Current Enthusiasms

Heritage Flakes cereal; terrible name but delicious. Barbra Streisand’s 1962 concert album Live at the Bon Soir. Rome’s il Palazzo Doria Pamphilj. The way Angelica Huston pronounces “Los Angeles” in the movie The Grifters. A Manhattan on the rocks.

Sumo oranges. The reasonably-priced wine called Josh. Alice Munro. Thinking about Underworld and almost crying. Rewatching Girls and arguing with people about which character from Girls I am. Salted pistachios.

Realizing that Nicole Kidman, who stars in two of my all-time favorite films (The Killing of a Sacred Deer and Birth) might, by transitive property, be my favorite actress. Robert Venturi’s ugliest furniture. Fairfield Porter. Obelisks.

Robertson Davies’ Deptford Trilogy. Keeping a diary. That New Yorker podcast where writers read short stories from the magazine’s archive, and perfect short stories generally.

Former Enthusiasms (some of which are still salient)

Salted pecans, but also honeyed pecans, or honeyed nuts more generally. Alexandre Desplat’s score for the film ‘Birth.’ A canned oat milk latte (quite expensive but whatever) when it’s very hot outside. Attempting to read poetry. Karl Ove Knausgaard. Helen Garner, and discussing Helen Garner with the many people who deeply love Helen Garner. The way children and young people say “mid” instead of “middling.” Collecting sea glass. Another Helen: Frankenthaler.

Pineapple upside down cake. Marlon Williams. Malachite. Store-bought marinara. Carmen Herrera.

2021
Oatmeal for breakfast. Annie Ross, with a particular fondness for "You and Me Baby." Egrets. Sharpened pencils. "Vorrei spiegarvi, oh Dio!" Robert Colescott. Murder, She Wrote, though it's very hard to find it these days, which is a terrible disappointment.

2020
Erik Satie. The Purple Rose of Cairo. The soundtrack to Phantom Thread. Nixon in China ("I speak according to the book!"). Dr. Bronner's almond soap. Earl Grey. Sol Lewitt.

Swan Lake. Mozart's horn concerto #3. Emmylou Harris. Rachel Ingalls. Bookforum. Smitten Kitchen's new cookbook. The New York Times Crossword Puzzle app. This method of cooking polenta by soaking the cornmeal overnight to eliminate lumps. Thomas Gainsborough. Barnett Newman. Alexander Calder. Keeping puff pastry in the freezer at all times. Thinking about Anita Brookner.

Looking at auction lots but never bidding on them. Rereading short stories I loved twenty years ago when I was an undergraduate (Lorrie Moore, Amy Hempel, those early George Saunders stories). Balthus. David Hockney, with the exception of those stupid iPhone paintings. Keith Haring. The original Law and Order when the cast was Lenny/Mike and McCoy/Kincaid.

2019
Willa Cather. Mary McCarthy. Thomas Mann. I read Buddenbrooks while lying on a beach in Hawaii, and I like to imagine that I am the only person in that book's long life to have ever read it while on vacation in Hawaii, but who knows. JG Ballard. Laurie Colwin. Thomas Hardy. I once read an entire William Gaddis novel, which I consider quite an achievement. I made it to the fourth volume of Proust before giving up for reasons I can't now recall.

The Smiths. Talking Heads. Bill Callahan, who is also known as Smog, and Joni Mitchell, and Fiona Apple. Blossom Dearie, and not just because her name is Blossom Dearie, and Eydie Gorme, whose Spanish language recordings were a significant source of inspiration when I was writing my book, and Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto, even though I know it's a bit dramatic. I love Monn's cello concerto in G minor more than anything else Jacqueline du Pre recorded. I love how Morrissey used to keep flowers in his back pocket. I'm very charmed by this short video about a group of musicians performing John Adams in an old garage. It's a beautiful piece of music, one of my favorite.