Peter Mendelsund is the creative director and a contributor at The Atlantic. On his website, he’s described as "a fledgling painter, a defunct graphic designer, and a recovering classical pianist." He is also the author of seven books—including The Delivery and What We See When We Read.
I include these details here by way of providing context for the wide-ranging discussion we shared.
Two books are our central focus here. Weepers is a novel. The protagonist is Ed. Ed is a weeper. He is a card-carrying member of a union of weepers hired to cry at funerals. This might seem like an unusual and surreal element of the story. But it really isn’t.
Weepers—or people who attend funerals for the purpose of crying—have existed a long time throughout the world. But in the case of this little town where the novel is set, the criers are a little burned out. And Ed—while a much in-demand weeper—is dealing with a lot of other problems. When a young, strange kid comes to town, something happens that affects everyone, including Ed.
In Exhibitionist: 1 Journal, 1 Depression, 100 Paintings, Mendelsund offers us a unique memoir.
In 2020, Mendelsund had been in a profound depression—one that could even be described as “dangerous.”
When the pandemic descended on the world in the spring of that year, Mendelsund was with his family, secluded in a farmhouse in New Hampshire. There, the depression took an intractable hold. This was a very different kind of depression for Mendelsund, who had endured other serious bouts of depression throughout his life. This time he’d been on the brink of suicide.
He had a hard time focusing on doing the things he loved best, including playing the piano and reading. But one thing he suddenly could do was paint. This might not seem so extraordinary until you realize that he’d never been a painter.
Something nameless pushes him to a Michael’s craft store where he buys canvasses and paints and brushes. He stows them in the trunk of his car for a very long time.
But once he brought those materials out into the light and started painting in the barn on that farm, he found some form of relief.
In some ways, he was pushed more deeply into a mind that contemplated suffering—his own and that of others. He comes to understand some of the mysteries of his enigmatic and troubled father. The admiration and love he feels for his mother—a woman who also suffered physical illnesses—deepens.
The memoir includes the journal entries Mendelsund was able to compose during a very dark and difficult time. He integrates 100 paintings, too. As we learn, he painted many more—because there was something lifesaving about painting—this new sort of stand-in occupation. Rather than sit at the keyboard—at the piano or at the computer— Mendelsund stood before the canvas on the easel. It kind of saved his life.
In this discussion, we talk about other books, including his 2020 novel, Delivery and a 2014 book, What We See When We Read —which is a kind of talisman for this podcast host.
Guest: Peter Mendelsund
Peter Mendelsund is the author of seven books, including the novels Delivery and Same Same, as well as the nonfiction works What We See When We Read, Cover, The Look of the Book.
His latest novel is Weepers. It's published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
His new memoir is Exhibitionist: 1 Journal, 1 Depression, 100 Paintings. It's published by Catapult.
Learn more about the author here.
