What a Difference a Prize Makes

PWTalks with Bruce Benderson

by Bettina Berch -- Publishers Weekly, 1/9/2006

Benderson's memoir, The Romanian (Reviews, Dec. 19), about his affair with a Romanian street hustler, won France's Prix de Flore. Penguin/Tarcher will publish the book in the U.S. in February.

Did you have an audience in mind when you were writing this book?

After I wrote the novel User[in 1994], the French called me "the poet of the underbelly of Times Square." But I was uninspired in my past 10 years in New York. I thought I'd lost my material. Then I met Romulus and I was inspired all over again. In my mind I thought I was writing something mainstream... so I was dismayed when I had trouble selling it in America.

Why do you think you had difficulty?

My main problem, I think, was the idea Americans have of where Romania is. It was this strange faraway country where all these visceral, passionate things were happening, but they couldn't place it. Or people would say, "Gee, I'm really having trouble getting through the historical parts—what if it were just a story of a passion and you took out the history?" But I couldn't bring myself to do that. Publishers were stymied: how would they market it?

Will gay readers in America like it?

Here in France, they love it. In America, it'll turn off the politically correct. They'll say, "How masochistic of him to run after a straight man." Or, "He [Romulus] was sleeping with him [Benderson], so he [Romulus] must've been gay even if he couldn't admit it." And I don't believe either. It's weird the way the politically correct formula works these days—if a straight guy sleeps with you, they'll say, "Oh, but he's really gay." If you sleep with a woman, they'll say you slept with her even though you're gay.

Tell us about the Prix de Flore.

It's not the best French prize, but it's the best Parisian prize. And the party for it is one of the biggest of the season. It's a prize that's never been given to foreigners, so they argued about it forever, until the very last day, when they decided that since I spoke French and the book came out first in France, it could be considered a French book. I was a zombie for that ceremony—I barely remember it—a million flashbulbs and people taking pictures, crowds of people—amazing! Then I came back to the United States, and some of the same publishers who'd rejected it, they were interested now that I'd gotten the prize.