Don DeLillo and Dana Spiotta will team up at the 92nd St. Y on May 2
Who: Don DeLillo, Dana Spiotta
What: Reading, conversation, and signing
Where: 92nd St. Y, Kaufmann Concert Hall, 1395 Lexington Ave. at 92nd St., 212-415-5500
When: Monday, May 2, $15-$35, 8:00
Why: In accepting the 2015 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, Bronx-born writer Don DeLillo spoke of looking at the books on his shelf, how fragile each one can be. “When I lift the book from the shelf, gently, I understand, again, the power of memory that a book carries with it. What is there to remember? Who I was, where I was, what these books meant to me when I read them for the first time.” There are millions of people in the world who feel the same way about books written by DeLillo, the author of such well-regarded works as Great Jones Street, White Noise, Mao II, Underworld, and his latest, Zero K (Scribner, May 3, $27). On May 2, DeLillo will make his only New York City appearance in conjunction with the release of the novel, at the 92nd St. Y, with one of his personal favorite writers, Syracuse-based author Dana Spiotta, who has written such books as Eat the Document and Stone Arabia. Spiotta will read from her latest book, Innocents and Others (Scribner, March 2016, $25), DeLillo will read from Zero K, and then the two will hold a conversation, followed by a signing. “We are born without choosing to be. Should we have to die in the same manner? Isn’t it a human glory to refuse to accept a certain fate?” one of the characters says in Zero K. It also is a human glory to read almost anything by the seventy-eight-year-old DeLillo, a fate always worth accepting.