Joy Williams' third novel, Breaking and Entering, is the story of lovers who break into strangers' homes and live their lives for a time before moving on. First published in 1988, it is a book impossible to describe, a work of singular vision and sensibilty that is as infectious in its weird effect as it is unforgettable for the quality of its prose.
In this episode, the novelist, spiritual thinker, and acclaimed podcaster Conner Habib joins JF and Phil to explore how the novel's enchantments rest on the uniqueness of Williams' style, which is to say, her bold embrace of ways of seeing that are hers alone. Williams is an artist who refuses to work from within some predetermined philosophical or political idiom. As Habib tells your hosts, she goes her own way, and even the gods must follow.
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REFERENCES
Conner Habib, "Joy Williams: The Best Fiction Writer Alive" (https://connerhabib.com/2015/12/31/on-joy-williams-or-the-best-fiction-writer-alive/)
Joy Williams, [Breaking and Entering](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/834582.BreakingandEntering)
Joy Williams, The Quick and the Dead (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780375727641)
The Paris Review, Interview with Joy Williams (https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/6303/the-art-of-fiction-no-223-joy-williams)
Heraclitus, Fragments (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780142437650)
Joy Williams, “Breakfast” in Taking Care (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780394729121)
Bret Easton Ellis, American Psycho (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780679735779)
The Phantom Stranger (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Stranger), DC Comics character
James Joyce, Ulysses (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780679722762)
Eugene Ionesco, Rhinoceros (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780573614743)
Deleuze and Guatarri, What is Philosophy? (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780231079891)
Quentin Meillassoux (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quentin_Meillassoux), French philosopher
David Mamet, On Directing Film (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780140127225)
David Mamet, True and False (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780679772644)
Nicholas Winding Refn (dir.), The Neon Demon (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1974419/)
Joy Williams, “Congress” (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9781400095520)
Joy Williams, “Hawk” (https://granta.com/hawk/)
Stephen Sexton, If All the World and Love Were Young (https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41081318-if-all-the-world-and-love-were-young)
Scott Burnham, Mozart’s Grace (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780691168067) Special Guest: Conner Habib.