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Thursday, January 20, 2005
Law (not) - At lunch with John Grisham
The NY Times had an interview with John Grisham yesterday in its Dining & Wine section titled "The Lawyer Enters a Plea of Lucky." Some quotes:
"I woke up and won the lottery," he recalled in a pronounced Southern drawl. "I stopped practicing law. I stopped practicing politics. And so for 15 years I've had the luxury of staying at home, being there with my kids, coaching Little League baseball. I didn't miss a play. I didn't miss anything." Those children, a 21-year-old son and an 18-year-old daughter, are in college now.Mr. Grisham had that luxury in part because he kept writing and writing, at least a book every year, and those books kept selling and selling. His 18th novel, "The Broker," was published by Doubleday last week. It will almost inevitably climb to the zenith of the best-seller list and linger there, because it is essentially a legal thriller and that is what Mr. Grisham's legal thrillers ("The Pelican Brief," "The Runaway Jury") do.
Over the last 15 years, more than 100 million copies of Mr. Grisham's books have been published in hardcover and paperback worldwide. That figure probably makes him the most commercially successful writer in the world for that time period.
But it has not, by all appearances, messed with his head, and his attitude toward lunch — toward food in general — reflects his striking equilibrium. He loves fine food and tries in a low-key manner to broaden his culinary horizons, an effort aided by his wealth and control over his time. He has not, however, become obsessive, pretentious or fetishistic about it.
On a trip to France several years ago with his wife and children he put together a schedule of five Michelin three-star restaurants over five consecutive nights, he said. "But after about the third one," he said, "there was open revolt. Every meal was at least three hours long." The family made a beeline for bistros and never looked back.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on January 20, 2005 08:25 PM
Posted to General Law Related