Richard Price

I never heard of Richard Price before Professor Bernstein told us about him. I thought it would be boring listening to an author I never heard of talk about a book I would probably never read, but the reading and talk back session turned out to be a lot of fun. Richard Price turned out to be a really interesting guy.

I’m not much of a book person, instead of reading I mostly watch movies. While listening to Richard Price read from his novel, Lush Life, I couldn’t help comparing his book with movies like Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, and Mystic River. His writing is gritty and straight to the point. He doesn’t waste time with too many adjectives, metaphors or poetic language. From what I could tell his books try to be realistic about crime and tensions in the city, which is similar to a lot of movies I’ve seen.

I also was interested in his opinion on the gentrification of NYC, since I have always been interested in demographics, especially when analyzing certain trends like the shifts occurring in the Lower East Side and Harlem. After asking him whether or not he would rather have NYC be the way it was in the 1970’s or keep it the way it is now, he said that the question was “a mess” and was unable to give me a yes or no answer. For one thing, he said he misses the diversity, the culture, and artsy way NY was back in the 70’s compared to the white, yuppie, hipster, bohemian bourgeoisie demographic that represents most of NYC today. On the other hand he said that the crime rate and drug problems today have greatly improved since the 1970’s and it would be hard too hard to choose between what boiled down to be the culture of the 70’s and the quality of life today. He ended my answer with a self referential anecdote: he said that back then no one ever talked about the kids who grew up in the projects, went to college and became relatively successful. The things that we hear on the news about the kids who got into the drug business and gunned down someone in the street are only a small minority of the population, even in the 1970’s.