Robert Glück’s “About Ed”

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Eric Newman and Kate Wolf are joined by the author, editor, and co-founder of the New Narrative movement Robert Glück to discuss his latest book, About Ed. The book is a non-linear memoir (of sorts), parsing the life and death of Glück’s lover, the artist Ed Aulerich-Sugai. The narrative moves promiscuously back and forth between the 1970s when Bob and Ed’s relationship takes shape, to the 1980s when AIDS ravages the gay community and Ed is diagnosed with HIV, to Ed’s death in 1994, and Bob’s wrestling with the emotional aftermath of Ed’s loss. Along the way, Glück captures the peaks and valleys of the relationship—tumultuous moments conjured in elegiac reveries—as well as the everyday objects by which the world of a deeply intimate history continues into the present. About Ed forces us to confront what we know and don’t know about those loved ones who indelibly shape our lives.

Also, Sasha Frere-Jones, author of Earlier, returns to recommend two books by Avi Shlaim, The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World, and Three Worlds: Memoirs of an Arab-Jew.