美国国家公共电台 NPR In Lauren Groff's 'Florida,' Everything's Out To Get You

 

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

Florida in the summer is a slow, hot drowning. That's the way Lauren Groff describes the state in her new collection of short stories. In another part of the book, she calls Florida a damp, dense¹ tangle², an Eden of dangerous things. Lauren Groff is best known for her novel "Fates And Furies," and this short story collection is appropriately called "Florida." Lauren Groff, welcome to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.

LAUREN GROFF: I'm delighted to be on the show. Thank you, Ari.

SHAPIRO: Why Florida?

GROFF: Oh, because I've lived here for 12 years, and it's still so alien and fecund³ and steamy and strange to me.

SHAPIRO: (Laughter) Those are great words to describe the state.

GROFF: Reptilian⁴, dangerous, teeming⁵ - I mean, there's so many things that you can call Florida. And so I'm from upstate New York, this little tiny village called Cooperstown which is the prototypical American village. And then I came down to Florida against my will - absolutely. And there's still...

SHAPIRO: Because of your husband?

GROFF: Yes, dang it. Yes, it's his fault. I was not prepared to love the place. And in fact, I didn't for about five years partially⁶ because of this feeling that everything is slightly dangerous or is kind of out to get you. You know, there are...

SHAPIRO: Yeah.

GROFF: ...Snakes everywhere, alligators⁷ in retention⁸ ponds. The mosquitoes are the size of houseflies. I mean, everything...

SHAPIRO: Even the weather's out to get you. You've got hurricanes.

GROFF: The - absolutely. And if it's not the hurricanes, it's the termites⁹, right? I mean, something's going to take your house down. So it feels as though there's this deep, dark something happening at the center of the state, and yet we're just pouring sunshine over it. And that feels very much like a microcosm of America, right?

SHAPIRO: Oh, wow.

GROFF: I mean, there's a lot of darkness happening, and then there's - we pretend that everything is fine. You know, we pour sunshine on everything. So I'm just fascinated by this place. It still feels alien to me.

SHAPIRO: There is a lot of the state that does not appear in the short story collection. There's no Disney. There's no South Beach, Miami. There's no plastic surgery or beach bunnies. Did you intentionally¹⁰ wall all that off? Or was it just that this is the stuff that made its way into the book, and the other stuff didn't?

GROFF: Well, one of my ideas about this book is that it's the Florida that is not the replicated¹¹ vision of Florida that people see all over the world if you don't really know the state, right? So if you do imagine the state, you do think South Beach, which is lovely and wonderful. You think Disney and standing¹² in those horrible lines for hours. But I was more interested in the stories that don't necessarily get told or the narratives¹³ that are maybe a little bit outside the norm.

SHAPIRO: There's a meme that I'm sure you've seen which is Florida Man, which basically...

GROFF: I love - (laughter).

SHAPIRO: ...Collect crazy headlines about things that men in Florida have done. And sometimes I felt like this story collection could be subtitled Florida woman.

GROFF: Right (laughter). But Florida woman is really subversive¹⁴, and she doesn't like Florida Man very much. Let's be honest, right?

SHAPIRO: (Laughter).

GROFF: I love Florida Man. I mean, that's the funny thing, right? That's the stereotype¹⁵. That's what everybody knows about Florida, is, you know, if something weird¹⁶ happens in the U.S., 80 percent of the time...

SHAPIRO: (Laughter) It's in Florida.

GROFF: ...It has happened in Florida, right? Someone has been standing on top of his car, like, throwing golf balls at a police car. And that's definitely - that has happened before.

SHAPIRO: And he was naked.

GROFF: And he was absolutely naked, right? Absolutely. This book is very internal, right? It's very much about domesticity and resisting domesticity and nature sort of imposing¹⁷ itself on people. It's not - it's dark but psychologically dark.

SHAPIRO: Because you brought up the idea of resisting domesticity, I have to ask you. There's one character that comes up a number of times, and she's ambivalent¹⁸ about being a mother. And she says motherhood was never interesting to her. Her husband had to be the one to make up for the depths of my lack. And this is a character who lives in Gainesville and is the mother of two children. And it's hard not to observe that you are also a mother of two living in Gainesville.

GROFF: That is a good observation, yes.

SHAPIRO: Thank you.

GROFF: (Laughter) So my general statement about this is that it's not not me, right? I mean, I think the question is...

SHAPIRO: This is your prepared statement that you're reading for the press. This is not not me.

GROFF: (Laughter) Ari Shapiro, the character is not not me.

SHAPIRO: (Laughter).

GROFF: Yes. So she's not me, right? She's a fictional¹⁹ character. So she's someone that I know made grotesque²⁰, basically. That is what I think of...

SHAPIRO: Yeah.

GROFF: So there's no such thing as fiction that's not somewhat autobiographical. Likewise, there's no such thing as memoir²¹ that's not fictional. And it's possible that some of the things that this narrator says and thinks are things that I myself have said and thought. But I think in general I'm less grotesquely²², like, frightened of the world.

SHAPIRO: I have to confess since I read this book I've been having snake dreams.

GROFF: Awesome²³. Good (laughter).

SHAPIRO: Will you read from one of the stories in this collection called "Snake Stories"?

GROFF: Absolutely. (Reading) Walk outside in Florida, and a snake will be watching you. Snakes in mulch, snakes in scrub, snakes waiting from the lawn for you to leave the pool so they can drown themselves in it. Snakes gazing at your mousy ankle and wondering what it would feel like to sink its fangs²⁴ in deep.

SHAPIRO: It's hard to escape the allegorical significance of a snake. I mean, you reference Adam and Eve. You reference the "Iliad." Snakes come up a lot in this collection. And do you know why?

GROFF: Absolutely. Yes. So snakes are the most untamed thing I can think of - right? - the most wild, the least concerned about humanity. They're the one thing that I see even after 12 years in Florida - and I see them almost daily because I go for a run out in the prairie a lot. They're the one thing that actually sends visceral horror through me...

SHAPIRO: Daily.

GROFF: A lightning bolt - pretty much daily, yeah. I mean, there's either a dead snake on the ground or my kid's bringing a snake in the house. My kids love snakes. They love them. I mean, snakes are very much related to the pigeon brain in me that is just full of dread²⁵.

SHAPIRO: So you've lived in Florida for 12 years, and it still seems alien to you. And you go for a run nearly every day, and a snake still sends visceral horror down your spine²⁶. Do you think these things, this place that is now your home, will ever stop being visceral and horrifying²⁷ and alien? And would you want it to?

GROFF: I don't want it to. I don't want it to because I'm a writer of fiction. And I think that if you feel too comfortable, you're writing from the inside. And so I think that the role of the fiction writer is very much to press up against the strictures of the society and the people within the society. So if you're writing from the inside, you can't do your job in a lot of ways. But also, Ari, I truly don't actually think that I would be happy anywhere, (laughter) right?

SHAPIRO: (Laughter).

GROFF: I'm a fiction writer. And it's possible that I would feel the same dread if I lived on my own island in the Caribbean - right? - if I lived in, you know, Mont Saint-Michel in France - right? - if I lived in Taiwan. Even though I still struggle against this crazy state that I find myself living in every single day, I am grateful to the struggle. And I'm grateful that it's something that I feel oppositional²⁸ toward and love at the same time.

SHAPIRO: Lauren Groff, thank you so much for talking with us.

GROFF: Thank you so much, Ari.

SHAPIRO: Her new short story collection is called "Florida."

1 dense   

a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的

参考例句：

• The general ambushed his troops in the dense woods. 将军把部队埋伏在浓密的树林里。
• The path was completely covered by the dense foliage. 小路被树叶厚厚地盖了一层。

2 tangle   

n.纠缠；缠结；混乱；v.(使)缠绕；变乱

参考例句：

• I shouldn't tangle with Peter.He is bigger than me.我不应该与彼特吵架。他的块头比我大。
• If I were you, I wouldn't tangle with them.我要是你，我就不跟他们争吵。

3 fecund   

adj.多产的，丰饶的，肥沃的

参考例句：

• The pampas are still among the most fecund lands in the world.南美大草原仍然是世界上最肥沃的土地之一。
• They have a fecund soil.他们有肥沃的土地。

4 reptilian   

adj.（像）爬行动物的；（像）爬虫的；卑躬屈节的；卑鄙的n.两栖动物；卑劣的人

参考例句：

• The chick is ugly and almost reptilian in its appearance. 这只小鸡长得很丑，看起来几乎像个爬行动物。 来自辞典例句
• Being from Orion do Zetas contain DNA from the Reptilian race? 齐塔人是从猎户座而来，DNA来自爬虫族吗？ 来自互联网

5 teeming   

adj.丰富的v.充满( teem的现在分词 )；到处都是；（指水、雨等）暴降；倾注

参考例句：

• The rain was teeming down. 大雨倾盆而下。
• the teeming streets of the city 熙熙攘攘的城市街道

6 partially   

adv.部分地，从某些方面讲

参考例句：

• The door was partially concealed by the drapes.门有一部分被门帘遮住了。
• The police managed to restore calm and the curfew was partially lifted.警方设法恢复了平静，宵禁部分解除。

7 alligators   

n.短吻鳄( alligator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Two alligators rest their snouts on the water's surface. 两只鳄鱼的大嘴栖息在水面上。 来自辞典例句
• In the movement of logs by water the lumber industry was greatly helped by alligators. 木材工业过去在水上运输木料时所十分倚重的就是鳄鱼。 来自辞典例句

8 retention   

n.保留，保持，保持力，记忆力

参考例句：

• They advocate the retention of our nuclear power plants.他们主张保留我们的核电厂。
• His retention of energy at this hour is really surprising.人们惊叹他在这个时候还能保持如此旺盛的精力。

9 termites   

n.白蚁( termite的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Termites are principally tropical in distribution. 白蚁主要分布在热带地区。 来自辞典例句
• This spray will exterminate the termites. 这种喷剂能消灭白蚁。 来自辞典例句

10 intentionally   

ad.故意地，有意地

参考例句：

• I didn't say it intentionally. 我是无心说的。
• The local authority ruled that he had made himself intentionally homeless and was therefore not entitled to be rehoused. 当地政府裁定他是有意居无定所，因此没有资格再获得提供住房。

11 replicated   

复制( replicate的过去式和过去分词 )； 重复； 再造； 再生

参考例句：

• Later outplant the seedlings in a replicated permanent test plantation. 以后苗木出圃栽植成重复的永久性试验林。
• The phage has replicated and the donor cells have lysed. 噬菌体已复制和给体细胞已发生裂解。

12 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

13 narratives   

记叙文( narrative的名词复数 )； 故事； 叙述； 叙述部分

参考例句：

• Marriage, which has been the bourne of so many narratives, is still a great beginning. 结婚一向是许多小说的终点，然而也是一个伟大的开始。
• This is one of the narratives that children are fond of. 这是孩子们喜欢的故事之一。

14 subversive   

adj.颠覆性的，破坏性的；n.破坏份子，危险份子

参考例句：

• She was seen as a potentially subversive within the party.她被看成党内潜在的颠覆分子。
• The police is investigating subversive group in the student organization.警方正调查学生组织中的搞颠覆阴谋的集团。

15 stereotype   

n.固定的形象，陈规，老套，旧框框

参考例句：

• He's my stereotype of a schoolteacher.他是我心目中的典型教师。
• There's always been a stereotype about successful businessmen.人们对于成功商人一直都有一种固定印象。

16 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

17 imposing   

adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的

参考例句：

• The fortress is an imposing building.这座城堡是一座宏伟的建筑。
• He has lost his imposing appearance.他已失去堂堂仪表。

18 ambivalent   

adj.含糊不定的；(态度等)矛盾的

参考例句：

• She remained ambivalent about her marriage.她对于自己的婚事仍然拿不定主意。
• Although she professed fear of the Russians,she seemed to have ambivalent feelings toward Philby himself.虽然她承认害怕俄国人，然而她似乎对菲尔比本人有一种矛盾的感情。

19 fictional   

adj.小说的，虚构的

参考例句：

• The names of the shops are entirely fictional.那些商店的名字完全是虚构的。
• The two authors represent the opposite poles of fictional genius.这两位作者代表了天才小说家两个极端。

20 grotesque   

adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物）

参考例句：

• His face has a grotesque appearance.他的面部表情十分怪。
• Her account of the incident was a grotesque distortion of the truth.她对这件事的陈述是荒诞地歪曲了事实。

21 memoir   

n.[pl.]回忆录，自传；记事录

参考例句：

• He has just published a memoir in honour of his captain.他刚刚出了一本传记来纪念他的队长。
• In her memoir,the actress wrote about the bittersweet memories of her first love.在那个女演员的自传中，她写到了自己苦乐掺半的初恋。

22 grotesquely   

adv. 奇异地,荒诞地

参考例句：

• Her arched eyebrows and grotesquely powdered face were at once seductive and grimly overbearing. 眉棱棱着，在一脸的怪粉上显出妖媚而霸道。 来自汉英文学 - 骆驼祥子
• Two faces grotesquely disfigured in nylon stocking masks looked through the window. 2张戴尼龙长袜面罩的怪脸望着窗外。

23 awesome   

adj.令人惊叹的，难得吓人的，很好的

参考例句：

• The church in Ireland has always exercised an awesome power.爱尔兰的教堂一直掌握着令人敬畏的权力。
• That new white convertible is totally awesome.那辆新的白色折篷汽车简直棒极了.

24 fangs   

n.（尤指狗和狼的）长而尖的牙( fang的名词复数 )；（蛇的）毒牙；罐座

参考例句：

• The dog fleshed his fangs in the deer's leg. 狗用尖牙咬住了鹿腿。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Dogs came lunging forward with their fangs bared. 狗龇牙咧嘴地扑过来。 来自《简明英汉词典》

25 dread   

vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧

参考例句：

• We all dread to think what will happen if the company closes.我们都不敢去想一旦公司关门我们该怎么办。
• Her heart was relieved of its blankest dread.她极度恐惧的心理消除了。

26 spine   

n.脊柱，脊椎；(动植物的)刺；书脊

参考例句：

• He broke his spine in a fall from a horse.他从马上跌下摔断了脊梁骨。
• His spine developed a slight curve.他的脊柱有点弯曲。

27 horrifying   

a.令人震惊的，使人毛骨悚然的

参考例句：

• He went to great pains to show how horrifying the war was. 他极力指出战争是多么的恐怖。
• The possibility of war is too horrifying to contemplate. 战争的可能性太可怕了，真不堪细想。

28 oppositional   

反对的，对抗的

参考例句：

• I wish to forcefully grasp fragile and entirely oppositional poles, allowing them to coexist. 我想要强押起脆弱的、完全相斥的两端，让他们共存。
• Robot Soccer game is an international and high-tech oppositional activity that develops rapidly in recent years. 机器人足球比赛是近年来在国际上迅速开展起来的高技术对抗活动。