Come and chat to award-winning author of Purity JONATHAN FRANZEN on Friday 2nd October, 12-1pm. Post your questions for him here.

[RachelMumsnet]

We're delighted to announce that our September book of the month will be Jonathan Franzen's latest novel Purity, which is published on 1 September. We're also honoured that Franzen has agreed to join us for a webchat to discuss the book and his other novels on Friday 2 October, 12 - 2pm.

Jonathan Franzen is one of America's most acclaimed contemporary novelist and essayist. In 2001, his novel The Corrections, a sprawling, satirical family drama, won a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction finalist and won Franzen a National Book Award.

Purity is a multigenerational American epic that spans decades and continents. The story centers on a young woman named Purity Tyler, or Pip, who doesn't know who her father is and sets out to uncover his identity. It's a story of youthful idealism, extreme fidelity, and murder.

Come and put your questions to Jonathan Franzen on Friday 2 October, 12-2pm

Yes it does doesn't it Itchy

@RachelMumsnet

I appreciate that you've got a lot to get through but can we put to you the standard Mumsnet Qs that we like to ask all our authors...

What childhood book most inspired you?

What would be the first piece of advice you would give to anyone attempting to write fiction?

What is the best book you have given anyone recently?

And the best you've received?

CS Lewis; read a lot and find merciless critics; Dale Jamieson's Reason in a Dark Time; Elena Ferrante's My Brilliant Friend. There!

Hi Jonathan. A massive fan of your novels and essays here but I haven't yet had chance to read Purity. I read somewhere that you like to write in a sound-proof room with earplugs in - is that true? When you're deep into a novel how do you structure your day? How many hours a day to you write?

@Greenstone

I read RachelMumsnet's intro as 'Jonathan is here and pissed to answer your questions.'

That was a great image.

Feeds right into my internet persona, right?

Thank you!

@frogletsmum

Hi Jonathan,

I've been racing through Purity trying to finish before the webchat but still have the final section to read - just left it on a literal cliff edge! I love the way you delve so deeply into your characters' psyches and I wanted to ask you, why did you choose to write Tom in the first person and did you consider writing any of the others in 1st?

Tom's memoir is so lacerating that I preferred that somebody other than the author take responsibility for it.

This might be the place to issue a blanket thank-you to everyone who's saying positive things about Purity. Blanket thank-you!

Hello Jonathan,
Thank you for coming here and thank you too for your excellent books.
I liked your post about writers developing what they are. When Kazuo Ishiguro came onto Bookclub he said he got all his practising done locked in his room writing terrible song lyrics (his description, not mine..)
At the very beginning, how did you develop your voice? Can you pinpoint a moment where you felt you'd hit the right note? Your novels are particularly meaty and ambitious and I wondered if you always felt you were suited to that larger structure.

Another question (if that's allowed): What are your attitudes to gun control? Why is America so far behind in this issue? Is there any hope?

Jonathan, there are some very interesting characters in this book. Do you base any characters on real people? Also, I was interested in your background and iany influences in your in particular that led you to become an author?

@Greenstone

Wowee Jonathan Franzen.

Jonathan, I'm sorry, I have not yet read Purity, but I loved Freedom and very much enjoyed How to Be Alone* and various other essays of yours.

I feel that many of the people who dismiss your work haven't actually read it - and so don't know how accessible and funny and entertaining it is.

Do you have any sense that the next generation of children will be the ones to go offline partially or completely? Or will it take another generation for that to happen? Or will it ever? Would welcome your thoughts.

*How my husband laughed when he saw me reading a book with this title. At the time I had a nine-week old baby velcroed to me 24/7...

Well, please don't read the posts here carefully, since this whole session is a minefield of spoilers. But I appreciate the words about Freedom, and, yes, I like to think that the dismissers haven't read what they're dismissing. It's a general problem with the internet and social media. Although it must also be said that I myself don't read what the dismissers are saying.

I don't know what the next generation will do. A good definition of "postmodern" is "everything and its exact opposite occurring simultaneously". So, probably, some young people will surrender ever more of themselves to their devices, while others will coalesce into a set of people who reject or severely limit their exposure to devices. It's hard for me not to think of the latter group as the lucky ones.

Do you enjoy interpretations of your writing that were not intentional?

I loved Sarah Waters saying last month to us "I sort of think: I’ve put all this time and work into putting the book together. Don’t take it apart, love; just read it and enjoy it..." Does this resonate with you Jonathan?

@mollkat

Do you enjoy interpretations of your writing that were not intentional? I loved Sarah Waters saying last month to us "I sort of think: I?ve put all this time and work into putting the book together. Don?t take it apart, love; just read it and enjoy it..." Does this resonate with you Jonathan?

Readers can do any damn thing they want with my books. Back when the Correx was published, two different readers told me they'd burned their copy of it. Both of them seem to have meant it nicely. Part of me feels like those are some of the best readers I've ever had. I mean: burning the book? It was fantastic.

If Waters is suggesting that she isn't writing to be interpreted, I get what she means. But sometimes a reader will report an insight that helps me understand what a book has accomplished. I let go of the books when they're finished, and it's fun to be just another reader of them afterward-- discovering things that, as an author, I was quite unconscious of.

Really interesting reply. Thank you.

@CalliopeStephanides

Another question (if that's allowed): What are your attitudes to gun control? Why is America so far behind in this issue? Is there any hope?

Some deep part of me relaxes whenever I leave the US and get to Europe, where there are so many fewer guns. Unfortunately, however much we liberals wish and argue that it were otherwise, our Constitution really does guarantee the right to have guns. So I'm fairly hopeless on that score.

Interesting definition of "postmodernism". I always think of it as the dots on an old fashioned tv screen. Before was a straight line, with an arrow going forwards. Perhaps people will turn more to the latter and certainties.

Loved Greenstone's image.

One thing that perplexed me was the repeated comparison of Pip to a 'dog'. Why? Are you trying to make a point about passions versus rational self? Has she been conditioned like a dog by her mother and absent father?

Great question mollkat, and great response

@mollkat

Thank you Mumsnet for the copy and Jonathan for making yourself available to us! My questions is how much does the public response to your writing affect you personally and in your writing. I have rarely seen opinion so polarised. People are never "meh" about your work - there is either admiration and adoration (understandable)or utter disdain (jealousy?). I was about to add an emoticon or two there but managed to resist!

I made the decision, back in 2001, never to look at what's said about me or my work online. The little I hear of it comes to me second- or third-hand. So it doesn't have much effect either on me or on the writing. But whenever there's a particular shitstorm, like the one last spring when I mentioned some inconvenient truths about climate change in the New Yorker, I do feel some embarrassment and chagrin at the idea that people I know casually (e.g., the neighbors in my apartment building in New York) are getting the idea that I'm the world's most horrible person.

Hi Jonathan

not sure if you saw my East Germany research question posted yesterday but great book and enjoyin reading it.

enjoying

@BearAusten

I am finding Purity to be an enjoyable read. It is the first time that I have read any Jonathan Franzen novels, previously I have been a little put off by their sheer magnitude.

The mother/child dynamic is interesting. Reminds me a little of Philip Larkin's poem, 'This be the verse'. I find it is not a case of liking or disliking some of the characters. I feel empathy for Pip, and whilst I cannot condone his actions in any form, I think pity for Andreas.

Your novels are mainly within the genre of social realism, a critique of the world we live in. Do you believe that as you have a particular skill for writing that you have a social responsibility to do just that, or do you do it solely for enjoyment, acclaim or even the money?

Has Karl Kraus, the Austrian satirist, been one of the main influences on your writing and thoughts, especially in terms of technology 'an apocalyptic red horseman'?

Thank you Mumsnet for this excellent, thought provoking novel.

Kraus was a very early influence, back when I was an angry young idealist. His sentence rhythms are all over my first novel. But I outgrew him a long time ago, around the same time that I was abandoning the project of social realism. I still like to situate my narratives in a recognizable present day, because it's fun, and because it helps me connect my characters with my own real-time anxieties about the world. But it's not my main project anymore.

I would also just like to add that for me, with Patty's account of her rape in Freedom, it was like you took the following recurring keywords/components:

jock, team player, injustice, like it was nothing

and somehow assembled them into something incredibly important, true, and brutal. I'm not really sure how you did this but it was totally brilliant and I'm not sure that's been recognised enough.

@pbandbacon

This is my first Jonathan Franzen novel too. I am really enjoying it!

My question for Jonathan is this: Andreas says: "It sucks to be well known. Everyone should be told this about fame before they start pursuing it: you will never trust anyone again." Do you ever wish you used a pen name or do you feel that fame plays a role in being a successful novelist?

I do sometimes envy people like Alice Munro and Thomas Pynchon, who get to keep to themselves. But publishing, unlike writing, is a communal enterprise, and if I were anonymous I would miss the contact with the people I'm writing for. There's a kind of two-sided affirmation in that. And there is a side of me that isn't a novelist but a grumpy old Swedish-American who has strong opinions about things and welcomes the chance to voice them publicly. So I wouldn't say fame sucks.

@Greenstone

I would also just like to add that for me, with Patty's account of her rape in Freedom, it was like you took the following recurring keywords/components:

jock, team player, injustice, like it was nothing

and somehow assembled them into something incredibly important, true, and brutal. I'm not really sure how you did this but it was totally brilliant and I'm not sure that's been recognised enough.

This comment makes my day. Thank you.

This isn't a question but it's a truly heartfelt thank you for something you did about 12 years ago - for my oldest friend. Her partner wrote a book when he left his native country. It came out, on the cheap - I did the maps when I can't spell or draw at all, and they persuaded the publishers to pay them a teeny bit (not for the maps). But they were still so broke the roof on their flat was non-existent & even buying a magazine was a hopeless dream.

Then you picked one of the guy's essays and recommended it in print. We were hysterical with pride and awe - I forgot to eat my cake. They were paid 100 dollars for the excerpt of their work. Beserk with joy, my friend went crazy and bought 4 pairs of pants in an afternoon.

Anyway, 10 years on, it's major deals and documentaries and things. But what you did started it all. And nothing else to date has beaten the hit of being recommended by you. So thanks.

She's still wearing the Franzen trousers.

@BearAusten

Interesting definition of "postmodernism". I always think of it as the dots on an old fashioned tv screen. Before was a straight line, with an arrow going forwards. Perhaps people will turn more to the latter and certainties.

Loved Greenstone's image.

One thing that perplexed me was the repeated comparison of Pip to a 'dog'. Why? Are you trying to make a point about passions versus rational self? Has she been conditioned like a dog by her mother and absent father?

Well, she identifies with dogs and also loves them. Maybe the repeated comparisons are part of her self-irony. Cf. also her repeated invocation of her poor impulse control.