i am a jeffrey eugenides groupie.
Last week, I volunteered for a day at the PEN World Voices Literary festival, and as a thank you from the organization, got an invitation to the closing party on Saturday night at the Hungarian Cultural Institute on Broadway. Several of the authors made cameos at the party, and being as big a fan of Middlesex as I am, couldn't resist the opportunity to take this photo.
One of my favorite things about this kind of party is that there are literally two kinds of people: the kind who are very serious about their writing and arrive at the beginning of the party dressed in all black, to seriously sip wine and rub shoulders with Salman Rushdie, and those who wear layers and layers of secondhand clothing and who can't pass up an open bar and an open dance floor. I also love a party where a Raymond Carver joke can go a looong way.
Anyway, later, when the respectable authors had long since departed, there was much drinking, dancing, and merriment. Here, ilya teaches some of the Cultural Institute staff how to do the Russian dance. This really is a big highlight of many a partygoer's evening. Just look at everyone's concentrated expressions.
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