How to pronounce “benni” in English

Greg Sanders: Right. Jennifer Egan: And that was exactly the thing that he abhorred and thought was, in a way, unmusical and inhuman. And so, that idea stayed with me and I think I gave thatidea to Bennie. Greg Sanders: You gave that to Bennie. Yeah.Jennifer Egan: Yeah. Greg Sanders: Do you think that there is a punk sensibility to the novel? I mean, it's

when I figured this out I'm G to hold off I'm going to explain you just conversation I had I was down anothertime at Fort Benning Georgia and I go out to dinner with this guy as a 1999 West Point grad and we're talking aboutall the themes that I'd heard over and over you know it's been to Iraq twice and he's seen a lot of death and

so she might wind up being a great multitasker.And Ben-- I call him Bennis the Menace in the book.He's a little wise guy, and I was too.

I mean, you're directing a platoon into combat, you're trying to get the trucks out of the motor pool, you're doing these things that are action-oriented,I went down to Fort Benning in Georgia last week, and that's where they train our infantry and our armor officers.

And then I did the grandmother.My Grandma's name was Bennie.They lady on the show was named Bennie.

My Grandma's name was Bennie.They lady on the show was named Bennie.My best friend was named Ernie.

Greg Sanders: Did you have to re-tool any of the previously published stuff, or what that pretty much-- Jennifer Egan: Very little in fact, because it wasn't just a matter of trying to workhas forgotten about that moment of Bennie reminiscing.

pleasure to be introducing arena rain Irene and I first met in 2004 when wewere both studying at the Bennington writing seminars and the first story of hers i read involves students at heachieve a a Jewish religious school in New York and I liked the story a lot I

So they may not be the right place, but they're the right country.Eventually they ended up taking 3rd Ranger Battalion out of Fort Benning, and they did a jump into Objective Rhino, Kandahar Airfield.

subcultures of immigrant life in the week that followed arena and I became fast friends and I've been admirer ofher work ever since after receiving her MFA at Bennington Irina began teaching English full time at the University ofPittsburgh she also edited living on the edge of the world New Jersey writers take on the Garden State a collection of

He actually flew Japanese craftsmen here to America just to build his house, because he has a lot of money,apparently. His protege is Mark Benningham, who founded salesforce.com.And Salesforce, as some of you might know, is a partner of Google.

"The New York Times Magazine," "Dissent," "Mother Jones," "Harper's," and another publications.He's taught writing at Harvard, Bennington, and Columbia.And he currently lives in Brooklyn, in New York.

desperate so imagine two hundred dollars a year coming in I think their average donation is twenty-five dollars so youabout what's going on TBN they'll never stick up for the for the sick people who get get ripped off by benni hannas a

What gives you hope that widespread change is possible?And I sat on a panel with Liz Coleman, who is the former president of Bennington College.

all combine into one story. And some of the issues braided through it are time and the music industry.Basically follows two main characters, a music producer named Bennie Salazar and his one-time assistant named Sasha. And it goes backward and forward through their lives and actuallyalso visiting peripheral character's lives over a span of about 50 years.

Greg Sanders: Yeah. I think it works. And one other one I noticed that also was a segue into one of the other threads is the technology that's the anchor, and then there's the musicanchor of mostly punk. I mean, Bennie Salazar is an ex-punk rocker and we meet some of his friends along the timeline, past and the future.And he's got this great internal monologue. I think he's driving down the West Side Highway listening to the Dead Kennedy's. And he's basically saying like, "I know why punk died.

entire time I was working for Bob Woodward on state of denial this is my nights and my weekends and there were alot of you know leave Woodward's office on a Friday night go to the airport fly to Fort Benning Georgia do interviewsall weekend fly back to Washington DC go to work on Monday morning and sort of you know good morning Bob good morning

that so I thought, "OK. You know what? I can't make this work." So, I sold the book and then after that, there were a couple of things that were really nagging at me. The main onewas that Sasha, one of the major characters, I was not able to find a way to visit her in her future life, whereas Bennie, the other one, appears in the chapter we were just talkingabout. And that seemed really asymmetrical and wrong. And so, that was nagging at me. And then there was the fact that I hadn't found a way to use the PowerPoint. And a third obsession

And so, I thought I liked that movement from she had been so central and now she's peripheral.It's at an earlier moment. And then, there was a brief mention in that chapter of Bennie's ex-wife who's now an avid doubles player at a country club. And I thought, "Yeah, butwhat is she like?" I mean, she marries this music producer and then ends up a doubles player. What's that about? So I thought, "OK, one more and that is it." So, I wrote a chapter about her, which

Greg Sanders: Did you have to re-tool any of the previously published stuff, or what that pretty much-- Jennifer Egan: Very little in fact, because it wasn't just a matter of trying to workThis backwards chronology is really costing me a lot of opportunities for surprise, and payoff for the reader." As one clear example, you mentioned that Bennie is in the car in