Dear Sara Serrao,
it is quite difficult to choose one of the options you suggest for the Brooklyn Follies competition, but I think I'll choose the one which suggests to tell more about one of my own particular follies... I'll do my best to write in English but it won't be perfect, I'm French!
Actually, my folly could be called a Brooklyn Folly or a Mania Auster Folly! shall I try to tell you more about it? As I am really keen on everything about Paul Auster and as I admire him deeply, I always feel ready to do extraordinary things to meet Monsieur Paul Auster and to know more about him. Two years ago, my husband took me and our children to New York for a few days; it was a wonderful trip, it was a short visit and there was a lot to do, a lot to see and a lot to visit but I managed to take my family to Brooklyn for the day (I had read several times Paul Auster's novels -all of them- I nearly knew them by heart and I knew every place where his heroes lived or walked, but I did not know where he lived in Brooklyn...perhaps Park Slope? never mind...) We spent the day walking in BROOKLYN, trying to find the street where my favourite writer lived, asking people, looking for him at the corner of a street...of course, we did not meet him, but I'm sure he was in the area and I still remember that day as a magic day in Brooklyn, "my Brooklyn folly"!
One year ago, I was listening to the radio when I heard that Monsieur Paul Auster was about to come to Paris , to read his book Oracle Night at Le Théatre du Rond Point, on Les Champs Elysées..I immediately booked two seats for that evening, but it was , indeed, a Paris Folly: we live far from Paris, we both teach and it was a hard job to get there on time: driving for more than two hours after work, being on time at the Théatre, and meeting Monsieur Paul AUSTER ( I had taken all his novels in a big bag...and he kindly accepted to sign them after the marvellous reading of Oracle Night). My book shelves are full of his novels, in American as well as in French and I can honestly say I know his novels and his heroes by heart... A room in my Hotel Existence is undoubtedly filled with his books, novels and films and it makes me deeply happy ... The end. Brigitte CHABERT