Cafe Society (ft. Felix Biederman)

Our Struggle

We're back! And joined by Felix Biederman, a promising young podcaster recently arrived in Los Angeles whom we condescended to let on the show. Although by no means a "bookhead" -- to appropriate his charming coinage -- Felix is a longtime fan of Karl Ove Knausgaard. The Norwegian author became a source of strength for Felix when he first encountered the Struggle books in 2017 amidst an increasingly cloying digital media landscape. With startling lucidity, Felix articulates how Knasugaard, with his undifferentiated and unselfserving stream of thoughts, served as a welcome anecdote to the insanely hypertargeted and overdetermined first person essay boom of the time (should she have pitched a piece about what it's like to be a quarter Portuguese woman in America? Lauren wonders). Then we get into the text: specifically pages 88-94 of book 2, which cover about five minutes of Knausgaard stalking around Stockholm with the stroller and having thoughts. We try to understand Knausgaard's aversion to being recognized as a "regular" as a coffee shop (and utter mortification at being presented with a free croissant) and Felix recounts his stint in cafe society (the LES Dunkin Donuts) as a young man. Also: we discover Knausgaard to have invented main character/NPC discourse, and consider the 2005 fashion trend of knee high black boots for women, which Knausgaard wishes "would last forever" (cruel hindsight: it didn't).

If you enjoyed this episode with Felix, make sure to check out his podcast, "Chapo Trap House"

As always we can be reached at [e-mail]; [e-mail]

LIVE SHOW IS THURS JUN 2 @ KGB BAR. Tickets are not available yet but will be soon. We'll send out an email blast!

Mugs are available at ourstruggle.store. Discount code MISTAKE valid for one week!

Oh and congratulations to our baby Joshua Cohen (novelist) on his Pulitzer win, which we like to think we are in some part if not all responsible for.