An Interview with Pamela Paul

Pamela Paul is the editor of The New York Times Book Review and oversees books coverage at The New York Times. She is also the host of the weekly Book Review podcast. Pamela Paul has written five books; her most recent is My Life with Bob: Flawed Heroine Keeps Book of Books, Plot Ensues. Pamela Paul has also made contributions to many notable publications including Time magazine and The Economist, as well as being a former columnist for The New York Times and Worth magazine.

Please enjoy my interview with Pamela Paul.

When someone asks you ‘what do you do for a living?’ – How do you respond?

I’m a journalist. I work as an editor full-time at The New York Times, overseeing books coverage, including editing The New York Times Book Review and overseeing daily reviews, news and features. Basically, all things books. I also host the weekly Book Review podcast for The Times. When I’m not at work, I write. When I’m reading, I write in the margins.

What are you reading at the moment?

I’m reading The Plague and I by Betty MacDonald. It was originally published in 1948 and recently reissued by the University of Washington Press. It’s a hilarious account of spending 9 months as a tuberculosis patient in a sanatorium. That probably doesn’t sound hilarious, but it is. MacDonald is mostly known today as the author of the children’s Miss Pigglewiggle books. It is hard for me to imagine anyone not adoring her.

What’s your earliest memory of reading?

I remember sitting in the bedroom I shared with my younger brother reading Busy Book by Richard Scarry when I was three or four. Reading? Maybe not reading in the strict definition of the word.  But I was reading the pictures, which meant I was on my way.

If you could encourage young people to read one book in particular, what would it be and why?

That is an impossible question for me to answer. I think young people should read books that encourage two things: empathy and imagination. Broadly speaking, I think that means reading books that lie outside your own experience, about people who are nothing like you, whether it’s a coming-of-age memoir about growing up in rural Jim Crow-era Mississippi or a novel about a lonely boy struggling at a New England boarding school. Biographies, to my mind, contain many of life’s greatest lessons. For readers, especially young readers, reading is what you do to learn how to do everything else.

What is the worst job you’ve ever had?

Working at a wine vineyard in the south of France. It sounds like the best job. It wasn’t.

Do you read as much as you’d like to?

Not even close.

What books do you feel are important reading for people on your career path and why?

For journalists, I love Follow the Story by James B. Stewart. For writers, I love On Writing by Stephen King. Most of all, it’s important to read broadly and widely and outside your comfort lane. I tend to lean towards books about what I don’t know, books outside my own experience. If you want to be a journalist and a writer, it’s important to be curious about many things, even the things you think you’re not interested in. There’s almost always something interesting there.

Is there a book that you’ve read more than once? What is it and why did you revisit it?

Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann. I first read it in my twenties and then I re-read it in my forties. I wanted to know if it would be just as stunning to read a book that Thomas Mann wrote about life at all its stages, from early adulthood to old age, when he was only 25. I wanted to know it would hold up once I’d gone through some of those life experiences myself. And it did, and was possibly even more impressive upon rereading.

What book have you recommended the most to friends and family?

For whatever dark reason, I very often recommend two books that begin with the 2004 tsunami: the excruciating and exquisite memoir, Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala, and the impossible to categorize book, Lives Other Than My Own by Emanuel Carrere. Both books made me cry, which is something I like books to do. Also, I have been telling everyone this year that they must read Master of the Senate by Robert Caro. I realize I am late to this, but that book is as much about our political world today as it is about the mid-20th Century.

What’s your favourite genre of book?

Biography and memoir.

What do you think a world without books would be like?

I cannot even understand this question.

Is there an author whose writing you’re such a fan of, that you’ll read everything they release?

David Sedaris and Roz Chast. Slapstick is what makes me laugh most, so finding writers who do as well is harder and I deeply cherish them as a consequence.

Do you think digital books will ever completely replace real books?

Nope.

What book do you feel humanity needs right now?

Humanity just needs to read more now, period. But I’ll recommend a couple of books I read in the past year that enriched and enlightened me: The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson and How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan. And for pure pleasure and escapism, read some Wilkie Collins if you haven’t already.

What is the book that you feel has had the single biggest impact on your life?

A Journey of One’s Own: Uncommon Thoughts for the Independent Woman Traveller by Thalia Zepatos. I bought a one-way ticket to northern Thailand and lived there for nearly a year, inspired by that book. It not only changed my life, it changed my approach to life. And Wild Swans by Jung Chang, which taught me to appreciate the life I had.

Are there any books you haven’t mentioned that you feel would make your reading list?

Every book that I’ve read has made my reading list because I’ve kept a list of every book I’ve read since I was 17. Except for picture books. That felt like cheating.

What books or subject matter do you plan on reading in the next year?

I plan to read more about LBJ (specifically the fourth volume of Robert Caro’s biography), the Revolutionary War period (specifically Rick Atkinson), and the period from Reconstruction up to the beginnings of the Civil Rights movement, which I expect will include several books. I think the last is one of the most interesting and important time periods to re-examine right now.

If you were to write an autobiography – what would it be called?

I wrote a memoir a few years ago called “My Life with Bob: Flawed Heroine Keeps Book of Books, Plot Ensued.” So if I were to write a full-fledged autobiography, it would probably be called, “I Thought I’d Already Written This.”

If you’d like to learn more about Pamela Paul, you can find them on their website and Twitter.

Image credit: Tony Cenicola

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