Richard Price's 'Lazarus Man' Follows The Aftermath Of A Building Collapse

Summary

Podcast Summary: All Of It with Alison Stewart – Richard Price’s 'Lazarus Man'

Episode Title: Richard Price's 'Lazarus Man' Follows The Aftermath Of A Building Collapse
Release Date: August 1, 2025
Host: Alison Stewart
Podcast: All Of It
Description: ALL OF IT is a show about culture and its consumers, engaging thinkers, doers, makers, and creators to explore the what and why of their work.

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Introduction to Richard Price and 'Lazarus Man'

In this episode of All Of It, hosted by Alison Stewart, acclaimed author and screenwriter Richard Price discusses his latest novel, Lazarus Man. Known for capturing the essence of New York City in his works like The Wanderers and Lush Life, Price delves into the intricacies of East Harlem through the lens of a tragic building collapse.

Notable Quote:
"Lazarus Man is a book about second chances and a colorful portrait of life in East Harlem." – Alison Stewart [00:09]

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Setting and Inspiration

Lazarus Man is set in East Harlem during 2008, a pivotal year for Price personally, as it marked his relocation to the neighborhood. The novel centers around the catastrophic collapse of a tenement building, resulting in numerous casualties, injuries, and missing persons. This event serves as the catalyst for the intertwining lives of four main characters: Mary, Felix, Royal, and Anthony.

Key Points:

• Mary: A community affairs officer grappling with a divorce while desperately searching for a missing resident.
• Felix: A newcomer and street photographer documenting the aftermath.
• Royal: A funeral home director opportunistically leveraging the tragedy to promote his services.
• Anthony: A survivor pulled from the rubble more than 24 hours after the collapse, symbolizing a rebirth.

Notable Quote:
"It's about what's going on in his mind after he's found. And I don't want to say any more, you know, because we'll save it for the end." – Richard Price [10:35]

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Richard Price’s Personal Connection and Research

Price shares his personal experiences during an actual building collapse near his residence, which inspired the novel's setting and events. Living a short distance from the collapse site, he spent hours observing the chaos, crowds, and first responders, capturing the human element amidst disaster.

Notable Quote:
"I spent a couple of hours just watching the crowds... by reflex, people with their cell phones are like photojournalists." – Richard Price [01:57]

He emphasizes his focus on small, nuanced details rather than grand narratives, seeking to portray the genuine reactions and interactions of people affected by the tragedy.

Research Efforts:

• Eyewitness Accounts: Connected with an EMT who witnessed the collapse.
• Interviews with Cops: Gained insights into the challenges of identifying and locating missing individuals.
• Community Engagement: Interacted with local funeral directors to authentically represent their roles.

Notable Quote:
"Write what you know. But what do you know when you're young, you know, and I would just go out. Hang out, learn that. And that becomes part of what you know." – Richard Price [20:06]

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Character Development and Narrative Structure

Price discusses the complexity of writing multiple perspectives, drawing parallels to ensemble films like those of Robert Altman. Each character’s storyline progresses in tandem, reflecting the interconnected nature of the community.

Notable Quote:
"It's like beboping, you know, I mean, it sounds like scatter, but there is pattern beneath the scatter." – Richard Price [27:02]

Character Insights:

• Mary: Explores the personal and professional struggles of a cop maintaining community relations.
• Felix: Represents the artistic eye capturing the transient moments of disaster.
• Royal: Highlights the opportunistic side of community services.
• Anthony: Embodies survival and the psychological aftermath of trauma.

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Exploring Themes of Community and Identity

Price delves into the essence of Harlem, emphasizing its vibrant, engaging community where interaction is a cornerstone. Moving to Harlem in 2008, he learned the importance of community engagement and the nuanced social dynamics that define the neighborhood.

Notable Quote:
"This is the most engaging neighborhood I've ever lived in in terms of eye contact and people's being willing. You just say hi, and they tell you the story." – Richard Price [07:07]

He contrasts Harlem’s openness with other parts of Manhattan, highlighting the neighborhood’s unique character and the deep sense of belonging among its residents.

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Authenticity in Portraying Professions

When discussing Royal, the funeral home director, Price emphasizes the authenticity of his portrayal by immersing himself in the lives of actual funeral directors in Harlem. This research ensured a realistic depiction of the profession, balancing the gravity of the role with moments of humor and humanity.

Notable Quote:
"I hung out with black funeral directors in Harlem... I believe in osmosis." – Richard Price [18:55]

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Audience Interaction and Writing Style

During the episode, audience members posed questions about Price’s writing techniques, including his use of run-on sentences and the development of peripheral characters. Price attributes his unique writing style to his personal experiences and a natural, unfiltered stream of consciousness.

Notable Quote:
"My mind is a run on sentence." – Richard Price [24:10]

He also discusses the importance of peripheral characters in enriching the narrative, ensuring they are memorable and contribute depth to the main storyline.

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Conclusion and Final Thoughts

As the conversation wraps up, Price reflects on the thematic elements of his novel, particularly the struggles and resilience of his characters in their personal relationships. He underscores the balance between personal growth and communal bonds, illustrating how each character's journey interweaves with the collective experience of East Harlem.

Notable Quote:
"One thing, I mean, one thing I haven't seen in your work earlier to this extent is... negotiations around sex were just... hilarious and tragic comic. Frequently." – Alison Stewart [28:39]

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Closing Notes:

This episode of All Of It offers an in-depth exploration of Richard Price’s Lazarus Man, revealing the thoughtful research and personal experiences that shape his portrayal of East Harlem. Through engaging discussions and insightful questions, listeners gain a deeper understanding of Price’s narrative choices and the rich, multifaceted characters that bring his novel to life.

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Additional Resources:

• Book Club Selection: January Get Lit with All Of It Book Club – Lazarus Man by Richard Price
• Live Event: Sold-out session at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library featuring Richard Price
• Audience Participation: Over 3,273 New Yorkers checked out the e-copy through the New York Public Library

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This summary was crafted based on the provided transcript of the podcast episode. For a more immersive experience, listeners are encouraged to tune into the full episode of All Of It on WNYC.

Transcript

[Alison Stewart]

You are listening to all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. Author and screenwriter Richard Price has spent his career capturing snapshots of New York City in novels like the Wanderers, Lush Life, and now his latest novel, Lazarus Man. It was our choice for our January get lit with all of it book club. Richard's new novel is set in east Harlem in 2008. It tells the story of the aftermath of a tenement building collapse that leaves many dead, injured or missing. Central to the novel are four characters whose lives are affected by this tragedy. There's Mary, a community affairs cop who becomes determined to locate a missing resident of the collapsed building. She's also in the midst of a divorce. She's not really sure what she wants. Then there's Felix, a newcomer to the neighborhood and a photographer who is on the scene capturing the aftermath of the collapse. Also on the scene is Royal, a funeral home director who uses this moment to advertise his services. And finally, there is Anthony, a man who is pulled out of the rubble of the building more than 24 hours after the collapse. Miraculously, he, he is still alive. Lazarus man is a book about second chances and a colorful portrait of life in East Harlem. Richard Price joined us for a sold out event at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library. Let's listen now to our conversation of our January get lit with all of it book club event. You told us you came on the show earlier this month and you said that there was a building collapse that was near where you lived. And you told us you spent a day just watching. What were you watching for?

[Richard Price]

I lived on, I do live on 129th and the building collapses on 116th, two blocks east. And the boom, it just went right through my body. And I don't know, I just went there and the building already had collapsed. I was, it couldn't get too close, but I spent a couple of hours just watching the crowds. And you know, that whole municipal block party, you know, EMS and fdny, ABC and dce, it was just. And just listening to people and watching, you know, how people moved and they would do this thing that you couldn't see what you're doing because of the rise of, I want to say detritus, but you know, just the ash that was coming up. But people had their phones out like this, like, it's like they were hailing a cab. And by reflex, people, everybody with a cell phone's a photojournalist. And. But by reflex, you know, because we do this now, they were going like this, like a searchlight, looking for an image. I'm just small things. I just focus on small things. And after the that day, I found a video that somebody took. I tracked down the guy who made the video. He lived right across the street and he was an emt, but he wasn't working that day. And I just got his eyewitness. Then it went to the cops. What was their experience that day? I just went to anybody who would have me, which is my usual mo.

[Alison Stewart]

Did you have your author hat on at that point?

[Richard Price]

Not really. But I told him I'm writing a novel and I am a card carrying novelist. So it wasn't like I'm thinking about writing my first book, you know, so you know that. But I also had friends that, you know, there was a couple of cops I knew one of them was supervising, looking for people that they could, you know, you have a building like that, it's Maybe you have 12 apartments and the rent rolls say there are 30 people or 40 people, but a lot of people. You don't know who else was in that building. You don't know who left before. You don't know if, you know they had their daughter and granddaughter sleeping over because the daughter had a fight with her husband or boyfriend or whatever. Somebody. The person on the rent rolls actually died three years earlier, but they didn't want to tell the landlord and all their relatives moved in. You don't know who was there. Just like ghost tenants. It's like double the number on the rolls. And now you gotta find all these people and you look at all CCC cameras, okay, you see people leaving the building beforehand, but then you see people going in right before they're not coming out. And just the whole thing, how a neighborhood, it was just how a neighborhood copes, how people cope.

[Alison Stewart]

Why did you want to set it in 2008?

[Richard Price]

That's a good question. I didn't want to deal with a lot of political moments of the moment. I didn't want to write about Obama, I didn't want to write about Trump. I didn't want to write about Black lives Matter, Blue lives matter. I just. And 2008 was the year that I moved to Harlem. And the Harlem that was is no longer. The Harlem that I saw in 2008 is no longer there. It was just a time just by instinct. I just didn't want to deal with politics. I didn't want to deal with current events. I didn't want to be a newspaper.

[Alison Stewart]

You told me that when you moved to Harlem in 2008, that you felt like you had a lot to learn. What did you feel you had to learn about the neighborhood?

[Richard Price]

Every time New York City, if you move five blocks, you're in a different city. I forgot who told me this, but they said, or I read it in the papers. Somebody said they moved literally five blocks away from where they lived. And after about a month, they came back to that five block area because they needed to use the laundromat. And somebody said, you're back. You know, I mean, it's like this. Well, who's New York City? Is it. Is it Louis Auchensloss, New York City? Is it my New York City? Is it Spike Lee's New York City? Is it Whit Stillman's New York City? I mean, there's a billion New York Cities, and yes. So I moved to Harlem, and it's like I moved to the city of Harlem where I'd never lived before.

[Alison Stewart]

What about the city of Harlem? Did you know that you had to get right in Lazarus, man?

[Richard Price]

Oh, well, yeah, everything. I mean, not everything. It just. Well, one big difference. In all the other places I've lived in Manhattan, you're on the street, somebody's coming the other way. You don't make eye contact. In Harlem, you make eye contact, you nod your head, hello. Somebody talks to you, you speak back. It's rude. You know, you're passing somebody. I just remember the first day that we moved in on 118th street in Atlantic. I was walking. Sorry. To the end of the block to cross the street, and there was a woman there, and she had a walker, and she was there every day and being like, from different neighborhoods. I didn't look at her. And this woman, right after we passed, she said, good morning. You're supposed to say. And I just elevated. Oh, good morning, good morning. How are you? Can I marry you? You know, I had to learn manners. Oddly enough, people think of Harlem is like, rough or its reputation is rough, but I had to learn manners. I had to. This is. This is the most engaging neighborhood I've ever lived in in terms of eye contact and people's being willing. It's like Dublin. You just say hi, and they tell you the story of the Iliad in Gaelic. It was. You talk to people on the street. It's different. With a head nod, at least. It's absolutely. You are on the street, they're on the street. You engage. This isn't Gramercy Park. This isn't even the West Village. This isn't Dumbo. Soho, Boho. You know, this is. I mean, I walk from my house across the street to. To get a carton of milk. I come back with, like, you know, six scenes for a play.

[Alison Stewart]

The four characters in the book, Anthony, Mary, Felix, and Royal. Who is the hardest to write?

[Richard Price]

Anthony. I mean, I don't know how to answer this quickly without telling people who each is. The four characters. One guy's a funeral director. That's. Funeral director is failing because people are not dying to get in. One woman is a community affairs officer based in East Harlem who's there to talk to people and work with missing persons. One guy is a photographer who lives right across the street, is a kid from upstate New York. And the fourth character, Anthony, who gets trapped in the collapse. And like, two days later, after the cadaver dogs have been through and everybody went over that rubble with a fine tooth comb and a telescope, periscope, microscope, stethoscope. All of a sudden, they find him, and it's a miracle. And he has. He. It's about what's going on in his mind after he's found. And I don't want to say any more, you know, because we'll save it for the end. He's the Ajita guy. I mean, he's, you know, angel and devil shoulders.

[Alison Stewart]

What was your process on deciding when to switch between each character's point of view?

[Richard Price]

I just developed a rhythm of just. I mean, Spike Lee's was interested in the rights to the film, rights to this book. And I could see it because, like, do the right thing. It was a drifting. It's an ensemble. It is no hero. You know, there's no. It's just people living, and you're shifting from one character to another character. Also, like a Robert Altman film, like Nashville or mash, you know, you're just constantly shifting. Everybody's like, shift. Ships passing in the night. And, you know, I got to a point, I just kept people abreast of things. They don't know each other, or they marginally know each other, or they get to know each other, or they barely interact. But it's four perspectives, and each person's story kind of climbs in parallels. And I like to just go back and forth a lot. That being said, one of the things that I hate is when I get reviews. You say, well, you know, his screenwriter skills were at play. I was writing like this. I wrote four books before I wrote my first screenplay. It's like, no, that's me. You know, it's not what I've Learned as a screenwriter. That's how I like to write. It goes fast.

[Alison Stewart]

Let's talk about Mary. She's a cop. She works in the public information office. What did you want to explore about the relationship between cops and the neighborhood?

[Richard Price]

And specifically through Mary, her, what they call the rabbi. Her rabbi, which is her mentor, figured out he's going to assign her to community affairs. You just go where people get pissed off and there's danger of things escalating. And that's her job is to. People know her. She knows people. She knows the neighborhood. She's Irish. She doesn't differentiate between races of people. She never makes things worse. And her job, basically, is to calm people down. And she gets paid for that.

[Alison Stewart]

We get a little taste of her personal life, and she and her husband, who she separated from, and he confides in her that the kids think that she is afraid of them.

[Richard Price]

Well, she never wanted to have kids. But, you know, like, you know, I'm supposed to have kids because I'm a woman. And, you know, I just want to write about a cop where it's not like copy, you know? Yeah. Not like tough street wisdom or capturing somebody or chasing somebody. I mean, God forbid somebody even touches their gun. It's about as domestic as I can make a cop in any book I've ever written, because I don't want to be called a crime writer ever.

[Alison Stewart]

Yeah, why not?

[Richard Price]

Because the thing about genres is they have a formula. And so in genres, there's nothing wrong with genres. There's fantastic writers in every genre. But in a. In a certain type of book, this happens and this happens and this happens, and it's a. It's. It's a pattern that's mostly obeyed. And it's like, it's not enough, you know, I mean, look at Dashiell Hammett or Raymond Chandler or Octavia Butler in science fiction. I mean. I mean, a lot of people feel like genres are bull because, you know, it's literature, but it feels to me like a cubbyhole.

[Alison Stewart]

Felix. Felix. Why did you want to make Felix a photographer?

[Richard Price]

Because I love street photography. And he's this upstate kid, and he's living in a brownstone back in the day. This is another reason why I made it 2008. Back in the day, these brownstones were cut up into, like, mini apartments. And, like, the brownstone next to mine, when I moved in, there was, like, 10 guys living there. They each had, like, a kitchenette, and, you know, they hung out. And then all of a sudden, real estate wants what it wants, you know. And one by one, they. It was the last time like a brownstone was used like that when you can get so much money, if you get them out of there and sort of rejig this place. And he, but. And he knows that these guys who live in the building with him, I mean most of them are gray market people, like burning CDs with somebody or make somebody dies in the culture. But the next day they sell them T shirts on the street, you know, Michael Jackson with angel wings. They're hustlers. They're hustlers. They're not illegals. They're just in the gray market, you know, you got to be inventive to survive. And it was a snapshot at the end of an era of a community and a building. It's hard to find a building like that.

[Alison Stewart]

What photographers do you like? Do you like Ouija? Do you like Elliot?

[Richard Price]

Yeah, Ouija's the cliche. But I love Ouija. I love me some Ouija. Yeah, but. Oh God, so many. It's like, like when I was in 11th grade, my quote unquote guidance counselor making a profile of me said, what was the last book you read? And I read so voraciously that I said, native Son by Richard Wright. And she wrote it down. It was one of 50 books. The next year as a senior, she said, what was the last book that you read? I said, native Son. And she started. She said, you're a liar. You said that last year. I said, I'll get it. A life. You know, how long do you have to live? Give you an hour. But anyways, it was like that. You asked me a question like, who's your favorite photographer? I mean, there's so many different types of photographers. Bruce Davidson, the German portraitist, August Sander. I always mess up his name. I want to say Mikimoto. He's a Japanese photographer who does 24 hour exposed light on a theater screen or on an ocean. Sugimoto. I was gonna say Mikimoto. Oh, no. Oh, that's a guy that sells pearls. Anyway, but so I'm Malik Sibaday, who was Malian, like society portraitist, had worked out of a studio. James Van Der Zee, this guy Joseph Rodriguez, who did all these shots, he was driving a cab at 4:40 in the morning in the late 80s. He would go past when the leather bars were closing down and you know, and the drag bars were closing down. He would do portraits of the people hailing him. Cool. And he didn't get his head handed to him. I mean, just there you go. And my favorite photographer is Richard Wright, who photographed native sons.

[Alison Stewart]

Let's talk about royal and funeral directors. There's a lot of great graphic, sometimes funny details about being a funeral director. What research did you do into it? What'd you learn?

[Richard Price]

I hung out with black funeral directors in Harlem, traditional funeral directors, and got a feel, you know, some guys were more inviting me into their world and you know, other people were very paranoid or protective. Like, who is this guy? He, he says he's writing a book. What do I know? He might be working for the health department. I got pretty friendly with a couple of guys and you know, just simply, I believe in osmosis. I believe in, you know, the thing is when the, the boilerplate thing you learn in the creative writing classes. Write about what you know. But what do you know when you're young, you know, you know, and I would be, you know, Thomas McGuain. This is things I always say. Thomas McGuain said, I've done a lot of horrible things in my life, but I never taught creative writing. Well, I did. I mean, I just, I lost my train of thought.

[Alison Stewart]

That's all right. I just asked you what you learned from funeral directors.

[Richard Price]

Oh, so, you know, so what I learned my first four books I wrote myself into a corner because it was all self referential, Every, every character was a stand in for me. So hey, guess what? I'm 30 and I got four novels out and, and you know, my, my experience is like elephant ears, you know, leaving a casino bust. And that's why I went to do screenplays for eight years, just to cleanse my palate. And I had enough great food to sorbet and I came back. And when Clockers happened, I saw a housing project in Jersey City that was built at the same time. But this is the height of the crack epidemic and it was like a tiger cage and it freaked me out and had my own drug problems in the past and all of a sudden I wanted to learn. So write about what you know. I don't know that much. Well, go out. What are you interested in? Go out, hang out, learn that. And that becomes part of what you know. What else, what else, what else, what else? You know, it's like, I always say it's like trying to empty the ocean with a colander. You know, it's like there's a whole world out there. You know, it's not about, you know, seeing your parents at Thanksgiving and, you know, being happy, but by the second day you were in a Rage. And the third day, your girlfriend dumped you, and then you couldn't wait to get back to the dorm. So, I mean, that's the story. I got 40 stories like that.

[Alison Stewart]

You're listening to my conversation with author Richard Price about his new novel Lazarus Man. It was our January get lit with all of it book club selection. We'll hear more from Richard and hear some questions from our audience after a quick break. This is all of It. You are listening to all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. We continue my conversation with Richard Price, author of the new book Lazarus Man. It was our January get lit with all of it book club selection. Thanks to our partners at the New York Public Library, 3,273 New Yorkers were able to check out an E copy to read along with us. As always, our audience had great questions for our author. We'll get to some of those in just a minute. But first, here's more of my conversation with Richard Price. All right, we're at Anthony. There's so much we can discuss about Anthony. He gets pulled out of the rubble. He finds he's really good speaking to people. Speaking to people.

[Richard Price]

Really feels like he's been reborn, you know?

[Alison Stewart]

Does he believe what he's saying?

[Richard Price]

Read the book.

[Alison Stewart]

I did. Twice.

[Richard Price]

So there.

[Alison Stewart]

What do you think?

[Richard Price]

What do you think? What do I think? Does he believe what he says? Yeah, I think he believes what he's saying, but that doesn't mean everything is true.

[Alison Stewart]

Why are people so moved by his words? Even if someone might consider his words trite?

[Richard Price]

Well, you know, some of the reviews I thought what I wrote for him to say, he becomes sort of like a motivational speaker. And he speaks at funerals and he speaks at Stop the Violence rallies. And I thought I wrote beautiful speeches for him. And then the reviews came out. He says, well, this is a genius because Price purposefully put all these trite blah blahs in there. What are you talking about? I brought myself to tears. You know, trite. You're trite. Where's your novel?

[Alison Stewart]

Let's take some audience questions. Let me see if I've got. There we go. I see a gentleman in the back.

[Richard Price]

There's a hand in the back there on the right. I do.

[Alison Stewart]

And he's got a microphone. There we are. Hello, sir.

[Richard Price]

I used to be a school teacher.

[Alison Stewart]

I don't need a microphone, I don't think. Can you talk a little bit about the beauty and the danger of run on sentences?

[Richard Price]

No, Period. I mean, my first perfect answer. My first paragraph is one sentence. And I didn't realize it was one sentence, you know, because it just kept coming to me. Come on, go on. You know, throw a semicolon in there. Or wait, wait, Colin, I don't know, comma, what, you know, and it just kept going. I'm not saying it was. I don't want to be romantic about it or magical about it, but I wasn't purposefully trying for a run on style. It just happened because it's like my mind is a run on sentence.

[Alison Stewart]

All right, I see Simon back there.

[Richard Price]

Great, thank you. You create these, I'm going to call them peripheral characters. They don't necessarily move the story, but they color the narrative. Like Ellis and Tony G. The kid, the guy on the stoop. And I'm wondering, do they come to you like in whole cloth? Because you give these vivid descriptions of them. You know, first of all, in a way, almost every character is peripheral. I mean, because, I mean, there are four key characters that you follow. But I mean, the whole book is matter of fact, you know, and in the process of writing, okay, he lives, Felix lives in the building, one of the last kitchenette SROs, and in that section of Harlem. I mean, all of a sudden these guys are on the stoop and once again. And they're talking and. But the thing with peripheral characters, just don't put them in once because then it feels really like peripheral. I mean, return to them like there's a woman who claims to be Prince's mother holding court on a street. I mean, I had to come back to her. And second time I came back to her, it's the same lady, but now she's claiming to be Senator Obama's sister. I mean, just peripheral is twice for me, but also the characters. I mean, give them as much life as you can for the brief time that they're on the stage.

[Alison Stewart]

Thanks so much. I wanted to ask about, you know, it seems like all four characters struggle throughout the book with their. With their romantic relationships in different ways, and they're kind of collapsing and rebuilding. And, you know, even Felix has this very short relationship with this woman he kind of meets casually. So I wanted to know what the. You know, that was kind of a theme throughout the book. And I wonder if you could talk more about that decision and what that represented in the book.

[Richard Price]

Well, it's like if Mary struggles, she's having an affair with another cop, but she's kind of half living with her soon to be divorced husband. Then I thought I wanted Anthony when he gets out good things start happening to him and he meets this woman who listens. All of a sudden he goes, well, what's. Well, what's Felix up to? I mean, sometimes these things just evolve on the page. I mean, it's not magic, like I said, but one character's spending a night with another person begets like, is rondelet a right word? All four of them are doing stuff that night with other people of a not exact nature, but similar nature. It just evolves like that. It's like beboping, you know, I mean, it sounds like scatter, but there is pattern beneath the scatter. One thing, I mean, one thing I haven't seen in your work earlier to this extent is. And this comes from like the. Write what you know or research what you don't know. A whole so many really funny, sad, human bad sex scenes or scenes of people sort of trying and deciding not to have sex. Just the negotiations around sex were just. I don't think I've ever seen it that real and that like hilarious and tragic comic. Frequently. And I was wondering, you can't like ask people about, I don't know, like, how. Where is that.

[Alison Stewart]

Wait, where does the.

[Richard Price]

Have. I had trouble getting laid? Is that what you're saying? I mean, it's just stuff you pick up as you age or like, I mean, listen, what is this, the National Enquirer? No, I mean, listen, you live long enough, you've been in all kinds of scenarios. It's not like I have to go out and google bad sex or great sex or like, stop start sex or almost sex or did I have a good time last night? Sex, you know, it's just life, you know, and you just, you know, listen, I'm 30 years old now. I've lived a long life. Listen, you live. The more life you live, the more you know, just by osmosis. Just. You don't even have to think about it. It's all in your head. And what you forget is not that important.

[Alison Stewart]

We've got time probably for one or two more questions.

[Richard Price]

Can you talk a little bit about Anthony's father? I'm sorry, say again? Can you talk a little bit about Anthony's father and his role in the novel? Can I talk about Anthony's. Anthony Carter? He's, like I said, he's in his early 40s and of a mixed marriage. His mother's from black funeral home money in the South. His father is an Irish Italian, pugnacious race warrior. Like, he's the guy that wants credit for getting punched by a cop or hit by a cop at a rally. He's the loud liberator of of a race that's not his. All of which is to say, no matter, like I said, no matter how many rallies you show up, no, no matter how many fists you raise in solidarity or how many creative writing classes you teach in prison, you know you're white. You know when the car gets stopped, you're white. You cannot be black by connection. Just because you have mixed race kids and a black wife does not make you anything but white. You might know more than the average bear for Caucasian, but you know, because of your experience, but you're white. Oh, by the way, he teaches African American history.

[Alison Stewart]

Of course.

[Richard Price]

That's like Dalton.

[Alison Stewart]

That was my conversation with Richard Price, author of the new book Lazarus Man. It was our January get lit with all of it book club selection. Coming up next, we'll hear a special live performance from jazz trumpeter Anthony Hervey. Stay with us. Did you know Tide has been upgraded to provide an even better clean in cold water? Tide is specifically designed to fight any stain you throw at it, even in cold butter. Yep. Chocolate ice cream. Sure thing. Barbecue sauce. Tide's got you covered. You don't need to use warm water. Additionally, Tide pods let you confidently fight tough stains with new coldzyme technology. Just remember, if it's gotta be clean, it's gotta be Tide. NYC now delivers the most up to date local news from WNYC and Gothamist every morning, midday and evening. With three updates a day. Listeners get breaking news, top headlines and in depth coverage from across New York City by sponsoring programming like NYC Now. You'll reach our community of dedicated listeners with premium messaging and an uncluttered audio experience. Visit sponsorship.wnyc.org to get in touch and find out more.