University of Kwazulu-Natal

Colorín Colorado By Camille Bordas The New Yorker

Bonisiwe Shabane
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colorín colorado by camille bordas the new yorker

The day they came for the interview, I woke up too early, thinking about Bernard Loiseau. This happens when I’m nervous—not thinking about Loiseau, specifically, but thinking in my sleep, waking up mid-thought. The thought was in fact a memory. I write fiction now, mostly, but back in the nineties I worked for a magazine in New York, one that sent me to France to profile Bernard Loiseau, after he earned his third Michelin... I was picked because I was half French and spoke the language, not because I was good. But I wanted to be good, and writing a profile was a major step for me, so I did a lot of research on Loiseau.

I concluded that interviewing him would be easy: the guy was funny, passionate, generous in his answers. The piece would write itself. A piece that wrote itself was dubious to me, though, even as a mostly inexperienced young writer. I needed to introduce conflict, I thought, something abrasive, get Chef Loiseau off balance. I asked him about food, of course, but then I quickly jumped to questions of ambition, of jealousy and envy. Those were the kinds of things that were on my mind at the time.

I was seeing too many people around me sign book deals and make connections while I was stuck cataloguing everyone else’s successes in hundred-words-or-less reviews for our culture pages. That was my story back then: twenty-four years old and already bitter. I don’t remember exactly how I phrased it to Bernard (he’d asked me to call him that), but I remember the sentiment, I remember wanting to get this honest man, this man who’d done... I wanted to know if he was angry at another chef’s success, if there were dishes that others got famous for which he thought were crap. Camille Bordas reads “Colorín Colorado.” “Do your readers need to know this?” Loiseau had answered, the way he’d answered all my questions—not taking a split second to think about them.

“Your readers—should they hear this? Do they want to know this?” (The short story “Colorin Colorado” by Camille Bordas appeared in the July 10 & 17, 2023 issue of The New Yorker.) Photograph by Ryan Frigillana for The New Yorker Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email. I felt the overall theme of the short story was the insecurity that come with writing and or being a journalist.

The questions that an author will asked themselves should be based around what they think the audience wants to hear. The shorty story overall held a comedic tone which made it easier to read. The description of the characters was in the middle of the short story. I understood more about how the character was feeling than their marital status. The description of the husband within the short story was explained almost as if the journalist was annoyed with the daily habits and sounds that came with the living arrangement. In totality the author of this short story held more admiration for other writers and questioned themselves.

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Learn more about our privacy policy SHOULD THEY HEAR THIS? - The day they came for the interview, I woke up too early, thinking about Bernard Loiseau. This happens when I'm nervous-not thinking about Loiseau, specifically, but thinking in my sleep, waking up mid-thought. The thought was in fact a memory. I write fiction now, mostly, but back in the nineties I worked for a magazine in New York, one that sent me to France to profile Bernard Loiseau, after he earned his third Michelin...

I was picked because I was half French and spoke the language, not because I was good. But I wanted to be good, and writing a profile was a major step for me, so I did a lot of research on Loiseau. I concluded that interviewing him would be easy: the guy was funny, passionate, generous in his answers. The piece would write itself. A piece that wrote itself was dubious to me, though, even as a mostly inexperienced young writer. I needed to introduce conflict, I thought, something abrasive, get Chef Loiseau off balance.

I asked him about food, of course, but then I quickly jumped to questions of ambition, of jealousy and envy. Those were the kinds of things that were on my mind at the time. I was seeing too many people around me sign book deals and make connections while I was stuck cataloguing everyone else's successes in hundred-words-or-less reviews for our culture pages. That was my story back then: twenty-four years old and already bitter. I don't remember exactly how I phrased it to Bernard (he'd asked me to call him that), but I remember the sentiment, I remember wanting to get this honest man, this man who'd done... I wanted to know if he was angry at another chef's success, if there were dishes that others got famous for which he thought were crap.

(The short story “Colorin Colorado” by Camille Bordas appeared in the July 10 & 17, 2023 issue of The New Yorker.) Photograph by Ryan Frigillana for The New Yorker (The short story “Colorin Colorado” by Camille Bordas appeared in the July 10 & 17, 2023 issue of The New Yorker.) Photograph by Ryan Frigillana for The New Yorker (The short story “One Sun Only,” by Camille Bordas appeared in the March 7th, 2022 issue of The New Yorker.)

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