Episode 116 – Magic City

Virtual Memories Show:
Thane Rosenbaum – Magic City

“I’m starting to think that the essays, the fiction, the long non-fiction are all coming from the same place, tapping the same resources, the same human experience, the same fears: all the things that built me, built me to write all of those things, not just one piece of it.”

sweetcoverThane Rosenbaum rejoins the show to talk about his new novel, How Sweet It Is!, the debut book from the new publisher Mandel Vilar Press! We talk about Thane’s family history from the concentration camps to ’70s Miami, his path to becoming a novelist and human rights lawyer, the relative lunacy of First and Second Amendment absolutists, the allure of print, growing up in a city without a bookstore, the fate of European Jewry, and more! Give it a listen!

“There’s a marketplace of ideas, and there’s a marketplace of assholes. It turns out they’re different marketplaces.”

We also talk about balancing fiction, non-fiction and op-ed pieces, what brought Isaac Bashevis Singer to Miami, the days when publishing was a way of life, the ways the “slippery slope” argument prevents people from taking righteous positions, why I should interview Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and more! Go listen!

Enjoy the conversation! Then check out the archives for more great episodes! You might like:

Follow The Virtual Memories Show on iTunes, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and RSS!

About our Guest

Thane Rosenbaum is an essayist, law professor, and author of the novels, How Sweet It Is!, The Stranger Within Sarah Stein, The Golems of Gotham, Second Hand Smoke, and Elijah Visible. His articles, reviews and essays appear frequently in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Haaretz, Huffington Post and Daily Beast, among other national publications. He moderates an annual series of discussions on culture, world events and politics at the 92nd Street Y called The Talk Show. He is a Senior Fellow at New York University School of Law where he directs the Forum on Law, Culture & Society. He is the author of Payback: The Case for Revenge and The Myth of Moral Justice: Why Our Legal System Fails to Do What’s Right. He is the editor of the anthology, Law Lit: From Atticus Finch to the Practice: A Collection of Great Writing About the Law. His forthcoming book is entitled The High Cost of Free Speech: Rethinking the First Amendment.

Credits: This episode’s music is Goin’ Back to Florida by Lightnin’ Hopkins. The conversation was recorded at Mr. Rosenbaum’s home on a pair of Blue enCORE 200 microphones feeding into a Zoom H5 digital recorder. I recorded the intro and outro on a Blue Yeti USB Microphone. Processing was done in Audacity and Logic Pro. Photo of Mr. Rosenbaum by me.

One Reply to “Episode 116 – Magic City”

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.