BY RON CHARLESThe light from Laura Zigman’s
new novel, “separation Anxiety,”
is generated by a kind of literary
nuclear fusion: an intense com-
pression of grief and humor. The
combination of those elements
usually produces cynical black
comedy, something witty and bit-
ter, but Zigman’s work is too ten-
der for that.
“separation Anxiety” is a long-
awaited comeback for this clever
writer who hasn’t published a
novel since “Piece of Work” in
- A series of personal trage-
dies, including the deaths of her
parents and her own cancer diag-
nosis, swept Zigman into what
she calls “so many dormant
years.” But now, she’s transmuted
those struggles into a new book —
a “second chance” — about a once-
successful author whose world is
collapsing under the weight of
disappointment and fear.
When we meet the narrator,
Judy Vogel, she’s been deflated by
a steady leakage of optimism.
Years earlier, she had published a
classic children’s book that be-
came a PBs series — a thrilling,
lucrative success that led to exact-
ly nothing else. At 50, she’s
mourning the loss of her parents,
nursing her best friend through
the final stages of a deadly illness
and longing for the happy rapport
she once enjoyed with her son,
who has drifted into “brutal teen-
see BooK world on c4
Book World
A return
swaddled
in humor
and grief
KLMNO
Style
wednesday, march 11 , 2020. washingtonpost.com/style ez su k c
Essay
late night gets the appeal
of latin pop stars. snl
should hop on board with
Bad Bunny. c3
Book World
anna Burns’s “little
Constructions” i s just as
twisting and tragicomic as
her “milkman.” c4PUBlIsHING
a fr ench publisher plans
to release Woody allen’s
autobiography after a u.s.
group backed out. c9carolyN HaX
she’s frugal. her fiance
likes to splurge. But that
doesn’t mean they can’t
live happily ever after. c10BY SONIA RAOAustin’s economy has come to
expect an influx of revenue from
south by southwest, the annual
technology, music and film festi-
val and conference that attracts
tens of thousands of visitors. so
when the city, c iting the spread of
coronavirus, canceled the entire
event this year, it sent a shock
through the system. emerging
artists lost their chance at a
high-profile platform. small
businesses saw an anticipated
swell of foot traffic vanish.
“We are devastated to share
this news with you,” sXsW orga-
nizers stated last week. “ ‘The
show must go on’ is in our DnA,
and this is the first time in
34 years that the March event
will not take place.”
The decision, made in tandem
with city officials declaring a
local disaster over the threat of
coronavirus, has been regarded
as unfortunate, but necessary.
Festivals are the latest sector of
the entertainment industry to
suffer as a result of the potential-
ly deadly virus spreading world-
wide, and though others can-
celed plans first, sXsW is widely
seen as the tipping point. offi-
cially postponed Tuesday eve-
ning from April to october, the
Coachella Valley Music and Arts
Festival was the next big event on
the hot seat.
And, as summer festival sea-
son approaches, it won’t be the
last.
“This is the beginning of the
virus,” said new York-based en-
tertainment attorney David
Chidekel. “What’s happening is,
people from a preventive stand-
point a re starting to go, ‘I’d better
cancel this thing because if it
goes wrong, we’re going to look
like the greedy scumbags who
didn’t do anything.’ ”
sXsW reported more than
400,000 attendees last year.
see virus on c3
Health
concerns
starting to
derail fests
BY CAITLIN GIBSONshelly Moran Pollard left her office
shortly before 6:30 p.m. on a recent
Thursday and drove through rush-hour
traffic from Bethesda to the retirement
community in Columbia where her 81-
year-old parents l ive. s he stopped by her
father’s apartment first, to help him take
his daily medications. Then she visited
her mother, who suffers from advanced
dementia and recently transitioned to
hospice care. As they sat together, Pol-
lard’s 15-year-old daughter called, ask-
ing for help preparing for a biology test
— so Pollard opened FaceTime on her
phone and quizzed her daughter whiletending to her mother. When Pollard
finally arrived home at 11 p.m., she set
her a larm f or 5 a.m.
“But really, I wake u p at 4 , because I ’m
not sleeping,” she says. “I’m always
thinking: What do I need to do for M om,
what do I need to do for Dad, what do I
need to do for my daughter?”
she has b een juggling t hese r esponsi-
bilities for seven years — since t he day in
July 2013 when her mother was hospi-
talized. Pollard was a 46-year-old mom
to an 8-year-old then, a Gen Xer who
suddenly found herself among the
“sandwich generation” — those who are
caught between the dueling demands o f
see generations on c2Care-giving at
both ends of life
‘Sandwich generation’ juggles care for younger kids, aging parents
BY CHRIS RICHARDSDan Bejar wrote a song titled
“The Te levision Music supervi-
sor” for the new Destroyer al-
bum, and in this s ong, something
has gone wrong. “I can’t believe
what I’ve done,” Bejar sings,
quoting the despairing supervi-
sor. “I can’t believe what I said.”
Like so many Destroyer songs,
the lyrics have terrific details,
just not the ones you need. What
was done? What was said? How
bad was it? And who defines
“bad” here? Bejar’s songs don’t
just make you wonder. They test
your experience of the world.
Perversely.
The new Destroyer album,
“Have We Met,” wears its excel-
lent vagueness like expensive
cologne. Motives and outcomes
usually get deleted from the
story, leaving the characters to
float in ambiguous peril, and
sometimes the character is you.
Like on Monday night at the
Black C at i n Washington, where a
new song titled “The Raven”
began with Bejar whiplashing
the entire nightclub to attention:
“Just look at the world around
you. Wait, no, don’t look!” What?
Why not? The lyrics that camenext didn’t s ay, infusing t he room
with uncertainty and focus. eyes
up here, everyone, look at this
radical troubadour, handsome
and lifelike as a Velasquez paint-
ing. Listen as he snarls at the
absurdity of existence. notice
how he holds the microphone as
if pouring the contents of a
champagne flute down his pants.
Bejar doesn’t care about an-
swers. not as a lyricist, not as a
singer. In his decades-deep song-
book, his lyrics rarely feel like
vehicles for moving melody. T hey
function as words, first and fore-
most, with Bejar bending them
into musical shapes with his
throat and mouth, creating a
groany-hissy affectation that
makes him sound like the sing-
ing villain in a Disney cartoon.
To tally aware of his strange and
singular gift, all Bejar did on-
stage Monday night was sing —
except for the few times when he
bashed on a tambourine, always
with his back to the crowd be-
cause how could anyone bear to
face an audience they respect
while doing something so ridicu-
lous and unnecessary?
Bejar’s backing sextet had
even weirder work to do, consid-
see music review on c9MUsIc rEVIEWAt the Black Cat, the band Destroyer crushes it in a vague way
kyle gustafson for the Washington post
dan Bejar of destroyer performs during the band’s tour stop monday at the Black cat.Cheryl Diaz meyer for the Washington postemily large photographyaBove: shelly moran Pollard, with daughter shelby, is always juggling duties
as a parent and a child of aging parents. rigHt: Katie shea Britton, top right,
with her mother, eileen shea, and daughters claire, left, a nd emma.