Jennifer Egan Tells Young Writers To Ignore “Best Of” Lists

While shooting a video about artists and their favorite places in Manhattan, author of A Visit From The Goon Squad Jennifer Egan offered encouragement to young writers who feel excluded from “best of” lists.

Throughout the series of clips, Egan also talked about her struggle to keep her ambitions modest while striving to become a professional writer in New York City in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, in a time when being a writer had become a fairly glamorous profession.

Each of these unfortunately brief video clips is definitely worth watching, as Egan offers her perspective on everything from feeling like a faceless scribe in a sea of literary “rock stars” to her former fondness for running in Manhattan’s East River Park and the affect it had on her writing.