AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Who gets to call themself an artist? What even is art? These are just a couple of the questions driving a new novel by Dave Eggers called "Contrapposto." It's a story about a man named Cricket, his devotion to art and his lifelong commitment to a woman who always remains just out of his reach. Olympia glides in and out of Cricket's life, the two of them forever bonded by their mutual dedication to art, even as their love changes over time. Even as they each carve their own path inside the art world, navigating its rules, hypocrisies and power dynamics. Dave Eggers joins me now in person to talk about his new book. Welcome back to NPR West, Dave.
DAVE EGGERS: Hey. That was really good, Ailsa. That was...
CHANG: (Laughter).
EGGERS: I was like, boy, that's a good description of the book.
CHANG: Oh, I'm so glad. I nailed it?
EGGERS: It's too late to put it on the back cover.
CHANG: (Laughter).
EGGERS: But, man.
CHANG: Thank you.
EGGERS: No, you always get it better than anybody else, so thank you.
CHANG: Oh, I don't deserve that. But thank you so much. No, I so enjoyed this book, especially reading about the friendship and love between Cricket and Olympia. It's the story - the way you tell it, it spans several decades in this book. But over the decades, what remains the same is they don't end up together, at least not in the conventional sense of coupledom. Why is that? What keeps them apart? How would you characterize that?
EGGERS: Well, I think that he's, for the most part, ready to - even when there's 8 and 9 years old, he's ready to...
CHANG: Yeah. I'm all in.
EGGERS: Yeah, she is his sun and moon, and he's ready to, you know, revolve around her forever. And - 'cause she's so compelling, I think...
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: ...That she's just, like, such a force of nature and so...
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: ...Brilliant. And also, she sees things in him that he doesn't see, and she wants things for him that he wouldn't ever imagine. And so maybe they're not in the right place at the right time in their lives. She's always maybe searching for something maybe a little more glittery than he is, I think.
CHANG: Yeah. Yeah.
EGGERS: He's a kid from rural Indiana that doesn't have any sort of glamour to him, really. He's dependable. He's solid. He's steady. He loves her unconditionally, but maybe that's not enough for her.
CHANG: Right. Well, as Cricket and Olympia's relationship with each other ebbs and flows over the years, so does their relationship to art. And in this book, you explore the question - what does it even mean to be an artist? How do you think Cricket and Olympia answer that question differently, even though they are both, arguably, committed to art?
EGGERS: Yeah. Well, I think that it's a central question because Cricket has more sort of natural talent as a draftsperson, as a painter. Olympia knows the landscape of the business of art...
CHANG: Yes.
EGGERS: ...Inside and out.
CHANG: Yes.
EGGERS: Very comfortable. This is just water that she feels very comfortable swimming in. And he never gets comfortable that way.
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: So there's a part where she has a show for him, puts on a show in a gallery. And it just becomes this, like, incredibly nightmarish experience for him.
CHANG: Oh, he hates it. He's so uncomfortable.
EGGERS: But, you know, because there are so many little compromises even to put on that show in a small gallery...
CHANG: Right.
EGGERS: ...In a town like Chicago. And so I thought he was interesting to explore just because I think we all know those folks that are - like, maybe the most talented musician you've ever known has never played outside their garage...
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: ...Because they just can't get through the thicket of, you know, all of...
CHANG: The industry.
EGGERS: The industry part and...
CHANG: The market.
EGGERS: Yeah.
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: And, you know, the personal relationships and managing all that stuff. And also, visual art is really unique in that to really make it, make a living, often you're selling very expensive works to a very few people. It can get very elitist and exclusive.
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: With a book, everybody can afford the book at $28, and it's very egalitarian and democratized. Visual art, for the most part, is like, well, here's my hundred-thousand-dollar painting. If I make six of these a year, I can make a living and send my kids to school.
CHANG: Sure.
EGGERS: So it's...
CHANG: But it's still got to fit in somebody's...
EGGERS: (Laughter).
CHANG: ...Particular room in their particular mansion (laughter).
EGGERS: Yeah, it has to match the couch and the accent wall. It's really weird. And I still love it. I still draw and paint all the time.
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: And I show my work in a very small gallery, and we do our thing and try to make it affordable on prints and stuff like that. But to really - on a certain scale that Olympia's on, it is really a different world that's unlike any other.
CHANG: I mean, Olympia seems to have made peace with aspects of the art world that Cricket disdains, like the industrial complex of it all, the gallery openings, the marketing, the elitism. And you mentioned, you know, you're a visual artist. In fact, you included many of your own sketches in this book. Is Cricket's jadedness a closer reflection of your own experience in the art world? Is that a little bit of you I'm seeing there?
EGGERS: No. You know, I'm a little bit - I've never really had to struggle with the discomfort of the scale of, like, there's an artist in the book named Kyle that really...
CHANG: Yes.
EGGERS: ...Is at the top of the pyramid, but he's so burdened by so many obligations and...
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: ...Lawsuits and...
CHANG: Right.
EGGERS: ...A hundred staff members, and he becomes a manager instead of, you know?
CHANG: Exactly. He's just a coordinator.
EGGERS: Yeah.
CHANG: An orchestrator, yeah.
EGGERS: Yeah, and, you know, you think that that's what you want. And if you can handle it, then that's great. But...
CHANG: He's so far away, though, from the process of making.
EGGERS: I know. And I think sometimes you find yourself lost. You don't even know where that original place of happiness was, you know?
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: And so I have a more balanced, kind of mellow relationship to it than...
CHANG: And...
EGGERS: ...I think Cricket and Olympia are struggling with.
CHANG: That is what I'm ultimately so curious about with respect to you, because you talk about how you be an artist while being content, while living and building just a life.
EGGERS: Yeah.
CHANG: So how do you do it, Dave Eggers? Like, how do you hold on to the simple joy of creation even as the industrial complex threatens to challenge that joy? How do you hang on to the simple happiness of creation?
EGGERS: Well, I think the book world is really unique in that it is by nature, like, a much calmer place, let's say. You get to write alone. I write on a boat under the Golden Gate Bridge, and I'm just sitting alone with the...
CHANG: Oh, my God, I'd get so seasick (laughter).
EGGERS: Yeah. And when it's rough, it's - I get used to it. But, you know, so I figured, OK, that's a good place to work. And then when you have - you know, all the people in the book world are kind of, like, there for - this is a "Bachelor" quote - there for the right reasons. And so - I like to quote "The Bachelor" every time I can.
(LAUGHTER)
EGGERS: But, you know, it's a very calm place, and so everyone is really, you know, devoted to books. And then you get to share this one object, you know, with each reader, and it's a really intimate one-on-one relationship. And so when you get to meet the readers as you travel around, it's such a beautiful kind of symbiosis. Like, we're - we don't exist without them. And they share. You know, a reader is a participant. They're the cinematographer, narrator...
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: ...Of your book, really.
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: So you want to know how they felt about it and what they added to it or got out of it. And so - and then there aren't the equivalent, really, of these, like, pretentious openings in New York or wherever, where people aren't necessarily there for the work, but for some other reason. So...
CHANG: Book launch parties are not as insufferable? (Laughter).
EGGERS: Well, I actually do avoid book launch parties. I haven't done one of those in 25 years. So there are certain things you do start ruling out as you get older. You're like, you know what? I really don't enjoy that part of this...
CHANG: Yeah.
EGGERS: ...So I'm going to excise that.
CHANG: You curate, so to speak.
EGGERS: You curate.
CHANG: Dave Eggers' new book is called "Contrapposto." Thank you so much, Dave, for coming into NPR West again and sharing this time with me.
EGGERS: I'm so grateful. Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF DAVID AXELROD'S "HOLY THURSDAY") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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