{"id":142925,"date":"2020-02-18T13:00:29","date_gmt":"2020-02-18T18:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=142925"},"modified":"2020-02-18T12:14:14","modified_gmt":"2020-02-18T17:14:14","slug":"redux-my-prose-was-from-the-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2020\/02\/18\/redux-my-prose-was-from-the-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"Redux: My Prose Was from the Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every week, the editors of\u00a0<\/em>The Paris Review\u00a0lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine\u2019s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by\u00a0signing up for the Redux newsletter<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Simone de Beauvoir.<\/p><\/div>\n

Valentine\u2019s Day may be long past, but this week at The Paris Review<\/em>, we\u2019re still preoccupied with the wretchedness of desire. Read on for Simone de Beauvoir\u2019s Art of Fiction interview<\/a>, Akhil Sharma\u2019s short story \u201cThe Well<\/a>,\u201d and Randall Mann\u2019s poem \u201cEvidence<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not\u00a0subscribe<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0The Paris Review<\/em>\u00a0and read the entire archive? You\u2019ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. And don\u2019t forget to listen to\u00a0Season 2<\/a>\u00a0of\u00a0The Paris Review Podcast<\/em>!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Simone de Beauvoir, The Art of Fiction No. 35<\/a>
\nIssue no. 34 (Spring\u2013Summer 1965)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

DE BEAUVOIR<\/p>\n

Love is a great privilege. Real love, which is very rare, enriches the lives of the men and women who experience it.<\/p>\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

In your novels, it seems to be the women\u2014I\u2019m thinking of Fran\u00e7oise in She Came to Stay<\/em> and Anne in The Mandarins<\/em>\u2014who experience it most.<\/p>\n

DE BEAUVOIR<\/p>\n

The reason is that, despite everything, women give more of themselves in love because most of them don\u2019t have much else to absorb them. Perhaps they\u2019re also more capable of deep sympathy, which is the basis of love. Perhaps it\u2019s also because I can project myself more easily into women than into men. My female characters are much richer than my male characters.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Well<\/a>
\nBy Akhil Sharma
\nIssue no. 218 (Fall 2016)<\/em><\/p>\n

Betsy agreed to meet with us\u2014me and my mother. We sat on her white sofa in the living room, and she placed a tray of tea and cookies on the coffee table. When I had called her to ask if I could see her, she had said, \u201cI am so angry,\u201d and her voice had been hard. \u201cYou didn\u2019t behave like a good man. I should have done something to take care of myself, but you didn\u2019t act like a good person.\u201d Now, she was polite. She told my mother how nice it was to meet her.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Evidence<\/a>
\nBy Randall Mann
\nIssue no. 163 (Fall 2002)<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2026 I dreamed of men whom I could not impress.
\nBlue is the evidence of what I do,<\/p>\n

the letter here that ends in I love you<\/em>.
\nMy prose was from the heart, my heart a mess.
\nThis is the past, and so it must be true<\/p>\n

I lacked the guts to send it off\u2014I knew
\nof certain things that one should not confess.
\nBlue is the evidence of what I do.
\nThis is the past, and so it must be true.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

If you like what you read,\u00a0get a year of<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>The Paris Review\u2014four new issues, plus instant access to everything we\u2019ve ever published.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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