{"id":83079,"date":"2015-02-25T18:57:32","date_gmt":"2015-02-25T23:57:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=83079"},"modified":"2015-02-26T11:29:56","modified_gmt":"2015-02-26T16:29:56","slug":"you-talk-your-book","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/","title":{"rendered":"You Talk Your Book"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/n2Vieqsh4K8?rel=0\" width=\"600\" height=\"450\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Looking rather F\u00fchrer-ish, Anthony Burgess appeared on <em>The Dick Cavett<\/em> <em>Show<\/em> in 1971, where he was in rare form throughout\u2014charming, funny, instructive, gently eccentric. The conversation ranges from England as a kind of bland utopia to Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cshowbiz\u201d skills and possible venereal disease, the perils of teaching writing (\u201cThe kids who want to write are usually very young, and their desire to write is usually a symptom of pubescence\u201d), the insincerity of Milton\u2019s <em>Lycidas<\/em>, and the distinction between pubs and bars:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>A bar is not a pub. There are one or two pubs I think in New York \u2026 a real pub is a place where all the social barriers come down. You can drink with a member of the aristocracy or the local dustman. You play darts, you drink, you talk, and by this means you generate an atmosphere of genuine democratic society. You get ideas, you hear stories, you talk. And this is useful for a writer. The only pubs you must not, if you\u2019re a writer, go to are the pubs in Dublin. Because in Dublin you <em>talk<\/em> your book. You say, I\u2019m writing a darling book. Ah, tell us about it, they say. Then you tell them about it. And by the time you tell them about it, you\u2019ve spent the desire to write it \u2026 The book is finished. You close it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>That Shakespeare book he mentions early on, by the way, received one of the most comically underdone blurbs I\u2019ve ever seen, from <em>Country Life<\/em>, a magazine for which Burgess himself often contributed. \u201cOf all the books about Shakespeare that 1964 will bring forth,\u201d they wrote, \u201cnone is likely to make livelier reading than Anthony Burgess\u2019s historical novel, <em>Nothing Like the Sun<\/em>.\u201d There are small daggers in that \u201c1964,\u201d that \u201cis likely to\u201d: the most damning of faint praise.<\/p>\n<p><em>Dan Piepenbring is the Web editor of\u00a0<\/em>The Paris Review.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Looking rather F\u00fchrer-ish, Anthony Burgess appeared on The Dick Cavett Show in 1971, where he was in rare form throughout\u2014charming, funny, instructive, gently eccentric. The conversation ranges from England as a kind of bland utopia to Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cshowbiz\u201d skills and possible venereal disease, the perils of teaching writing (\u201cThe kids who want to write are [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1539],"tags":[2286,1803,1448,1132,10489,948,15897,14568,14987,7214],"class_list":["post-83079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-video-multimedia","tag-anthony-burgess","tag-bars","tag-dick-cavett","tag-interviews","tag-pubs","tag-shakespeare","tag-show-business","tag-talk-shows","tag-venereal-disease","tag-videos"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Watch Anthony Burgess on the Dick Cavett Show, 1971<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Burgess talks bars versus pubs, Shakespeare\u2019s showbiz skills, and more...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"You Talk Your Book by Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"February 25, 2015 \u2013 Looking rather F\u00fchrer-ish, Anthony Burgess appeared on The Dick Cavett Show in 1971, where he was in rare form throughout\u2014charming, funny, instructive,\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-02-25T23:57:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-02-26T16:29:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-1.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"675\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Dan Piepenbring\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b16ca558fc538230f135c3220dfd3c8\"},\"headline\":\"You Talk Your Book\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-02-25T23:57:32+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-02-26T16:29:56+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\"},\"wordCount\":323,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Anthony Burgess\",\"bars\",\"Dick Cavett\",\"interviews\",\"pubs\",\"Shakespeare\",\"show business\",\"talk shows\",\"venereal disease\",\"videos\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Video &amp; Multimedia\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\",\"name\":\"Watch Anthony Burgess on the Dick Cavett Show, 1971\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2015-02-25T23:57:32+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-02-26T16:29:56+00:00\",\"description\":\"Burgess talks bars versus pubs, Shakespeare\u2019s showbiz skills, and more...\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"You Talk Your Book\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"description\":\"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"width\":696,\"height\":696,\"caption\":\"The Paris Review\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b16ca558fc538230f135c3220dfd3c8\",\"name\":\"Dan Piepenbring\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/6fde7ced443ba5b52db3b06239dca8a2eaeff111fccecd7bf483663c99d2762b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/6fde7ced443ba5b52db3b06239dca8a2eaeff111fccecd7bf483663c99d2762b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dan Piepenbring\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/dpiepenbring\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Watch Anthony Burgess on the Dick Cavett Show, 1971","description":"Burgess talks bars versus pubs, Shakespeare\u2019s showbiz skills, and more...","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"You Talk Your Book by Dan Piepenbring","og_description":"February 25, 2015 \u2013 Looking rather F\u00fchrer-ish, Anthony Burgess appeared on The Dick Cavett Show in 1971, where he was in rare form throughout\u2014charming, funny, instructive,","og_url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/","og_site_name":"The Paris Review","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","article_published_time":"2015-02-25T23:57:32+00:00","article_modified_time":"2015-02-26T16:29:56+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":675,"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-1.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Dan Piepenbring","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@parisreview","twitter_site":"@parisreview","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Dan Piepenbring","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/"},"author":{"name":"Dan Piepenbring","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b16ca558fc538230f135c3220dfd3c8"},"headline":"You Talk Your Book","datePublished":"2015-02-25T23:57:32+00:00","dateModified":"2015-02-26T16:29:56+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/"},"wordCount":323,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"keywords":["Anthony Burgess","bars","Dick Cavett","interviews","pubs","Shakespeare","show business","talk shows","venereal disease","videos"],"articleSection":["Video &amp; Multimedia"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/","name":"Watch Anthony Burgess on the Dick Cavett Show, 1971","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-02-25T23:57:32+00:00","dateModified":"2015-02-26T16:29:56+00:00","description":"Burgess talks bars versus pubs, Shakespeare\u2019s showbiz skills, and more...","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/25\/you-talk-your-book\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"You Talk Your Book"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","name":"The Paris Review","description":"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization","name":"The Paris Review","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"The Paris Review"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b16ca558fc538230f135c3220dfd3c8","name":"Dan Piepenbring","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/6fde7ced443ba5b52db3b06239dca8a2eaeff111fccecd7bf483663c99d2762b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/6fde7ced443ba5b52db3b06239dca8a2eaeff111fccecd7bf483663c99d2762b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Dan Piepenbring"},"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/dpiepenbring\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83079"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83085,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83079\/revisions\/83085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}