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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Adam Dalva, a writer, and literary critic has a surprising essay in The New Yorker, maybe you saw it, and here's the gist of it. Back in late 2015, professional and personal lows left him in a hard place. He writes, "I had a desperate impulse to confess my failure to a stranger, someone who didn't know any of my friends or family, someone who probably didn't care about literary fiction at all." When he didn't know who to vent to, he turned to a very unlikely figure never expecting a reply. It was this man, see if you recognize the voice.

Jeb Bush: I think the next president needs to be a lot quieter, but send a signal that we're prepared to act in the national security interests of this country to get back in the business of creating a more peaceful world. Please, clap.

[applause]

Brian Lehrer: [chuckles] He had to ask for applause at the end of his applause line, and who was it? Well, if you guessed Jeb Bush, congratulations. Remember that moment on the campaign trail in 2016? Well, as his own tone there seem to indicate he wouldn't be surprised that you probably don't. Jeb Bush's inbox became something of a private journal for Adam Dalva. He says it gave him a routine and a sense of clarity as he navigated difficult situations in his life. Imagine his surprise when a not-so-private journal entry, got a response from the former presidential hopeful.

With us now is Adam Dalva, writer, editor, and graphic novelist, and listener, standby, we're going to see if any of you have a similar story to tell. Hi Adam, welcome to WNYC. Great to have you with us.

Adam Dalva: Thank you for having me on Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, here's a question for you. Have you ever reached out to a celebrity or public figure who you didn't know personally, with something more than fan mail, something that suggested perhaps a substantive response, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. If you reached out for advice, or other kinds of help, or clarity, and especially if you actually got it. If you got a reply like Adam did from Jeb Bush, 212-433-WNYC. Tell us a story, 212-433-9692.

We can also tack on to this while this isn't exactly the same, I wonder who out there has sent a basic piece of fan mail and received a personal reply, 212-433-9692, or tweet @BrianLehrer. Tell us about your unexpected correspondence with a public figure. Adam, take us back to that difficult time. What were you going through?

Adam Dalva: Well, there was a lot going on. I was writing a novel for many years that I had went to an MFA program for and had staked all my hopes and dreams on not just career dreams, but artistic dreams, and the dream of being able to continue to write. I went to Vermont for a month to a residency and my agent called me and said that the book hadn't sold. Basically, we sent it to many publishers and editors in the lit world, and no one acquired it. It was-- like all the oxygen sucked out of my life. This dream that I've had since I was quite young, had just dead-ended hard stop nowhere else to go.

Brian Lehrer: What was it that made you connect with Jeb Bush of all people enough to send him an email about what you're experiencing?

Adam Dalva: Well, as a depressed person does, I was watching the Republican primaries. I was struck by how he had been bullied off the center stage to the periphery. Also, someone threw an egg at me so I had this burst of adrenaline. I was just walking down the street in Vermont, and a man in a truck threw an egg at me. I went to the laundromat and sat down, and I read that he had asked people to send him emails for help. I don't have any political alignment with Jeb Bush, I vociferously protested his older brother's actions throughout the odds, and I somehow felt very liberating to think well, I can turn to this person who I don't know, who I have nothing in common with, who I don't support in any way, and tell him this deep secret that I don't know how to tell to anyone else because I was quite embarrassed about my book not selling.

Brian Lehrer: Now, whoever threw an egg at you that wasn't like a publisher agent saying, "I hate your book so much I'm going to throw--"

Adam Dalva: That would be interesting. It's not impossible.

Brian Lehrer: I actually got hit by an egg once, believe it or not.

Adam Dalva: Really?

Brian Lehrer: Yes. There are that many people who can say that, I guess, and I haven't thought about it in a long time, but since you brought it up, and it's pertinent to this time of year, because I was probably about nine years old and I was trick or treating, it was Halloween, and some neighborhood ruffian who I never did see who it was just tossed an egg across the street, which I didn't see. The first thing I knew was that I had gotten hit by an egg. I didn't get injured, but it ruined a jacket. Anyway, we share having been hit by an egg. I can only imagine the shock you must have felt when you saw in your inbox from Jeb Bush.

Adam Dalva: My memory of it is like that every light where I was just got three times as bright because I've been writing to him for years at that point, many years. I had told him or his inbox, which I thought was his campaign email and would therefore be defunct, the secrets I had never told any person on the planet, relationship secrets, death secrets, emotional secrets, career secrets. When he wrote back, my first reaction was something like, "Huh, he wrote back." My second reaction was, "Oh, my goodness, has he read every email I sent him? This journal of mine is just suddenly yelling at me."

Brian Lehrer: Why to Jeb Bush in the first place? Was it an act of irony? Like, here's this loser Republican who you probably didn't support anyway, and you are going to dump all this stuff in his inbox as an act of irony, or is that the wrong word?

Adam Dalva: I think it's the wrong word because it was more that, although I don't support him, I felt-- if you think back to even the police clap the clip you played, there was a sort of shot in freud going on in America toward him. I had never seen someone just fail so publicly, in such a fashion, someone who had been built up in such a way. I felt oddly aligned with the arc of his career. I felt that I had experienced a public failure that was affecting me privately, much more than was affecting anyone else.

It was really a journaling practice that was quite organic and not expecting a reply. When I couldn't write after my novel didn't sell, I could always write in his inbox. I didn't know why, but it was a very liberating and freeing experience.

Brian Lehrer: We're going to take some phone calls now because whether you're surprised or not by this, we have a completely full board, of course. We have 10 lines, and they're all lit with people who have had some kind of surprise correspondence or surprise response, I should say after correspondence with a celebrity or public figure. I'll tell you a quick one of mine to start it out, and it doesn't involve being hit by an egg. It's much less nuanced and beautiful than yours.

When I was a kid I was a pitcher in Little League, and I wanted to learn how to throw a curveball. I could have just asked my coach, but instead, I sent a letter asking for instructions from a pitcher on the New York Yankees. It was the pitcher from a long time ago, Jim Bouton-

Adam Dalva: Oh, wow.

Brian Lehrer: -who went on to be much more famous for writing books about baseball, and sure enough, I got a picture postcard of Bouton at the stadium and a few lines on how to position my fingers on the ball and twist my wrist. I could hardly believe it. Looking back, why did I write to an actual Major Leaguer instead of ask my coach? Who knows, but that's my little addition to the conversation.

Adam Dalva: I love that.

Brian Lehrer: Nell, in Texas, you're on WNYC. Hi, Nell.

Nell: Hi, Brian. I love your show, and I adore you. I just wanted to call in with this really fun story, which is my daughter was 14 a few years ago. She was a huge fan of Aurora, the Norwegian pop singer pop star. She was working for her high school newspaper, and I got this idea to reach out to Aurora in hopes that my daughter could interview her. It just so happened that Aurora was coming to the Liverpool International Music Festival that year. My husband's British we were going to visit his mother just outside of London so we made an extra side trip to Liverpool so my daughter could spend five minutes backstage interviewing Aurora, and she ended up getting published in our local newspaper and also in the Norwegian newspaper. It was the experience of her lifetime.

Brian Lehrer: There you go. That's a great story. Let's go right to Beth on the Lower East Side, you're on WNYC. Hi Beth.

Beth: Hi Brian. This is a great segment. My story was about a week before the pandemic hit. I'm a big basketball fan and I particularly like the San Antonio Spurs. I saw Gregg Popovich walking down 12th Street so I fell on a step with him and out front of the [unintelligible 00:10:19] Bookstore where he was about to go in. I introduced myself and I just said, "I'm a huge fan." He was so gracious and I don't think that everyone would think he would be because he's known for being rather gruff, but he was so incredibly gracious.

Afterward, I wrote him a note and just thanked him for being so delightful and thanked him for taking the time because I really did intrude on his personal time. About a month later, and by this time we're deeply immersed in the pandemic and it was just a very difficult time in New York City, I get a note back from him, two pages handwritten saying how delight it was meeting me and he talked about New York City and how much he loved the city. Then he made some comment, he is been very outspoken against the former president, so he made some comment about the lack of leadership in this dark time. It was just wonderful. [laughs]. I was so surprised and very excited and haven't stopped talking about it.

Brian: Great story, Beth. Thank you very much.

Adam Dalva: That's great.

Brian Lehrer: Alan in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Alan.

Alan: Good morning, Brian. I called in with a recollection about a time I had The City in History by Lewis Mumford, one of those doorstop first-year texts for pre-architecture majors. I had a question for the author and I just thought I'd leave a phone message on his line and maybe get something back in the future. Mr. Mumford just picked up his line in Amenia, New York, and talked for about half an hour about the topic. I was just so surprised and pleased that he talked to this college freshman, 52 years ago. Whenever I pass through Amenia, New York on Route 22 on the way to the Berkshires, I think fondly of the fact that Lewis Mumford lived there.

Brian Lehrer: Alan, thank you very much. What do you think about these stories, Adam?

Adam Dalva: Oh, they're so moving. I'm really struck by how they're sticking with people and they're really resonating. I think when we talk to people we don't know and they respond to us, it can be such an opening.

Brian Lehrer: You actually had a Zoom call with Jeb Bush, not just the email correspondence. Was that on the record for you as a writer or was this just, "Hey, let's actually talk about our shared troubles"?

Adam Dalva: It was in between the two. The fact checkers for the New Yorker had to contact, I believe it was my ex-girlfriend, my mother, and Jeb Bush, which is quite the trio.

[laughter]

I had to talk to him to prove that it was him and not some, I don't know, board assistant who had responded to my email. In so doing, I didn't really have a kicker for the essay. I didn't know how to end it and I thought, "Well, this could be an opportunity to really flip it and ask him some questions." Also, I read him some of the questions I had asked him initially many years ago, which I thought might make an interesting ending for the piece. It was on the record but thinking about the essay and what we might do with it.

Brian Lehrer: Can you tell us after that Zoom call you had, how's Jeb Bush doing? He might be in more self-esteem distress than you ever were considering.

Adam Dalva: I have to say he was the most easy and gracious contact I've had in many years. He was very accommodating. I was the one who ended the Zoom call. I was like, "I have to go now."

[laughter]

"I have something I got to do."

Brian Lehrer: That's funny.

Adam Dalva: He told me a lot of stories. He occasionally would disassociate and talk about the 2016 election even when I wasn't asking about it and his advice to me for my initial failure of my novel not selling was to-- he said, "I would've told you to put on your big boy pants." I said, "My big boy pants? That's terrible advice." I was quite relieved he didn't write back to me with that response initially.

Brian Lehrer: Last thing, we've been having some fun with this, but I think your essay really gets at something a lot of people resonate with. Sometimes you just feel like you need to confess something to a stranger. Maybe that's what bars are for sometimes. If you weren't emailing public figures, do you have any advice for people for what to do and you feel that urge now or do you think that's one of the reasons why people have responded to your article in the New Yorker?

Adam Dalva: I think that is part of the reason people have responded to it. I will tell you that I've had a few people confessing to me in my email, since the piece came out, quite a few. I do think that's the reason we have a confession with priests, that's the reason we have therapists. Sometimes it's very useful to be able to talk to someone without the fear of, not just the fear of judgment, but the fear of that judgment perhaps leaking into a social circle or a person who would know a lot about literary fiction and would assess my career in a way that I wouldn't have been comfortable with.

I do think having a confidant who is contained or doesn't have any connections can be a very powerful and useful thing. That could be a friend who you have coffee with once a month and talk to without needing to include them in your other friendships.

Brian Lehrer: Adam Dalva, writer, editor, and graphic novelist, his essay in the New Yorker is Letters to Jeb Bush. Listeners, thanks for your stories too. Adam, thank you very much for sharing this with us.

Adam: Thank you for having me on, Brian.

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