Interviews
A Q&A with the Author:
1) What gave you the impetus to write the book?
It seems to me we're living in a time of "extreme capitalism," where the marketplace rules as never before. We're living in a time when almost everything (news, politics, advertising, the computer revolution) is a form of entertainment. And we're obviously living in a time when the culture generally, thanks to technology and the aging of the baby boomers and the end of the Cold War and feminism and a hundred other reasons, is in a state of thrilling, terrifying flux and newness. All those seemed rich, ripe terrains on which to stake out a big, realistic, funny, social novel. I hadn't seen contemporary business or a certain kind of modern marriage drawn very knowingly or interestingly in fiction, and I thought I might be able to do an entertaining job of it.
2) Set in the not so distant future, Turn of the Century has many futuristic inventions and events — such as computer games that incorporate biofeedback, minty-flavored Prozac for kids, civil war in Mexico. What new developments from the book do you think we'll actually see?
Of the three "inventions" you mention, one—the mint-flavored Prozac for children—-actually exists. I am thrilled that reviewers and reporters (you're not the first) assume some of the actual things in the book are fictional, and vice-versa. I think practically everything in the book could come to pass, and may. In fact, some of my inventions in earlier drafts did come to pass before I was finished, and I edited them out.
3) As a writer for The New Yorker and Time magazine, editor in chief of New York magazine, and co-creatorof Spy magazine, you've been writing and editing for years, but this is your first novel. How does writing fiction compare to nonfiction?
After 20 years of adhering scrupulously to facts, fiction-writing was discombobulating at first—I felt giddy, like gravity had changed, or as if I were committing adultery. In the end, I find writing fiction (and a 659-page book, as opposed to a 1000 or 10,000 word magazine piece) both vastly more difficult and more fun than writing non-fiction. But without those years of writing and editing week after week, I wouldn't have had the confidence in my craft to attempt a novel—nor, I don't think, the experiences worth transmuting into fiction.
4) What research did you do to be able to so realistically depict the business lives of your characters who work in television, the computer industry (both software executives and hackers), Wall Street ...?
I have some professional experience in television and online, but only some, so as I was beginning the book I spent weeks doing research in Seattle and Los Angeles and on Wall Street, hanging around with friends in the software and TV and financial businesses as they did they jobs, and asking lots and lots of stupid questions.
5) Where did you grow up? Your young children could live to see the turn of the next century — How do you think their experience and their adult lives will differ from yours?
I grew up in Omaha. And the distinct possibility that my daughters will live in the 22nd century is a fact I regularly astonish myself with. I can't pretend to have any idea what that world will be like. Well, I can pretend—in fact, at one point, this novel had an epilogue set on New Year's Eve 2099, with two of the three children in the book reminiscing about their lives and the 21st century. I do have a hunch that a hundred and two hundred years from now, the current epoch—1960-2010, say—will look pivotal.
6) Real people mingle with fictional characters in your novel. Does anyone in the book have a real-life counterpart (if you can tell us) and are you concerned about whether people will see themselves, rightly or wrongly, as the models for your characters?
In general, I am not one for doctrines, but I did begin this book with a doctrine about reality and invention—that is, I endeavored either to concoct wholly fictional people (and places and companies and TV shows and movies and inventions), or to use real people (and places and companies and TV shows and movies and inventions) as themselves. This is not a roman a clef, thinly veiled or otherwise. That said, I will confess that my good friend Jim Cramer, the financial writer and stock trader, bears a certain strong genetic resemblance to the character Ben Gould.
7) Turn of the Century highlights the cultural differences between New York, Seattle, and Los Angeles. Do you think these and other American places will come to resemble each other more in the faster-paced, more technologically-driven future, or will they maintain their distinct characters?
I think they will maintain their distinct characters, even as they become, in places, more alike. I think it's places like Omaha and Minneapolis and Houston and Atlanta that are more quickly becoming more alike—as well as more like NewYork, Seattle, and Los Angeles. And I think Washington (D.C., not State) is as close to irrelevant to the national life as it has been in this century.
copyright Kurt Andersen 1999