Novelist Paul Auster Reads From ‘Sunset Park’ In a Rare Appearance

Paul Auster looked down as he read from his new novel “Sunset Park” in the crowded Brattle Theatre. The lamplight reflected off his glasses, almost as if it were a campfire and Auster were telling ghost stories. That intuition isn’t far off, though Auster’s tale is of more modern ghosts. He tells of abandoned buildings in the aftermath of the 2008 economic collapse as well as the haunted veterans returning from war.

Auster gave a reading and book signing sponsored by the Harvard Book Store at the Brattle this past Tuesday. “’Sunset Park’ takes place now—that is, from the fall of 2008 to the spring 0f 2009,” said Auster before beginning to read. Set in New York City, the book touches on themes of destitution, dispossession, and trauma as it follows the trials of a multitude of characters.

The most central of these is 28-year-old Miles Keller, a trash-out worker who obsessively photographs abandoned objects in the foreclosed homes which it is his job to clean out. “Perhaps, impulsive acts triggered by the rage of the dispossessed, disgusting but understandable statements of despair, but even if he is not always gripped by revulsion when he enters a house, he never opens a door without a feeling of dread,” Auster writes of Miles as he is confronted with the destruction done to a house since its desertion.

In jumping from section to section, Auster’s reading reflected the structure of the book itself, which is organized by narratives that switch from character to character.  What manages to unite these mostly young and disparate individuals is that “they’re all poor. All these people are struggling,” Auster explained. This is perhaps what drives these characters to come together as squatters in an apartment in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. One of the many characters trying to scrape by is Ellen, who, as Auster noted during his reading, “is trying to be an artist but not getting very far with it,” a comment that drew laughs from the crowd.

One might expect Auster, given the explicit timeframe of the book, to have strongly emphasized the war in Iraq. But in the excerpts Auster chose for this specific event at the Brattle, the commentary focused on veterans of wars more distant in history. Reading from one of the sections on the character Alice Bergstrom, Auster said, “When she thinks of that generation of silent men, the boys who lived through the Depression and grew up to become soldiers or not soldiers in the war, she doesn’t blame them for refusing to talk, for not wanting to go back into the past.” In the novel, Alice is writing her PhD on the 1946 film “The Best Years of Our Lives” about servicemen’s experiences returning to civilian life following the end of World War II. The disquiet of current generations is echoed through the trials of veterans of wars past.

Between the subjects of poverty and the effects war, Auster is seeking, in this latest book, to deliver a critique of contemporary America. His characters are struggling to find their own identity and personal meaning in an alienating world—a topic that recurs throughout Auster’s body of work. “Sunset Park” intersects thematically with his most famous series of novels “The New York Trilogy,” non-traditional detective stories which his new work reflects with its dimly noir sensibilities.

Cambridge was rather fortunate to host this event, since Auster rarely does readings except in New York City. In fact, this event was the only reading outside New York City he is giving for “Sunset Park,” as William Corbett, who introduced Auster, informed the crowd. Corbett is a longtime friend and literary colleague of Auster. “What has been going on in his writing has been percolating in our conversations for years,” said Corbett. According to him, the book that resulted from those discussions is compelling: “‘Sunset Park’ is a knock-out,” he said.