For those who know the work of Richard Price, it may seem a leap
of the imagination to picture him seated comfortably behind a small
table, autographing books for his admirers amid the ritz and
glamour of Brentwood.
Price, who will be signing copies of his new novel
“Samaritan” today at 7 p.m. at Dutton’s Brentwood
Bookstore, is best known as a man whose stark prose and social
realism gave life to novels like “The Wanderers,” and
screenplays including Spike Lee’s “Clockers” and
Martin Scorsese’s Oscar-nominated “The Color of
Money.”
Price delivers his stories straight up, documenting the harder
edge of the human struggle with drugs and violence. And for all his
work in Hollywood, Price’s dark-eyed vision comes more from
the Bronx borough of his youth, or his time investigating the mean
streets of Manhattan, than the rumors of West Side schmoozers.
He will be in Brentwood tonight because he believes in his
craft.
“People need stories like they need food. It’s just
a form of connecting, it’s a gift,” Price said on the
phone from San Francisco, where he is on a tour that will
eventually take him across most of the United States, and into
Wales and England in May.
Since the ’70s readers have been consuming Price’s
brand of no-nonsense tales ““ stories characterized by their
attention to detail and the author’s uncanny ability to
record the varying voices, smells and sounds that beat from the
heart of any urban landscape.
With “Samaritan,” Price returns to his fictional
city of Dempsey, the site of his previous novels
“Clockers” and “Freedomland.”
“Samaritan” tells the story of Ray Mitchell, a
successful television writer, who has come back to Dempsey to
teach, pro bono, a creative writing workshop for the city’s
working class. In spite of his good intentions, Mitchell ends up
getting beaten by an attacker, who he refuses to identify.
In contrast to characters from his other novels, Ray is drawn
more directly from Price’s own life.
“Ray was more like me. He has a lot more Hamlet in him,
and a lot more introspection,” Price said. “He’s
not a criminal, not oppressed, he’s not a hardcore homie;
just a middle-aged Jewish guy, who made a little too much money
than he knows what to do with.”
Price includes a second dimension to the book’s plot in
the character of Nerese Ammons, the detective who sets out to
arrest Ray’s assailant. What ensues is a study of Ray’s
charitable aims and of how narcissism can betray even the best
deeds.
“Ray means well, but there’s an unconscious thing
where he’s getting off on helping people,” Price said.
“I really wanted to explore this whole notion of what the
intersection is between altruism, between doing good deeds, and how
the ego taints that altruism.”
While the implications of altruism and the potential destruction
it can breed could be interpreted on a national or international
level, Price says he is less interested in drawing larger political
conclusions and more intent on creating powerfully drawn characters
and the carefully detailed work that gives Dempsey its own life on
the page.
As for the future of that city, Price prefers not to guess.
“In the middle of a book tour I can’t even think
about what I’m going to write next. It’s like trying to
get pregnant when you haven’t given birth to the baby
you’re carrying,” he said.
Price will be reading and signing at Dutton’s in
Brentwood, 11975 San Vicente Blvd., today at 7 p.m. Call (310)
476-6263 for more info.