Knowing the sound of an author’s voice can completely change your reading experience.
I just polished off David Sedaris’ “When You Are Engulfed In Flames,” a book I read entirely with his voice running through my head. Sedaris is a sort-of frequent contributor to Chicago Public Radio’s “This American Life” and thus I have heard his very distinct voice many times.
It was a bit jarring that from the very first paragraph it was as if I was listening to a book on tape. The way he punctuates the paragraphs led me through each sentence just the way he would speak it. It made me read slower, sitting over certain words and phrases and putting in pauses where he would have taken a breath between sentences.
It reminded me of an episode of Seinfeld where George says he can’t read because the voice in his head is too annoying. He then buys a popular book in the audio format, only to find that the narrator has the same annoying voice.
I didn’t mind this experience so much. What I did find odd about Sedaris’ voice is that he looks nothing like I would have expected. Click on any of the stories on this page to hear his voice.
Before I looked up his picture, I always envisioned he looked something like this.
In reality, he looks like this.
Before finding I was so very wrong, I actually thought I had a pretty good ability to translate a voice into an image. If there were records kept in this area, I would have been undefeated after hearing WAMU radio host Kojo Nnamdi and NPR’s Diane Rehm. They look exactly as I pictured them.
Okay, back to a few points about the book itself. It is a collection of anecdotes that doesn’t have a plot, yet the pieces do combine to give a sort of rounded-out picture. If you have heard his “This American Life” stuff, expect much of the same.
Early on he is talking about being at a house in Paris with some family. There is a conversation about accusing his sister of “wanting to be French.” Her husband interjects that they are in fact from the United States.
“‘Americans,’ he repeated. ‘We don’t live in France, we live in Virginia. Vienna, Virginia. Got it?’ I looked at this guy and knew for certain that if we’d met at a party he’d claim to live in Washington, D.C. Ask for a street address, and he’d look away mumbling, ‘Well, just outside D.C.'”
If you are from the D.C. area, you know this dance all too well. I went to college in Pennsylvania and used the phrase “just outside D.C.” more times that I could begin to count. No one knows where Vienna is, even though it is home to the high school of such noted alumni as myself, my brother and even my sister. “Just outside D.C.” is close enough.
Sedaris later talks about his own time living in France, during which he became fond of the spiders living in his house. He took interest in every aspect of their lives, particularly the main female, April (he named all of them).
“Why Marty or Curtis or Big Chief Tommy didn’t mate with April is a mystery, and I put it on a list beside other nagging questions, such as ‘What was Jesus like as a teenager?’ and ‘Why is it you never see a baby squirrel?'”
I understand that many of you have only read the blog since it moved to this location. But those who were around in the MySpace blog days (or read the archives I copied over) know that I agonized over the squirrel question myself. You can read my take here.
The last chunk of the book is about his quest to quit smoking. Naturally he gives a detailed description of what different cigarette brands say about a person and describes his chosen brand (Kools). I don’t know anything about cigarettes, so I appreciated his efforts to educate those in the same boat.
“For those who don’t smoke, a mild or light cigarette is like a regular one with a pinhole in it. With Kools it’s the difference between being kicked by a donkey and being kicked by a donkey that has socks on.”
Now that is a description you don’t hear very often.
I know I have written before about my affinity for John Steinbeck’s writing and his evocative descriptions of settings. He has a knack for putting you in the story, making you feel the sunshine and the breeze blowing through the trees.
Today, Sedaris made me smell a cigarette. I have been around enough smokers in my life to have a thorough knowledge of the various smells. But right now I life in a pretty smoke-free area and can’t recall the last time I had those aromas flowing through my nose. And then I read:
“Sitting there in that hot little room, I wished I’d taken the advice of my friend Janet, who filled a baby food jar with an inch of water and a half-dozen butts. This she carried around in her purse, and whenever she wanted a cigarette, she’d just unscrew the lid and take a whiff of what even the most enthusiastic smoker has to admit is pretty damn nasty.”
Now I make no judgment about smoking — if you want to, knock yourself out. In the experience of being lost in this text, this section immediately brought that smell to my nose even though there is no cigarette anywhere near where I was sitting.
It was a really strange experience, but like the book, one that I found very interesting.
