The Oprah Effect

摘要

The phone call would forever change the life of Robert Morgan, an English professor who had taught at Cornell University for nearly three decades. On Jan. 10, 2000, a woman who failed to introduce herself began chatting with him about his fifth book, Gap Creek, a tale narrated in the voice of an older Southern woman. "I'd like to include it in my book club," she said. "That sounds nice," replied Morgan, assuming she was a Southern reader who found the theme familiar. The woman finally disclosed her location—Chicago—and her identity: Oprah Winfrey. "We decided it was a prank call," Morgan recalls. "Then the second call came from her producer wanting us to fly back to Carolina to film a segment and to book my studio visit to. Chicago. I asked my wife how many copies she thought this might sell—20,000? We had 500,000 copies in bookstores within a week."