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Note: An interview with America's most glamorous literary couple
The Sorrows of an American By Siri Hustvedt Henry Holt 320 pages; $25
The voice coming out of the speakers starts in a low whisper, like the first sound one hears upon waking. Then it climbs higher and starts to sing of heartbreak, of loneliness. In a few minutes it has changed again, this time to a bellow-throated, bluesy rasp, full of womanly wisdom and sass.
Listening in on a recent Brooklyn afternoon, novelists Paul Auster and Siri Hustvedt shake their heads and tap their feet. Auster wears a smile so big it nearly wraps around the back of his head, while his eyes squeeze shut with pride. And he should be pleased - it's their daughter singing.
"Doesn't she have a great voice?" Auster asks of 20- year-old Sophie. When not finishing up a degree at Bard College, Sophie Auster has been putting together a new album, occasionally appearing with her father, best known for his New York Trilogy series of novels, on stage at events. As soon as the music stops Auster is rifling through other demo CDs. "Oh, don't play the whole album," Hustvedt says, her six-foot frame folded into an armchair. I ask why a girl with a voice like that is bothering with university at all and Hustvedt gives me a stern look. "Let a mother have her dreams," she laughs.
We've been at their Brooklyn brownstone for an hour, talking about Auster's and Hustvedt's two upcoming books, and one gets the sense that this is the first time America's highest-profile literary couple has been completely happy. It's all part of the family business in creation, but they seem more comfortable when the light is turned off them. Daniel, Auster's son from his first marriage, to short-story writer Lydia Davis, is a photographer and DJ. (He made a cameo appearance in Smoke, the 1995 film Auster wrote, as well as co-directed with Wayne Wang.) Sophie is well on her way to a singing career. Still, Auster and Hustvedt have not slowed down - if anything, they have speeded up.
IN THE past decade, the two of them have collectively published or edited more than 17 volumes of poetry, essays, fiction, graphic...