BEST AUTHOR BEST : GEORGE PACKER

'' I've stopped being a prig about beautiful writing, '' says the prizewinning journalist and the author of '' The Emergency,'' the first novel in some 25 years. [ Psst.....is that a skateboarding book on his shelves ?]

.-  Describe your ideal reading experience [ when, where, what, how ].

Age 15, in my bedroom. Shakespeare, undisturbed.

.-  What's the last great book you read?

Giorgio Bassani's '' The Garden of the Finzi-Continis,'' for book group.

.-  What book did you feel as if  you were supposed to like, and didn't?

Sally Rooney's '' Normal People.'' But I might not be the ideal reader.

.-  Why write a novel now ?

I wanted to explore the feeling alive in America today, seeing the world I knew fall apart, being a parent, trying to accept change without letting go of important values.

Journalism is essential, but it can't get at certain levels of experience - so I wrote a book.

.-  You published '' Central Square,'' your last novel, in 1998. What's different about you as a fiction writer now?

Becoming a father and a quarter century of journalism made me a better novelist. I learned how to pay attention.

Writing for great editors at The New Yorker and The Atlantic gave me the confidence that I could tell a story.

.-  Is writing fiction an admission that even powerful nonfiction isn't changing minds?

'' Poetry makes nothing happen '' Auden. I think that's true of all writing, with few exceptions. We shouldn't expect to change the world.

Witnessing, recording, protesting, affirming should be enough.

.-  What has led you to be hopeful since publishing '' Last Best Hope '' in 2021?

Ukrainians. Neil Young at 80. My kids.

.-  Can a great book be badly written? What other criteria can overcome bad prose?

When I was young I was allergic to any hint of literary self-display. This led me into a perverse embrace of profound truth expressed in clumsy prose - an example might be Dreiser.

I still prefer the plain style, but I've stopped being a prig about beautiful writing.

.-  What books are on your night stand ?

Sinclair Lewis, '' It Can't Happen Here '' ; Ford Madox Ford, '' The Good Soldier '' ; Honor Jones, '' Sleep '' ; Vassily Grossman, '' Life and Fate ''; Anna Seghers, '' Transit.''

The Publishing continues to Part [ 2 ].

The World Students Society thanks Scott Heller, and The New York Times.