Viet Thanh Nguyen

speaker

1,011 appearances 2 recordings 2 series first heard Sep 2025 last heard 7 May

Viet Thanh Nguyen’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in May 2026 with 1.

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The Dan Le Batard Show · South Beach Sessions - Viet Thanh Nguyen · 18 Sep 2025 podcast

They're looking for the pill.

But human life is not like that.

So let's say being a parent is joyful.

Well, I think a lot of parents will say, yeah, being a parent is joyful.

Then they'll also say, it's also really boring.

You know, I've spent time with my kids.

I'm like, ah, I can't believe I'm going to be watching this stupid TV show or watching them build blocks or whatever.

And then, you know, I can't believe I'm going to spend 18 years doing this.

That can be very painful.

But it's also joyful.

And the thing is, you can't have the joy without the pain.

And that maybe some people don't recognize that.

That's the complicated version of joy that we have as human beings that we're all capable of, that the pill cannot do.

The pill is a shortcut to something that we as human beings have to actually struggle for.

So fatherhood and children do represent all of that complexity of boredom and pain and terror and joy that is a part of human nature and human experience.

Now, with the writing, it is painful, like you said.

Anybody who's ever written will acknowledge that it's painful.

But there have been many moments in my life, just to use a sympathizer as an example, where I laughed out loud while I was writing a sentence.

I was like, oh my God, this is a great sentence.

And I couldn't believe that I was able to create that.

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