More Alan Furst Blogging

More Alan Furst blogging, this time from Unqualified Offerings:

Unqualified Offerings: Henry Farrell got me into a to-do for novelist Alan Furst at GWU this evening. The food was fabulous and the author did not disappoint. Controversial GWU President Stephen Joel Trachtenberg did the introduction, and it was good - the kind of informed appreciation a writer can get, if lucky, from a very smart fan. See previous Furst-blogging on this site and current Furst-blogging from Brad DeLong. Furst read a few pages from The Foreign Correspondent, which will be out in time for Father's Day - 2006. I have to say, the excerpt completely hooked me...

Now excuse me while I turn green with envy.

Comments

[John Emerson]

You think you're envious. I went to school with the guy.

He was a very pleasant, unassuming guy. No one had any idea he was that sharp. Most of the big egos of that time and place have crapped out by now, and it's nice to see Alan making it.

[Henry Farrell]

Well, if you'd been in town ... As Jim said, it was a good event, and Trachtenberg's intro was an unexpected delight - smart, funny and heartfelt - not at all the usual sort of university-president-launching-an-event speech that you expect at these occasions.

[Craig Kaplan]

Furst's first "Night Soldiers" was probably originally several of his first novels put together- apparently the original draft was 1500 pages. I would have loved to read that. Furst has some Greene in him (although sex is just sex usually in Furst and his later novels seem to be filling in a worn template) and some Ambler as well.