Colson Whitehead grew up in Manhattan, now lives in Brooklyn, and has spent much of his career writing ambitious, award-winning novels set around New York or a place that feels very much like it. Now, he's gone and destroyed the whole city for his latest book, Zone One, a post-apocalyptic tale of a Manhattan crippled by a plague and overrun with zombies. But it's so much more than that! One, while ostensibly a horror story, transcends the genre by bringing in elements of some Whitehead favorites, like race, ambition, and societal fear in a post-9/11 world. Also, it's funny! Whitehead, who maintains a hilariously melancholy Twitter feed and is described by his publisher as "the most morose man in Brooklyn," has a delightfully twisted sense of humor that permeates the entire novel...and most of his conversations. We spoke to the author about surviving Comic Con, leaving Manhattan for dead, and go deep into some zombie mythology.
Colson Whitehead On Manhattan Being Destroyed By Zombies
Extra, Extra
- Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a shooting on 109th Ave. and Merick Blvd. in Queens, a person under a train at Sutphin Blvd. in Queens, and a cyclist pinned beneath the wheels of a bus on 14th St. and 1st Ave. (looks like victim will survive) in Manhattan.
- The tech-savvy youth who got himself arrested for stealing a Sidekick mobile device and then allowing its owner to track him down via MySpace remains jailed on $20,000 bail.
- Welcome Abigail Fulop. The Leap Year Baby was born on Staten Island at 2:23 a.m. on the 29th. Her parents Dave and Michelle will be celebrating their daughter's birthday on March 1st three years out of four.
- A scholarship endowment fund has been established in the name of Ossie Davis to aid young actors who are not only pursuing performance arts, but embodying the activism of the late actor. Davis died in 2005, was the husband of actress Rubie Dee, and was a featured speaker at the funerals of both Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.
- Hoboken, NJ police officers are now claiming that they were forced to go to a Hooters restaurant and hand over their automatic weapons to scantily clad waitresses while posing cheerfully for photos.
- Red Hook's new IKEA manager isn't from New York. The Brooklyn Swedish mega-furniture-mart boss is from North York, in Canada. Will the perfidy of our pleasant and polite northern neighbors ever cease?
- We find this harder to swallow than a cat fur-covered Milkbone: AIBO robot dogs are as effective at relieving lonely old persons' isolation as actual living dogs.
- Colson Whitehead is an established and successful author who lives in Brooklyn. If you're only 50% there, get over your zip code and give the attitude a rest. Apparently, Brooklyn writers are the new actor-waiters.
Karl Lagerfeld Thinks E.B.White is New York
A recent series of essays about New York that we enjoyed is Colson Whitehead's The Colossus of New York. What are some books about New York that you like?
Pencil This In
MOVIES: Don't forget, the Bryant Park movies start tonight! The movie won't begin until sunset - which is about the same time the rain and thunder are scheduled to begin. Tonights features in Alfred Hitchcock's thriller, The Birds. Be an early bird (heh) and get there at 5 for a good spot on the lawn!
There but Not There: Our Cell Phone Society
Goldberger also laments the disappearance of telephone exchanges that were defined by neighborhoods. With land lines moving to cells, 212 might be as "placeless" as 917 and 347. [Via Metafilter]
Colossus of New York
Gothamist has been reading Colson Whitehead's new book of essays, Colossus of New York, and we might need to make it our official book. Whitehead, who wrote The Intuitionist and John Henry Days, the books is a collection of essays about New York - essentially a love letter in thirteen parts to New York. An excerpt:
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