speaker 1: kind of get lured into and I'm naive where a

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Speaker 1: Solomon trader uses me to abuse a Solomon customer. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and I'm selling him at and T bonds and the

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Speaker 1: guy who I'm selling them too, I call herman the Germans.

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Speaker 1: I just jammed bonds, albeit unknowingly for the first time.

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Speaker 1: I'd lost my innocence. But what did I tell herm

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Speaker 1: in the German? Don't let your sixty thousand dollars loss

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Speaker 1: bother you too much. You have a short memory and

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Speaker 1: you'll soon forget. Sorry. I'm new at this, and guess what,

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Speaker 1: ha ha, you've just been had him. Sorry to take

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Speaker 1: so long. It's been really busy here, I said. Rifling

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Speaker 1: through the range of tones I might adopt, I was

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Speaker 1: unable to find anything exactly appropriate to the occasion, and

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Speaker 1: settled on sounding cheer full. I must have managed an

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Speaker 1: expression halfway between a brave smile and the grin of

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Speaker 1: an idiot. Dash rip Rock was watching the charade and laughing.

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Speaker 1: Now that was unnecessary, I flipped in the finger. I

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Speaker 1: was more embarrassed for myself than I was concerned for Herman.

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Speaker 1: I just spoke with a traitor, I said to my

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Speaker 1: new customer, and he said that the AT and T

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Speaker 1: s didn't do very well overnight, but they'll definitely come

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Speaker 1: around soon. What is the price, he asked again? Let

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Speaker 1: me see about wow. About ninety five, I said, and

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Speaker 1: felt my face wins ah. He shouted, as if he

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Speaker 1: had been stabbed with a knife. He'd lost all ability

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Speaker 1: to articulate his feelings. His primal, teutonic scream captured for

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Speaker 1: all time the collective pain felt by the valued customers

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Speaker 1: of Solomon Brothers. That's stretch. I'm so in the event

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Speaker 1: and still so outraged when I'm writing it that I

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Speaker 1: don't that I don't think of anything. I don't think

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Speaker 1: of how I'm doing it. I'm just trying to get

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Speaker 1: it across the way I felt it, and it came

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Speaker 1: out sounding like me, sounding like me. It recognizable me

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Speaker 1: to me now. And it was the first time when

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Speaker 1: I was reading the book where I didn't kind of

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Speaker 1: look up at the producer and say, can a boy,

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Speaker 1: I really would like to change this. It was a

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Speaker 1: stretch of you know, seven pages or whatever it was

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Speaker 1: where I thought, I actually wouldn't change any of this,

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Speaker 1: So it felt more consistent with who I was going

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Speaker 1: to become as a writer. Yeah, but never mind me

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Speaker 1: coming up after the break, we're going to find out

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Speaker 1: when Ira started to find his voice as a writer,

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Speaker 1: and where as it happens, it was at a cookie factory. Okay,

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Speaker 1: I'm back with Ira Glass I'm curious when it was

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Speaker 1: the first time you said, huh, yeah, that's me. Means

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Speaker 1: like in listening back, or when I was making this stuff,

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Speaker 1: when you were making the stuff, when I was making

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Speaker 1: this stuff consciously. I remember when I wrote there's a

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Speaker 1: story I sent you on the anniversary of the Oreo cookies. Yes,

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Speaker 1: which which? Like? Which? Which is just not a great story.

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Speaker 1: The cookies pass under a roller, which flattens them, then

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Speaker 1: travel through a cooling tunnel. The cream is added by

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Speaker 1: three spinning drums, one behind another on the assembly line.

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Speaker 1: The first drum places a row of chocolate wapers face

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Speaker 1: down on the conveyor belt. The second drum squirts cream

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Speaker 1: on the wapers. The third drops a pace up waper

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Speaker 1: on top. In the time it takes me to finish

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Speaker 1: this sentence, this machinery turns out four hundred Oreos. But

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Speaker 1: I remember when I finished it. I was like, I

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Speaker 1: remember feeling like, Okay, I finally got it. I finally

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Speaker 1: know what I'm doing, and and it's so funny, like

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Speaker 1: it existed that way in my memory for decades until

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Speaker 1: like a couple of years ago, to give a speech,

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Speaker 1: I was like, I wonder what that story is like

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Speaker 1: I used to pull that out and I heard how

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Speaker 1: just utterly mediocre it is. Well, you know, the choice

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Speaker 1: of subject is brilliant. It's the seventy fifth anniversary of

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Speaker 1: the Oreo Cookie, which I did not know is far

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Speaker 1: and away the most popular cookie in the world. Who

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Speaker 1: knew I didn't know. Yeah, I didn't know it either,

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Speaker 1: But I mean the Oreo Cookie. It's like it's it's

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Speaker 1: it's like a soliloquy. It's a month blogue the Oreo Cookie.

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Speaker 1: It's not that it was bad. It was good, but

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Speaker 1: it was just it's still it's nobody would notice it

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Speaker 1: as being anything special. I think that's right, that's right.

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Speaker 1: It's a successful NPR story. It's funny, like like when

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Speaker 1: you say this, like it reminds me of this thing

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Speaker 1: that Alice Spiegel, one of our producers at the radio show, said,

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Speaker 1: like very early on, it was like a year or

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Speaker 1: two into making the radio show, and she pitched a

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Speaker 1: story that was actually the same story as one of

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Speaker 1: the supermarket stories that I did like years before at

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Speaker 1: that point, and I was like, oh my god, I

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Speaker 1: did that story. Like, let's pull that out and see

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Speaker 1: if we can like salvage something from it, and I

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Speaker 1: remember she listened to the story, and I remember she

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Speaker 1: came back like wow, and she said like, wow, there's

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Speaker 1: no sign that you have any talent for radio. She's like,

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Speaker 1: there's no sign that you're gonna make it, Like there's

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Speaker 1: just nothing in here. What do you say to that?

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Speaker 1: I was, I mean, I mean, I was very willful

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Speaker 1: and marching forward. I guess, yeah, I mean I she's right, Like,

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Speaker 1: she's right. I think we must we shared this quality

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Speaker 1: in that I think you were neither you nor I

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Speaker 1: cared all that much. If there was a sing that

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Speaker 1: you were gonna make it, you were just gonna do

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Speaker 1: it anyway. Yes, that's very true. Yes, yeah, I liked

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Speaker 1: doing it and I was just gonna keep going. There's

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Speaker 1: an analogy with my experience. It's actually almost exact. How so, well,

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Speaker 1: like you, I didn't grow up like wanting to be

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Speaker 1: a journalist. I didn't work in school newspapers. It would

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Speaker 1: never have occurred to me to be school newspapers. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And I didn't have any literary ambition. I didn't, you know,

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Speaker 1: in New Orleans, I didn't. I not only didn't know

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Speaker 1: anybody who had written a book. I didn't know anybody

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Speaker 1: who read a book. I mean, it was just it

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Speaker 1: was not an intellectual culture. I mean that's not completely true.

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Speaker 1: My father is a kind of intellectual, but just generally.

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Speaker 1: But by the time I'm sitting at Solomon Brothers, you know,

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Speaker 1: there's all this stuff around us being written about Wall

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Speaker 1: Street and often about us, Like I come in to

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Speaker 1: work in the morning in the first few months, and

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Speaker 1: there'd be an article in the New York Times about

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Speaker 1: what was going on in Solomon Brothers. And it was

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Speaker 1: it was so different from the lived experience that the

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Speaker 1: journalism that I saw about what we were doing was

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Speaker 1: so pale and so uninteresting and so colorless that it

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Speaker 1: in no way captured the feeling of the experience of

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Speaker 1: being inside the place, yea, and in no way told

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Speaker 1: the story of the place. And so I have in

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Speaker 1: the back of my mind these people I read when

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Speaker 1: I was with flashlights under my sheets when I was

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Speaker 1: supposed to be asleep, you know, on school nights. George

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Speaker 1: Plimpton and Tom Wolfen. How fun that was. And I thought,

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Speaker 1: you know, this stuff, the way journalism works, it's leaving

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Speaker 1: all the fun. So I had that sense when I

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Speaker 1: sat down, like I'm gonna put the fun back in.

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna talk about this the way I

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Speaker 1: would talk about it with a friend over a beer.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's funny. Listening back, it really sheds a

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Speaker 1: lot of light on conversations that I had with my

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Speaker 1: parents where they were hearing the work I was doing

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Speaker 1: and telling me that I should go to medical school.

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Speaker 1: And I remember at the time feeling like, well, you

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Speaker 1: are very not supportive of my dream, you know. And

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Speaker 1: but now, like you're listening back, I realized, like, oh wait, no,

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Speaker 1: they just heard the evidence in front of their ears

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Speaker 1: of like, oh this isn't good, Like this isn't good

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Speaker 1: what you're making. My version of this, it's a happier,

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Speaker 1: waspier version, is that my parents seemed to be view

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Speaker 1: my career such as it was as a matter of

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Speaker 1: indifference for a very long time and like just as

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Speaker 1: long as Michael's happy. But though they didn't have any

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Speaker 1: strong reaction, strong positive reaction to the early stuff I published,

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Speaker 1: my mother would take the letters that I wrote and

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Speaker 1: circulate them to her friends because she thought they were

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Speaker 1: so funny. Huh. And to this day, when I'm in

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Speaker 1: trouble as a writer, I write it as a letter

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Speaker 1: to my mother. Oh wow, when I need to start.

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Speaker 1: So you just you just read the book, right, you

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Speaker 1: just read it? Yeah? Yeah, I'm curious what you made

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Speaker 1: of it. You can be as rude as you want,

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Speaker 1: because I'll probably be ruter. But what struck you about it?

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Speaker 1: I mean, it struck me, honestly by how much of

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Speaker 1: you is in there. And I get what you're saying

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Speaker 1: that the writing style often doesn't sound like you at all.

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Speaker 1: And there are sentences that are just embarrassing. Yep, And

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Speaker 1: I would highlight them in my kindle whenever I would

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Speaker 1: come across on just because some of them was so

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Speaker 1: funny to me. Sentences like when good friend had been

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Speaker 1: crowned by the gentleman of the press. You could almost

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Speaker 1: hear traitors thinking. Foolish names and foolish faces often appear

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Speaker 1: in public place, and you're like, you could almost hear

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Speaker 1: people like, well are they thinking it? Like I don't

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Speaker 1: even understand, Like everything about it is so ridiculous. You

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Speaker 1: can see the problem I had reading it aloud for

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Speaker 1: the first time. I was just shocked by the sentences

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Speaker 1: of the come out. Okay, so there's that, But I

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Speaker 1: have to say like that there's something very essential about

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Speaker 1: your later writing that is in there and in fact,

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Speaker 1: like at one point I was like, there's a sentence

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Speaker 1: but you say it was like, I swear I just

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Speaker 1: read this sentence in um in the most recent book,

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Speaker 1: where you say I can use any number of data

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Speaker 1: points to illustrate this, and I was like, oh, you

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Speaker 1: just wrote that sentence like gas in another book. But anyway,

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Speaker 1: but but like, but that aside, like you recognize the story.

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Speaker 1: You honestly tell like a bunch of really great stories

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Speaker 1: in sequence, Like the story of getting the job and

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Speaker 1: seeing the queen mother is like good, it's a little shorty,

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Speaker 1: and then like the story of the training program is

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Speaker 1: just like I was there, no editor, why does that

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Speaker 1: go on for so long? But whatever? But then like

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Speaker 1: you know, you have the story of the like the

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Speaker 1: creation of the mortgage department yep, and it's destruction. That's

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Speaker 1: a fucking great story that you really nail the characters,

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Speaker 1: and I feel like I know who all the people

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Speaker 1: are and like I have feelings when when the dude

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Speaker 1: leaves who creates it? And then you have the story

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Speaker 1: about doing the job and getting good, which honestly, like

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Speaker 1: you as a reader, you kind of like, I definitely

331
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Speaker 1: wanted more. You kind of go from bad to good

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Speaker 1: in like two pages, and you explain the machinery of it.

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Speaker 1: You say, like, where there's this guy who I'm imitating

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Speaker 1: than this other guy who I'm imitating, and then kind

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Speaker 1: of I get the swing of it, but it just

336
00:18:41,196 --> 00:18:43,796
Speaker 1: happens way too fast, given the like there's like a

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00:18:43,836 --> 00:18:46,236
Speaker 1: kind of very before and after quality to it. No,

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00:18:46,356 --> 00:18:48,716
Speaker 1: that's right. The things in the book that should be shorter,

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Speaker 1: and there are things in the book that should be long. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: And so in that way, it's like it's flawed, but honestly,

341
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Speaker 1: like the basic like skeleton of the story is there.

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00:18:56,836 --> 00:18:59,516
Speaker 1: And then they're like the people are very clear in

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Speaker 1: a way that you still write today. So it's funny

344
00:19:02,436 --> 00:19:06,836
Speaker 1: we're both more sympathetic towards each other's early work than

345
00:19:06,916 --> 00:19:12,716
Speaker 1: we are ourselves to our own work. I cringed. I

346
00:19:14,116 --> 00:19:16,756
Speaker 1: cringed as I was reading until you know, I can

347
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Speaker 1: see pieces of me there, But it was reading. It

348
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Speaker 1: was just an odd experience because I felt like, thought,

349
00:19:22,916 --> 00:19:24,996
Speaker 1: these lines just don't come out of it. It doesn't

350
00:19:25,476 --> 00:19:30,476
Speaker 1: sound like crazy like it so sounds like you like

351
00:19:30,596 --> 00:19:33,316
Speaker 1: it's like it's the pacings fucked up sometimes and like

352
00:19:33,436 --> 00:19:35,316
Speaker 1: sometimes you're trying to explain some economic thing and you

353
00:19:35,356 --> 00:19:38,076
Speaker 1: would do it so much clearer today, but like it's there,

354
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Speaker 1: you know, Like I don't know, Like what you're missing

355
00:19:40,836 --> 00:19:43,716
Speaker 1: that you're not seeing because you're you, is that most

356
00:19:43,756 --> 00:19:47,316
Speaker 1: reporters wouldn't see. Oh, this is the good story, and

357
00:19:47,356 --> 00:19:49,916
Speaker 1: here are the fun characters to write about and describe

358
00:19:49,916 --> 00:19:51,996
Speaker 1: them in a way that's fun to read. Like all

359
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Speaker 1: that stuff that to you is like the premise is

360
00:19:54,716 --> 00:19:57,356
Speaker 1: all the stuff that nobody else would do, but you're

361
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Speaker 1: just used to being used, so you don't understand how

362
00:20:00,076 --> 00:20:06,436
Speaker 1: unusual that is. I don't know about you, but I've

363
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Speaker 1: had very little impulse towards fiction. Yeah, very the link,

364
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Speaker 1: Like I just I really like walking into reality and

365
00:20:13,556 --> 00:20:16,956
Speaker 1: making sense of it in narrative form, finding the story

366
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Speaker 1: that's actually happening. And that's what you've made your career doing.

367
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Speaker 1: How is how you do that change since the beginning?

368
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Speaker 1: Like how in the mirror looking for and gathering a story?

369
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Speaker 1: How is you now different from you when you're starting out?

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Speaker 1: I mean, now I know how to like spot a story,

371
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Speaker 1: and I know how to and just in a like

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Speaker 1: a technical level, and I'm sorry this is true for you.

373
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Speaker 1: Like I just know how to get the right quotes

374
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Speaker 1: and lay them out in the right order, and I

375
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Speaker 1: could just I've done it so many times, Like I

376
00:20:46,116 --> 00:20:50,036
Speaker 1: could just see the thing form before I make it,

377
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Speaker 1: Like I can imagine what it can be, and then

378
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Speaker 1: I can follow it as it doesn't follow my plan,

379
00:20:54,276 --> 00:20:55,796
Speaker 1: but just kind of like go with it to where

380
00:20:55,796 --> 00:20:59,076
Speaker 1: it goes. Have you ever been fly fishing trout fishing

381
00:20:59,156 --> 00:21:01,796
Speaker 1: in a stream? No, if you just go by yourself,

382
00:21:01,796 --> 00:21:03,836
Speaker 1: you don't know what you're doing. You throw your flying

383
00:21:03,876 --> 00:21:06,276
Speaker 1: the stream and nothing happens unless you get lucky. But

384
00:21:06,476 --> 00:21:08,716
Speaker 1: you go as someone who's really good. They can see

385
00:21:08,756 --> 00:21:11,796
Speaker 1: the fit and they dropped their fly on top of

386
00:21:11,836 --> 00:21:14,236
Speaker 1: the fish, and the fish rises and strikes the fly.

387
00:21:14,836 --> 00:21:17,796
Speaker 1: The fish is invisible, but they learn how to see

388
00:21:17,836 --> 00:21:20,836
Speaker 1: the fish. And I think of it that way, that

389
00:21:20,916 --> 00:21:23,396
Speaker 1: you get better at seeing the fish that you that

390
00:21:23,636 --> 00:21:26,876
Speaker 1: you're moving through the world, and people who have not

391
00:21:27,196 --> 00:21:32,076
Speaker 1: developed this muscle or this this visual ability would walk

392
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Speaker 1: right by something that causes you to stop and say, huh,

393
00:21:37,436 --> 00:21:39,676
Speaker 1: there's something there. I want to throw my fly on

394
00:21:39,756 --> 00:21:44,436
Speaker 1: top of that. So now you've read Liar's Poker, what

395
00:21:44,556 --> 00:21:47,196
Speaker 1: advice would you give would Ira now give to young

396
00:21:47,356 --> 00:21:50,636
Speaker 1: me as a writer? I mean, it seems like you

397
00:21:50,636 --> 00:21:53,236
Speaker 1: didn't really need any advice. It seems like you were

398
00:21:53,276 --> 00:21:56,596
Speaker 1: doing just fine, and you certainly thought you were doing fine,

399
00:21:57,036 --> 00:22:00,436
Speaker 1: which I think was key. The pleasure I took in

400
00:22:00,556 --> 00:22:03,236
Speaker 1: my own company when I was sitting down writing the

401
00:22:03,316 --> 00:22:07,156
Speaker 1: thing was central to the energy of the book, and

402
00:22:07,236 --> 00:22:09,436
Speaker 1: there wasn't a whole lot of self criticism going on.

403
00:22:09,676 --> 00:22:12,036
Speaker 1: But but that's still true, right, Like the pleasure you're

404
00:22:12,036 --> 00:22:15,556
Speaker 1: taking in the writing is central to them making it. Now, Yeah,

405
00:22:15,556 --> 00:22:18,476
Speaker 1: that's true. No, it's totally that's that's totally right. So

406
00:22:18,716 --> 00:22:23,236
Speaker 1: your advice is just to keep doing what I'm doing. Yeah, yeah,

407
00:22:23,236 --> 00:22:25,236
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. This is like it was a smart question

408
00:22:25,276 --> 00:22:27,596
Speaker 1: with a bad answer. So yeah, no, no, it's not

409
00:22:27,636 --> 00:22:29,956
Speaker 1: a bad answer. The advice I would have given the

410
00:22:30,036 --> 00:22:35,956
Speaker 1: young Ira is take more pleasure in yourself. Yeah, you were.

411
00:22:36,716 --> 00:22:40,396
Speaker 1: You were squelching yourself. The sad truth is, though, that

412
00:22:40,436 --> 00:22:42,396
Speaker 1: I was trying to have like I thought I was

413
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Speaker 1: having fun like like like except for the like you know,

414
00:22:45,116 --> 00:22:48,276
Speaker 1: the supermarket stories, like all those other stories. Is me

415
00:22:48,716 --> 00:22:52,356
Speaker 1: out there trying to like live it up as effectively

416
00:22:52,396 --> 00:22:56,396
Speaker 1: as I knew, how like the part of me that

417
00:22:56,436 --> 00:22:58,836
Speaker 1: had like loved Broadway shows when I was a kid,

418
00:22:58,956 --> 00:23:01,116
Speaker 1: just like somehow, I think unconsciously, I just wanted the

419
00:23:01,876 --> 00:23:04,796
Speaker 1: radio stories to have those feelings, like that kind of

420
00:23:04,796 --> 00:23:07,036
Speaker 1: pop yeah, right, like like when you just pulled in

421
00:23:07,116 --> 00:23:09,076
Speaker 1: and you love it and you're like, just what's gonna

422
00:23:09,116 --> 00:23:10,836
Speaker 1: happened next? And then it gets sad and then it's

423
00:23:10,956 --> 00:23:13,556
Speaker 1: about some big idea and like I just wanted to

424
00:23:13,636 --> 00:23:15,916
Speaker 1: like do all that. I just feel like it's I

425
00:23:15,956 --> 00:23:17,916
Speaker 1: feel like it's out there somewhere, like I could feel

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Speaker 1: like I'm heading there. But like, oh my god, it

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00:23:21,236 --> 00:23:24,836
Speaker 1: took a while. This was great. I really appreciate you

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00:23:24,916 --> 00:23:27,356
Speaker 1: taking the time. I've enjoyed it. I enjoyed prepping for it.

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00:23:27,356 --> 00:23:29,476
Speaker 1: It was really fun to read Liar's Poker again. Despite

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00:23:29,516 --> 00:23:34,636
Speaker 1: your your your hate of the book, you're completely yourself hate.

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00:23:35,076 --> 00:23:37,796
Speaker 1: You hate the young Michael Lewis. You hate twenty seven

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00:23:37,876 --> 00:23:40,596
Speaker 1: year old you. It's not that I hate twenty seven

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00:23:40,676 --> 00:23:44,116
Speaker 1: year old me. Hate is too strong a word. I'm

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00:23:44,276 --> 00:23:47,196
Speaker 1: very wary of twenty seven year old me. Twenty seven

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00:23:47,236 --> 00:23:50,556
Speaker 1: year old me has got serious character defects that they're

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00:23:50,596 --> 00:23:53,516
Speaker 1: coming through between every line. And I see that, And

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00:23:53,556 --> 00:23:55,316
Speaker 1: who better to judge him than the older you who

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00:23:55,356 --> 00:24:01,156
Speaker 1: has discarded those character defects at least No, I'm at

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00:24:01,196 --> 00:24:03,796
Speaker 1: least a little more aware of them. No, that's that's

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00:24:03,796 --> 00:24:10,156
Speaker 1: the purprise. Yeah, so I really enjoy that. I love

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00:24:10,196 --> 00:24:13,156
Speaker 1: talking to Ira Glass about his younger self. And I

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00:24:13,196 --> 00:24:15,196
Speaker 1: loved in part because he'd actually thought quite a bit

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00:24:15,236 --> 00:24:17,036
Speaker 1: about his younger self. And I was going to leave

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00:24:17,036 --> 00:24:19,476
Speaker 1: it at that, but then I ran across another writer

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00:24:19,596 --> 00:24:21,836
Speaker 1: whose experience with his first book was worthy of a

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00:24:21,876 --> 00:24:25,356
Speaker 1: novel in itself. It was so funny because literally, you know,

447
00:24:25,396 --> 00:24:28,436
Speaker 1: there's I think when we aren't writing, well, we kind

448
00:24:28,476 --> 00:24:31,476
Speaker 1: of know it. And so in her reaction there was

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00:24:31,516 --> 00:24:34,636
Speaker 1: just no joy. There was nothing but oh and as

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00:24:34,636 --> 00:24:36,396
Speaker 1: soon as I saw her face one, yeah, I know that.

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00:24:36,556 --> 00:24:41,836
Speaker 1: I know. On our next episode, George Saunders, short story writer,

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00:24:41,916 --> 00:24:59,916
Speaker 1: a novelist on the necessity of failure. Other People's Money

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00:24:59,996 --> 00:25:02,996
Speaker 1: is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you like the show,

454
00:25:03,156 --> 00:25:06,196
Speaker 1: please remember to share a rate and review. You can

455
00:25:06,236 --> 00:25:09,956
Speaker 1: buy our new Liars Poker audiobook unabridged then read by

456
00:25:09,956 --> 00:25:14,276
Speaker 1: me the author at Pushkin, dot Fm, slash Liars, Poker,

457
00:25:14,916 --> 00:25:19,876
Speaker 1: and also at Audible, define more Pushkin podcasts, listen on

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00:25:19,916 --> 00:25:24,756
Speaker 1: the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

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Speaker 1: ACT three Campaign Diaries. Throughout this year, we've been bringing

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00:25:36,556 --> 00:25:39,836
Speaker 1: you the reportage of Michael Lewis. He's publishing his campaign

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00:25:39,916 --> 00:25:43,596
Speaker 1: diaries in The New Republic. Regular listeners to our program

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00:25:43,636 --> 00:25:45,756
Speaker 1: are regular readers of his. Know that at some point

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00:25:46,676 --> 00:25:50,556
Speaker 1: during this election year, Michael Lewis became mesmerized with the

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00:25:50,596 --> 00:25:53,996
Speaker 1: presidential candidate by the name of Moray Taylor. Maury Taylor

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00:25:54,036 --> 00:25:56,596
Speaker 1: ran in the Republican primaries. He shows up in this

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00:25:56,636 --> 00:25:58,796
Speaker 1: installment you're about to hear, and he goes by the

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00:25:58,876 --> 00:26:03,556
Speaker 1: nickname the Grizz. Soon enough I find the parking lot.

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00:26:04,436 --> 00:26:08,556
Speaker 1: It lies directly behind a small cluster of procasters, a

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00:26:08,636 --> 00:26:12,236
Speaker 1: half hour or so from the convention center. It consists

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00:26:12,276 --> 00:26:14,436
Speaker 1: of maybe four acres of concrete, at the back of

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00:26:14,476 --> 00:26:18,476
Speaker 1: which is a stage. Over the stage is an American flag,

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00:26:18,916 --> 00:26:21,276
Speaker 1: and in front of the flag is a huge banner.

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00:26:21,996 --> 00:26:27,916
Speaker 1: It reads Tighten America's newest tire company. That's Morey's Company.

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00:26:28,996 --> 00:26:32,556
Speaker 1: On the stage are five large black men playing loud instruments,

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00:26:32,556 --> 00:26:35,596
Speaker 1: each of whom wears a bandana that says the grizz

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00:26:36,316 --> 00:26:40,196
Speaker 1: That's more at the front of the stage with a

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00:26:40,276 --> 00:26:43,716
Speaker 1: cigar jutting straight out from his mouth, gyrating slightly to

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00:26:43,796 --> 00:26:45,076
Speaker 1: the funk is Morey