Gary Shteyngart (q.v.), Absurdistan, pp. 87–88:
“I know you and Alyosha[-Bob] love this song,” she said. “I’ve been playing it over and over. It’s so much better than techno and Russian pop.”
“In terms of popular music” – I spoke now with the authority of a former Multicultural Studies major – “you should listen mainly to East Coast hiphop and ghetto tech from Detroit. We must reject European music categorically. Even so-called progressive house!”
Shteyngart on Studio 360: “My physique is not so wonderful, and yet I love to, in a sense, metaphorically speaking, take my shirt off and bare my chest and maybe beat it a little bit, and, you know, I think men and women [and women?] aren’t really supposed to do that anymore in terms of letters.” I think he also said something about punching above his weight. And how, tovarishch!