I was reading a Zadie Smith essay about your work [The Tattered Ruins of the Map, from Feel Free] and it gradually became clear that you know each other.

Yes, I met her through an art critic, Hal Foster, and now we’re close friends with Zadie and Nick Laird, her husband, who is also a great writer.

It all sounds very glamorous…

Spending time with Zadie and Nick is always interesting; they are absolutely brilliant. But as for glamorous… My teacher, Ursula von Rydingsvard, she’s an artist, and her husband, Paul Greengard, is a Nobel prize-winning neuroscientist. I remember when I was a student, she was on stage and someone asked: “Ursula, you’re married to a scientist, you must have all these incredible conversations.” She said: “Yeah, I’m like, ‘Paul, did you play the plumbing bill?’”