Like the rest of the twitterati, the novelist Walter Kirn quickly tried to make sense of the Arizona shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and several others.
As events unfolded, Kirn’s tweets stood out. By Sunday night, Kirn realized the uncanny similarities alleged shooter Jared Loughner shared with Kent Selkirk, the socially-inept-loner-on-the-internet protagonist of Kirn’s novel, The Unbinding.
“It was a sense of recognition,” Kirn told Kurt Andersen. “The forces that created this Loughner may be spawning more of him.”
Kurt reached Walter Kirn in Montana to talk about how a confusing violent tragedy has spurred such an intense cultural moment. Kirn explained, “If we look at this story as a story, and not as a basis of issue oriented argument, we see all sorts of characters who defy stereotypes and partisan description.”
–Michele Siegel
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Andy Revkin, amitavakumar, Russ Campbell, Carol Krol and others. Carol Krol said: Hey,Walter Kirn & Kurt Andersen: loners like Loughner have sadly always existed. The Internet did not create them.http://tinyurl.com/6dbpqgv [...]
Thanks Kurt, your tweets have lead me to Mad Men and now Mr Kirn. Raising the discussion above the vapid political positions is what we need more of.