Sunday Morning! “The Cannibal” by: John Hawkes

Rufus F.

Rufus is a likeable curmudgeon. He has a PhD in History, sang for a decade in a punk band, and recently moved to NYC after nearly two decades in Canada. He wrote the book "The Paris Bureau" from Dio Press (2021).

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4 Responses

  1. Saul Degraw says:

    I know that book store!! I’m not sure it is as odd in that neighborhood as you think it is. Though I have not been in Williamsburg since 2018 or so. There is another decent book store on Bedford that is pretty good or once was there. Also we call them neighborhoods, not districts 🙂 It is funny though, when I grew up in Long Island in the 1980s and 90s, Williamsburg was largely nothing. There were parts of Brooklyn that started gentrification as far back as the 1970s but these were the areas of Brownstone Brooklyn where former old grandhomes could be snatched for a steals (though most of them needed major TLC). Now those homes are worth millions of dollars. WIlliamsburg was not part of this movement though which was largely done by people already outpriced from the West Village.

    When I graduated college, my best friend invited me to hang out with her as she went looking for apartments in Williamsburg. I was confused as to why but then I saw that it was starting to be a bit more cool than a former industrial neighborhood where most of the residents were Eastern European immigrants or Hasidic Jews. For the nest 15 or so years, I saw it get bougier and bougier. LeeEsq lived in South Williamsburg for over a decade. When I lived in Brooklyn, it was in the brownstone part on the border of Boreum Hill and Carroll Gardens.

    As to your question, we watched A Hero on Friday Night. This is an Iranian film that won that grand prize at Cannes in 2021. It is about a man who is stuck in prison for a debt.* While on leave, his paramor finds a handbag filled with gold coins which should pay off half his debt. Instead of selling the coins, he decides to find the owner and return them. The rest of the movie unfolds somewhere between the perils of doing the right thing for the wrong reasons and no good deed goes unpunished.

    *Many Islamic countries, including Iran, still allow for imprisonment for debt. It is a counterproductive punishment which keeps people in prison until the debt is paid off and/or the debt holder decides to forgive and release the debtor. Some googling revealed a story about an owner of a failed factory that spent 20 years in prison until a combination of charity and forgiveness eliminated the debt.Report

    • LeeEsq in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      Before gentrification, Williamsburg was divided between Eastern Europeans in the north part and Satmar Hasidim and Puerto Ricans in the South Party. Then in the 1990s, the artists started coming in and after the artists the hipsters and yuppies. The north part hipsterized first but South Williamsburg had a lot of gentrification to.Report

  2. LeeEsq says:

    As my brother mentions, I used to live near Book Thug Nation and hung out there a lot. On Williamsburg near the Bedford L subway stop, I had a friend who sold books on the weekend on the streets.Report

  3. Rufus F. says:

    I’m being a little cheeky- Williamsburg is definitely bougie but a lot of fun too. My girlfriend has been on Houston since the 90s and apparently the East Village is less bougie than it was a few years ago. I have a feeling when I come down I will visit Book Thug Nation very often. Although she’s about 2 blocks from Bluestockings, which is also great.
    I get neighborhoods. What really got me was the different length blocks. They’re a lot shorter in NY than elsewhere. I walked to 42nd from Houston, and that many blocks back home is impossible.Report