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Paper Towns Tastic Question Tuesday

2009-02-10 · Q&A · John · 3:53 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Books & writing · mode: Q&A & conversation · tags: recurring series, self promotion

John answers Nerdfighters' questions about Paper Towns, explaining that it is about how we misimagine other people and our stories: Margo as a mirror, colours after Moby-Dick, the Black Santas and Gatsby's self-made man.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Greeting; Paper Towns questions: what it is about, why Song of Myself, will it be a movie

  • ★★ John finally answers real Nerdfighters' questions about his new book Paper Towns, for the Nerdfighter Blurbing Book Club per the description. — 00:00:00 · Paper Towns, Nerdfighteria, Question Tuesday
  • ★★ John says Paper Towns is about Margo Roth Spiegelman, her next-door neighbour Q, the state of Florida and Walt Whitman. — 00:00:00 · Paper Towns, Florida
  • ★★★ Song of Myself is central because it is a beautiful poem deeply involved with how we can imagine other people more effectively (and, he jokes, Whitman is hot). — 00:00:00 · perspective-taking
  • ★★ The Paper Towns movie rights were acquired by Mr. Mudd and Mandate, the people behind Juno. — 00:00:00 · Paper Towns

00:00:46 — Screenplay; Quentin's parents; the name Spiegelman (mirror maker) and the two covers; a 20-year-old reader

  • ★★ John does not know whether Paper Towns will be a movie; he is writing the screenplay, so it is up to him whether it is good enough. (hedged) — 00:00:46 · Paper Towns
  • ★★ John says Spiegelman is a German word meaning mirror maker, the man in old German villages who made the mirrors. — 00:00:46
  • ★★★ Margo is the book's mirror maker: people looking at her see a funhouse-mirror reflection of themselves, not what is true of her, hence the two different, equally inaccurate covers. — 00:00:46 · Paper Towns, perspective-taking
  • ★ Asked by a 20-year-old whether they are too old for the book, John says no: that day an 82-year-old woman emailed that she liked it. — 00:00:46 · Paper Towns

00:01:22 — Misimagining (Q/Margo, Pudge/Alaska); colours and Moby-Dick; purposeful vs random details; Q vs John

  • ★★★ Q's misimagining of Margo resembles Pudge's of Alaska; John argues that imagining someone as more than a person does them and ourselves a profound disservice. — 00:01:22 · Looking for Alaska (novel), perspective-taking

    “whether we're Edward Cullen-izing them or Alaska-izing them or Margo-izing them”

  • ★★★ On colours: the book has much Moby-Dick in it (white imagery, Black Santas, Margo's middle name meaning red); like Melville, John wanted to subvert white as a symbol of purity and put Margo outside the good/evil dichotomy. (hedged) — 00:01:51 · Paper Towns

  • ★★ Ideally nothing in a novel is totally random, John says, though asked about Ben's beer sword he concedes some things are random. — 00:01:51
  • ★ Q is not really based on John's high-school self; he thinks they share nothing except being tall and vaguely nerdy. (hedged) — 00:01:51

00:02:36 — Paperback; the Black Santa collection; writing from experience; the Great Gatsby comparison

  • ★★ The Paper Towns paperback will be out at the end of this year (2009). — 00:02:36 · Paper Towns
  • ★★ The paperback will probably not have either current cover, so John tells viewers who want these covers to get them now. (hedged) — 00:02:36 · Paper Towns
  • ★★★ The book is about how we misimagine other people and our stories; Radar's parents own the world's largest Black Santa collection because John finds it funny and it asks us to imagine the world more complexly. (hedged) — 00:02:36 · perspective-taking, Paper Towns, imagine others complexly
  • ★★ John very rarely steals directly from his own experience, though he says there are two occasions where he clearly did. — 00:02:36
  • ★★ Paper Towns shares many of The Great Gatsby's questions, above all whether there is such a thing as the self-made man; John then jokingly declines the 'modern-day Gatsby' label. — 00:03:05 · Paper Towns

00:03:27 — Alternate titles; thanks to Nerdfighters; sign-off

  • ★★ Alternate titles: 'More Light Than Heat', from a line in Hamlet, and 'Under the Red, the White, and the Blue', one of Fitzgerald's alternate titles for Gatsby. — 00:03:27 · Paper Towns
  • ★★ John thanks Nerdfighters for reading Paper Towns and responding with thoughtfulness and depth, which reminds him why he loves his job. — 00:03:27 · Nerdfighteria, Paper Towns

In the description and comments

  • ★★ The description says several more questions will be answered in a video on Friday or Saturday. — video description
  • ★★ The description asks viewers to leave questions in the comments for the Question Tuesday after next. — video description · Question Tuesday

Humor (significant)

  • Second reason Song of Myself is central to Paper Towns: Walt Whitman is hot. — 00:00:00

    “that guy could sound his barbaric yelp over the roofs of my world anytime.”

  • Asked whether Quentin's parents are based on his own parents or people he knew. — 00:00:46

    “No, but I have had a lot of therapy.”

  • After explaining the colour symbolism, John stages a cow fighting a Black Santa. — 00:01:51

    “That is the first time in the history of YouTube that a cow has had a fight with a Black Santa.”

  • Right after saying nothing in a novel is random, John reads: does Ben's beer sword represent inner conflict? — 00:01:51

    “Okay, fair enough. Some things are random.”

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: Margo Roth Spiegelman · Paper Towns · perspective-taking

Also: People: Herman Melville · Walt Whitman

Works: Juno · Looking for Alaska (novel) · Moby-Dick · Song of Myself · The Great Gatsby

Organizations: Mandate Pictures · Mr. Mudd · YouTube

Terms: imagine others complexly

Concepts: American Dream · authorial intent

Places: Florida

Characters: Alaska Young · Ben Starling · Black Santa · Dr. Jefferson Jefferson · Edward Cullen · Miles Halter · Quentin Jacobsen · Radar

Only in the description or credits: Blurbing Book Club · F. Scott Fitzgerald · Hamlet (play) · Question Tuesday

Also centred on Margo Roth Spiegelman: On Loving One Another or Dying

Later videos replying to this one

Part of an exchange of 5 videos, 2009-02-08 – 2009-02-21.