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Writer Gary Shteyngart

His debut novel, The Russian Debutante's Handbook, received critical acclaim and is now out in paperback. The main character of the book, like Shteyngart, is a Russian-American Jew who emigrated to the United States as a child. In a New York Times Magazine cover article, Daniel Zalewski wrote, "Gary Shteyngart has rewritten the classic immigrant narrative — starring a sarcastic slacker instead of a grateful striver. And after all his parents have done for him!" This interview first aired July 2, 2002.

19:50
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Fresh Air with Terry Gross, June 6, 2003: Interview with Questlove; Interview with Gary Shteyngart; Review of the film "Capturing the Friedmans."
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Movie Review: 'Capturing the Friedmans'

Film critic David Edelstein reviews Capturing the Friedmans, a new documentary by Andrew Jarecki about a family torn apart by charges of pedophilia and child molestation.

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In Little Failure, the novelist recounts his emigration from the USSR to the U.S. when he was 7. For the first few years, he says, he would sit alone in the school cafeteria, talking to himself in Russian "in this gigantic fur hat and fur coat." It wasn't long before a teacher advised, "Children won't play with you if you have that much fur on."

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