Jonathan Safran Foer’s new piece in The New Yorker’s fiction issue feels like lyrics. “I’m not forty-five or eighty-three, not being hoisted onto the shoulders of anybody wading into the sea. I’m not learning chess, and you’re not losing your virginity.” Like “Turn, Turn, Turn,” which lyrics were taken from another book (Ecclesiastes).
[p.s. A few of my favorites: “You didn’t know where e-mails were.” “I didn’t know where my voice was between my phone and yours.” “We couldn’t wait for the beginnings and ends of vacations.” “You broke everyone’s heart until you suddenly couldn’t.” “One night I couldn’t help him with his math. He got married.” “At a certain point you became convinced that you were always reading yesterday’s newspaper.” “At a certain point I could hear my knees and felt no need to correct other people’s grammar.” “I couldn’t tolerate magicians who did things that someone who actually had magical powers would never do.” “They kept producing new things that we didn’t need that we needed.” (read it here (with a New Yorker subscription))].