{"id":17598,"date":"2025-06-25T17:25:20","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T21:25:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/?p=17598"},"modified":"2025-06-25T17:52:31","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T21:52:31","slug":"episode-644-paul-karasik","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-644-paul-karasik","title":{"rendered":"Episode 644 – Paul Karasik"},"content":{"rendered":"

Virtual Memories Show 644:
\nPaul Karasik<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/traffic.libsyn.com\/secure\/virtualmemories\/Episode_644_-_Paul_Karasik.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div>

Podcast: Play in new window<\/a> | Download<\/a><\/p>

Subscribe: Spotify<\/a> | TuneIn<\/a> | RSS<\/a> | More<\/a><\/p>\n

“I feel like I’m a character in a Paul Auster novel: a life rife with circumstance and unpredictable coincidence.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>Thirty-plus years in the making, the graphic adaptation of Paul Auster’s THE NEW YORK TRILOGY<\/a> (Pantheon) is here at last! Paul Karasik<\/a> rejoins the show from Yaddo Artists Retreat<\/a> to talk about the process of adapting Auster’s postmodern crime novels into comics, how he collaborated with David Mazzucchelli (CITY OF GLASS<\/em>) and Lorenzo Mattotti<\/a> (GHOSTS<\/em>) on the first two and how he wound up drawing the third book, THE LOCKED ROOM<\/em>, how these novels possessed him for decades, and the moment when he understood what each novel was really<\/em> about. We get into how he met Auster at a parent-teacher conference shortly after the New York Trilogy<\/em> came out, the moment of truth when Auster first saw the pages for City of Glass<\/em>, the freedom (and restriction) Auster offered for the project, and whether Auster got to see the finished pages before his death in 2024. We also discuss Paul’s comics upbringing, how his mother supported his habit (and maybe melted her son’s brain by getting him a book of R. Crumb comics at 12 or 13), his lack of confidence in his drawing and his supreme confidence in his teaching, how meeting Art Spiegelman changed his life, why he’s starting an online graphic novel workshop<\/a>, the immense inspiration of staying at Yaddo (and how he learned The Two Rules Of Yaddo), and a lot more. Give it a listen!<\/a> And go read THE NEW YORK TRILOGY<\/a>!<\/p>\n

(And listen to our 2018 talk<\/a>, with Mark Newgarden)!<\/em><\/p>\n

“I learned from Art & Francoise how much fucking work it is to make comics without compromise, and that anything else is not worth doing.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n