The monthly Lit Glit salon returns with A Manual For Cleaning Women, a pulverising selection of short stories from the previously unsung queen of story, Lucia Berlin.
Berlin wrote in binges, brilliantly, throughout the 60s, 70s and 80s until her death in 2004. Ten years later, with the release of this book, she became a New York Times Bestseller and the kind of writer that Mel says "I’d start a fight with my then boyfriend about".
You think Bukowski lived a life? Maaaate. If there can only be one true cataloguer of the ugly-beautiful, the itinerant, the mundane-transcendent, the gurgling bottle, to imbue the city dump with the majesty of a field of wildflowers, then Lit Glit decrees: it is she.
Listen back as writer Grace Yee and painter Kirsty Budge have a belter of a conversation about the woman who could be described as the godmother of autofiction. As Berlin herself said – “The story is the thing.”
About this program
Championing stylish wordsmiths and sterling conversation, Literati Glitterati is a weekly book show that loves a good story, well told.
LITERATI GLITTERATI SALON: A MONTHLY BOOK CLUB
Join Mel and a rotating roster of bookish conversationalists as they unpack Literati Glitterati’s book of the month.
Expect a spiriting assortment of cult classics, forgotten wonders, timeless treasures, zesty new releases and pulp fictions wrestled straight from the zeitgeist by Mel herself.
Each book will be announced a month out from the special, so that you can read along at home. On the last Wednesday of every month, tune into Literati Glitterati from midday till 1pm with your thoughts and feelings ready: we’ll be taking questions through the text line.
Literati Glitterati Salon: a monthly book club for folks who like a good story, well told.
NOVEMBER'S BOOK: Family Lexicon by Natalia Ginzburg.
‘Autobiography crept up on me like a wolf,’ said Natalia Ginzburg of her charming and dynamic autofictional novel from 1963, Family Lexicon: a dancing love letter to memory, language and family, set against the backdrop of fascist Italy.
What do you do when you miss your home and your big raucous family? You summon them on the page in clean, supreme prose of course. You make them TALK. You like Cusk? Maggie Nelson? Tessa Hadley? You like to laugh? This one’s for you, cutie. Ginzburg’s dad called all his kids jackasses.
Tune in! Call your sister! Stick it to the fascists! Stop dropping bombs you fucking ghouls! Love and hugs to all.
Featuring an unbelievable panel of kaleidoscopic life force, of course: giant of publishing Hilary McPhee; songwriting storyteller of Orbweavers fame, and all-time great conversationalist Marita Dyson; and author of the electric The Degenerates, Raeden Richardson. Much to discuss!
Tune in Wednesday 27 November, 12pm.
