I don't believe that I got what I got because I worked hard. What did you think you could lose by not feeling that way anymore?īISS: One of the things that I didn't want to have happen to me as I entered this new life and lifestyle was I didn't want to begin to think that I had what I had because I'd worked hard, which is one of the patterns of thought very common to upper middle class.

You seem to think that if you lost the sense of discomfort, there actually was a loss there. I had the sense that the discomfort had something to teach me. And I wrote the book as an effort to hold onto that discomfort. This book came out of that contradiction of me enjoying all the new comforts that came with having a home, having more space and also a new kind of economic security but feeling uncomfortable, I think, really, with the system in which I had acquired those things. But you say it gave you a sense of security that felt unfamiliar and even uncomfortable. And for a lot of people, that would be considered a pure success, a goal of adulthood. PFEIFFER: Eula, this book grew out of you having finally bought your first home.

What is capitalism? For her, the answer to that question is complicated and elusive and comes in the form of short, often funny essays that make up her new book, 'Having And Being Had.'ĮULA BISS: Oh, thanks so much for having me. Biss was described in The New York Times as 'a poet, essayist and a class spy.believer and apostate, moth and flame.' This event will be held in person at Hunter College.The essayist Eula Biss focuses her new book on what seems to be a simple question. She lives a mile from Lake Michigan, where she swims in sun and shadow. She is a founding editor of Essay Press and a member of the Penny Collective. She currently teaches nonfiction for the Bennington Writing Seminars. She developed a commitment to progressive education at Hampshire College, where she studied creative writing and visual art before earning an MFA in nonfiction writing from the University of Iowa. For the past twenty years, Biss has taught writing in large lecture halls and small community bookstores, at public elementary schools and private universities. As a 2023 National Fellow at New America, she is at work on a collection of essays about how private property has shaped our world. Her work has been translated into a dozen languages and has been recognized by a National Book Critics Circle Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a 21st Century Award from the Chicago Public Library.

Eula Biss is the author of four books: Having and Being Had (2020), On Immunity (2014), Notes from No Man's Land (2009), and The Balloonists (2002).

Having and being had by eula biss