Why David Sedaris Still Keeps His Daily Diary

Illustration by Krishna Bala Shenoi.

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso is a weekly series of intimate conversations with artists, authors, and politicians. It’s a podcast where people sound like people. New episodes air every Sunday, distributed by Pushkin Industries. 

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In this episode from June 2022, we’re joined by beloved author David Sedaris! We begin with the timely opening essay from his latest collection, Happy-Go-Lucky (4:05). Then, David describes growing up in Raleigh, North Carolina (10:07), his mother’s “Group Therapy” sessions at the dinner table (11:03), the night his father heckled him during a live performance (16:02), and what he learned about writing at the Art Institute of Chicago (26:55).

On the back-half, David reads a tribute to his mother from Calypso (32:55). We also unpack the way his work has evolved (35:09), the transformation that occurred in his father’s final days (39:20), and why, after 40 years, he continues to keep his daily diary (46:45).

Subscribe and download the episode, wherever you get your podcasts!

From the episode: 

Sam Fragoso: Your time in college in Chicago in 1984 was the beginning of when you started to find your voice, right?

David Sedaris: I started writing when I was 20. I wrote every day, but I was writing in a diary. When I went to the Art Institute, I took a short story class. That’s when I organized my writing; it was more than just completely private, me writing in my diary about what was going on in my life.

Sam Fragoso: How did your writing and performing differ from your classmates’ work?

David Sedaris: Well, it was different because I went for painting and sculpture. They didn’t have writing majors, but you had to take a certain number of English classes. So, a creative writing class was a way to get an English class. But I was the only one who really read. You can’t write without reading. When I started writing, I started reading—and reading more critically. You could learn so much from a good piece of writing, and you can learn just as much from a bad piece of writing.

Sam Fragoso: Do the events in your life not really exist until you write about them?

David Sedaris: Yes, I guess writing is just a way of me trying to make sense of the world. If I could write it on paper, then I could just hold it in my hands long enough to make sense of it. Like, there was this guy who was really angry when I checked into my hotel last night. He was trying to yell at the woman behind the front desk, but for some reason, the music in the lobby was like a discotheque. The music was so loud, and the woman at the front desk was having to yell at everybody, like, “I’M GOING TO NEED YOU TO HAVE YOUR ID—”

Sam Fragoso: Competing with the music.

David Sedaris: Yes, and this guy was yelling twice as hard at her. It was interesting to me to be in this room where everyone has to yell, but this guy is angry and trying to out-yell everyone. I didn’t want to forget it, so I made a little note and wrote about it in my diary when I got up this morning.

Sam Fragoso: What does it say there?

David Sedaris: It says “insanely loud, mad guy.” Twenty years from now, when I see that in my diary, it will take me right back, and I’ll remember it vividly.

Sam Fragoso: At the end of your introduction of Theft by Finding: Diaries (1977–2002), you have this passage—

David Sedaris: “That’s the thing with a diary, though. In order to record your life, you sort of need to live it. Not at your desk, but beyond it. Out in the world where it’s so beautiful and complex and painful that sometimes you just need to sit down and write about it.”

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David Sedaris is the author of twelve previous books, including, most recently, A Carnival of Snackery, The Best of Me, and Calypso. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker and BBC Radio 4. In 2019, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is the recipient of the Thurber Prize for American Humor, the Jonathan Swift International Literature Prize for Satire and Humor, and the Terry Southern Prize for Humor.

Sam Fragoso is the host of Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso, a weekly series of conversations with artists, activists, and politicians. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, and NPR. After conducting seminal interviews with icons like Spike Lee, Werner Herzog, and Noam Chomsky, he independently founded Talk Easy in 2016.