How did you two first meet?
ANN PATCHETT Okay, so the
reason that we have an affec-
tion—other than the fact that she
is one of my top-three favorite
living authors—is that her editor
was a really good friend of mine.
ELIZABETH STROUT Yes! So when
we met, it was almost like I knew
you without having met you.
And you both had stories in Sev-
enteen magazine early on, right?
STROUT I did read Ann Patchett’s
story in Seventeen.
PATCHETT No, you did not.
STROUT Yes, yes I did... Sorry
I didn’t tell you that I was, like,
stalking you! But the reason,
I remember, is because I was
struck [by] it.
Elizabeth, you’ve said before that
Olive really just came to you.
STROUT Oh yeah, she showed up
with a bang. Very fully formed.
But Ann, you struggled with the
first drafts of The Dutch House?
PATCHETT I threw the whole book
out. I made a huge mistake early
on—I turned left on like, page 12,
when I should have turned right.
Do you delete those versions for-
ever, or save them somewhere?
PATCHETT I permanently delete
them. I have no papers. [Turning
to Strout] Do you have papers?
STROUT I do, and I rip them up as
soon as I’m done with them.
PATCHETT Well then, that’s the
definition of not having papers.
[Laughs] It’s not like they’re
going to the archives.
STROUT Oh my God, no no no. I rip
them in four squares and then
put them in the wastebasket,
and it’s lovely. I enjoy it.
PATCHETT I love you so much.
The actual house in Dutch House
feels so real. I’m thinking of other
novels where houses loom large...
PATCHETT Manderley, Howards
End. Yes! But there’s actually not
many details in the book. If you
took every description and put
them together, it would be about
a page and a half—the kitchen,
the front hall. It’s really important
to me that the reader can bring
in their own experience.
And Elizabeth, in Olive, Again, you
revisit some beloved characters
from other, unrelated books of
yours. Was that deliberate?
STROUT They just pop up for me,
because they’re all right there [in
fictional Crosby, Maine], and I just
realized, “Oh, bingo, fabulous.”
Politics seems to bleed into most
things now, and it does come in
at the edges of Olive. Ann, were
you happy to be clear of that?
PATCHETT The Dutch House
[actually] came very much out of
the Trump election, because it
seemed like a moment that was
such a celebration of wealth. So
my original idea was to write
about a person who said, “I don’t
want to be rich; I don’t find that
the goal; I don’t find that attrac-
tive. In fact, I find that repulsive.”
So it’s funny when people say,
“Oh, your work isn’t political.”
STROUT Well, I think everything’s
political as well, because it just
is. The personal is political, right?
PATCHETT Yes! Every choice you
make—where you shop, what you
buy, how you conduct your life.
Ann, you famously only own a vin-
tage flip phone. Do either of you
have e-readers, or spend much
time at all on social media?
PATCHETT I’ve never done social
media, I don’t text... Although
the Malcolm Gladwell podcast is
fantastic. I listened to it while I
was in Utah by myself for three
weeks finishing this book, and I
just needed to hear somebody’s
voice while I was eating dinner.
So I had dinner with Malcolm
Gladwell every night. [Laughs]
STROUT I do have a cell phone,
and I like my cell phone.
One way celebrities like Bill Gates
and Reese Witherspoon seem to
use these platforms so well is by
recommending books they love.
PATCHETT She picked my essays
[This Is the Story of a Happy Mar-
riage]. She put on a red sweater
and red lipstick that matched
the cover and held it up and my
gosh, it was adorable. A book
of essays, and it sold! So thank
you, Reese.
THEY’RE TWO OF THE MOST DECORATED WOMEN IN MODERN AMERICAN LETTERS:
Elizabeth Strout, the Pulitzer Prize-winning maestro of Maine (her
small-town epic Olive Kitteridge was adapted into an Emmy-sweeping
2014 miniseries; Barack Obama named Anything Is Possible one of his
favorite books of 2017), and Ann Patchett, whose lauded catalog includes
the best-sellers Bel Canto and Commonwealth. But on a bright fall morn-
ing in New York, they were just two old friends catching up to talk about
their latest works—Olive, Again and The Dutch House, respectively—
what they’re reading, and why you won’t find them on Instagram.
BY LEAH GREENBLATT
@Leahbats
ANN PATCHETT & ELIZABETH STROUT
The Dutch
House
ann
patchett
—
9.24.2019
Olive,
Again
elizabeth
strout
—
10.15.2019
96 NOVEMBER 2019 EW ● COM
