Podcasts about bay area book festival

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Play Episode Listen Later Jul 22, 2024 61:59

This week's episode airs Brooke in conversation with Naomi Klein at this year's Bay Area Book Festival. While this interview does not hew to Write-minded's effort to offer weekly doses of inspiration for writers, Brooke and Grant decided to make this available both because our listeners requested it and because we admire the work Naomi Klein is doing in the world. This is a conversation about Israel/Gaza, Jewish heritage and history, American politics, and about Doppelganger, Klein's 2023 book, which was Brooke's favorite book of last year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Aya de Leon, The Bay Area Book Festival 2024

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Play Episode Listen Later May 26, 2024 49:02

Aya de Leon, the Interim Program Director of the Tenth Annual Bay Area Book Festival, June 1-2 in various locations in Berkeley, talks about this year's festival with host Richard Wolinsky. Aya de Leon is the Poet Laureate of the City of Berkeley. She is a novelist and poet who currently teaches creative writing at U.C. Berkeley. She is the author of ten books, the most recent of which are the adult novel, “That Dangerous Energy,” and the young adult novel, “Untraceable.” Originally a hip hop artist, Aya de Leon is also a noted local activist, and the acquiring editor of Fighting Chance Books, the climate justice fiction imprint of She Writes Press. She organizes with the Black Hive, the climate and environmental justice formation of the Movement for Black Lives. The post Aya de Leon, The Bay Area Book Festival 2024 appeared first on KPFA.

The Very Good News About Publishing featuring Brooke Warner

Let’s Talk Memoir

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 27, 2024 42:52

Brooke Warner joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about nontraditional publishing, the massive sea change we're seeing in memoir, how for authors visibility and marketing work is never done, protecting our memoir worlds, accountability groups, what all memoirs require, the genesis of She Writes Press, balancing her multiple roles, the project she is working on now and the many resources she offers memoirists. Also in this episode: -when creativity merges with our working life -carving out time to write -Substack and content-creation Books mentioned in this episode: Heavy by Kiese Laymon Bird by Bird by Anne Lamont The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith Brooke Warner is publisher of She Writes Press and SparkPress, president of Warner Coaching Inc., and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What's Your Book?, and three books on memoir. Brooke is a TEDx speaker and the former Executive Editor of Seal Press. She's the current Board Chair of the Bay Area Book Festival, and sits on the Board of the National Association of Memoir Writers. She writes a weekly Substack newsletter @brookewarner, and a regular column for Publishers Weekly. Connect with Brooke: Website: www.brookewarner.com She Writes Press: www.shewritespress.com SparkPress: https://gosparkpress.com Brooke's memoir courses: www.writeyourmemoirinsixmonths.com www.magicofmemoir.com — Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

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Stories That Must Be Told, featuring Nicole Chung

Viewless Wings Poetry Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 5, 2023 40:38

This is an onstage interview with Brooke Warner and this week's guest Nicole Chung. Brooke interviewed Nicole at the Bay Area Book Festival in May. The conversation is wide-ranging and covers the topics and themes central to Nicole's new memoir, A Living Remedy, as well as questions and considerations central to memoir and telling the stories that must be told. Don't miss this thoughtful and relatable interview. If you're writing your story, Nicole's words will make you feel like you can and should keep going! Also, Write-minded is celebrating our 250th episode this week. We thank you for your loyal listenership! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Bay Area Book Festival - Viewless Wings Poets Laureate Celebration Preview

Play Episode Listen Later May 2, 2023 16:06

Join Viewless Wings for an extraordinary day of poetry readings and book signings by celebrated current and former SF Bay Area Poets Laureate at the 2023 Bay Area Book Festival on Sunday, May 7 (11 am - 5 pm) in the Viewless Wings booth (#96). James Morehead (Poet Laureate - Dublin, CA and host of the Viewless Wings Poetry Podcast), Sarah Kobrinsky (former Poet Laureate - Emeryville, CA), Kathleen Moore (former Poet Laureate - San Ramon, CA), and Kimi Sugioka (Poet Laureate - Alameda, CA) will be on hand, including the debut of Morehead's newly released book, "The Plague Doctor." Selections from participating poets are featured on this weeks episode. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/viewlesswings/support

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Norah Piehl, Bay Area Book Festival 2023

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 30, 2023 59:29

Left to right: Norah Piehl and Bay Area Book Festival Executive Director Cherilyn Parsons. Photo: Norah Piehl. Norah Piehl, who is the Director of Literary Programs at the Bay Area Book Festival, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. The Bay Area Book Festival is in its 9th season and runs Saturday and Sunday May 6th and 7th in various venues around Berkeley, including the Berkeley Public Library and Freight & Salvage. Among the guests are singer and activist Joan Baez, novelist and cyber-expert Cory Doctorow, playwright V (Eve Ensler), historian Adam Hochschild, and novelists Dave Eggars and Jane Smiley. Norah Piehl has been the Director of LIterary Programs since November, 2021 and before that served as the Executive Director of the Boston Book Festival. She is a freelance writer, and the author of a series of books titled “Social Issues Firsthand. Website for the Bay Area Book Festival. The post Norah Piehl, Bay Area Book Festival 2023 appeared first on KPFA.

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Bookwaves/Artwaves – April 27, 2023: Don Winslow – Norah Piehl

Authors on the Air Global Radio Network

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 27, 2023 59:58

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to assorted local theater & book venues Bookwaves Don Winslow, author of “City of Dreams,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded via zencastr on April 12, 2023 Don Winslow is the author of 22 novels, many of which focus on crime and the criminal underworld, including The Cartel, The Force, Savages (which became an Oliver Stone film), and The Border. His latest novel, “City of Dreams”, continues the saga of “City on Fire,” which told of a mob war using as a template the story of the Trojan War, The Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid and other works. In this latest novel, we follow the character of Danny Ryan, (Aeneas) as he finds himself in Hollywood, and falling in love with one of filmdom's biggest stars, which tells the story of Aeneas and Dido, with forays into the Odyssey and the greek tragedies of Aeschylus and Europides. The third volume, which shifts the locale to Las Vegas, is scheduled to be published in April, 2024. Don Winslow has stated that these will be his final novels. Don Winslow also produces political videos aimed at saving the American democracy from insurrectionists and fascists, and is a vital force on Twitter. Complete Interview. Photos: Richard Wolinsky. Artwaves Left to right: Norah Piehl and Bay Area Book Festival Executive Director Cherilyn Parsons. Photo: Norah Piehl. Norah Piehl, who is the Director of Literary Programs at the Bay Area Book Festival, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. The Bay Area Book Festival is in its 9th season and runs Saturday and Sunday May 6th and 7th in various venues around Berkeley, including the Berkeley Public Library and Freight & Salvage. Among the guests are singer and activist Joan Baez, novelist and cyber-expert Cory Doctorow, playwright V (Eve Ensler), historian Adam Hochschild, and novelists Dave Eggars and Jane Smiley. Norah Piehl has been the Director of LIterary Programs since November, 2021 and before that served as the Executive Director of the Boston Book Festival. She is a freelance writer, and the author of a series of books titled “Social Issues Firsthand. Complete 30-minute interview Website for the Bay Area Book Festival. Book Interview/Events and Theatre Links Note: Shows may unexpectedly close early or be postponed due to actors' positive COVID tests. Check the venue for closures, ticket refunds, and vaccination and mask requirements before arrival. Dates are in-theater performances unless otherwise noted. Some venues operate Tuesday – Sunday; others Wednesday or Thursday through Sunday. All times Pacific Standard Time. Closing dates are sometimes extended. Book Stores Bay Area Book Festival Lists of guests at the upcoming Book Festival, May 6-7, 2023, event calendar and links to previous events. Book Passage. Monthly Calendar. Mix of on-line and in-store events. Books Inc. Mix of on-line and in-store events. The Booksmith. Monthly Calendar. On-line events only. Center for Literary Arts, San Jose. See website for Book Club guests in upcoming months. Green Apple Books. Events calendar. Kepler's Books On-line Refresh the Page program listings. Live Theater Companies Actor's Reading Collective (ARC). See website for past streams. Alter Theatre. See website for upcoming productions. American Conservatory Theatre Poor Yella Rednecks: Vietgone 2 by Qui Nguyen, March 30 – May 7, Strand. Aurora Theatre Cyrano by Edmond Rostand, adapted by Josh Costello, April 7 – May 7. Awesome Theatre Company. Check website for upcoming live shows and streaming. Berkeley Rep English by Sanazz Toosi, March 31 – May 7, Peets Theatre. Boxcar Theatre. See website for calendar listings. Brava Theatre Center: See website for events. BroadwaySF: Pretty Woman: The Musical, April 26-30, Orpheum Broadway San Jose: Riverdance, 25th Anniversary Show, May 12-14. 1776, May 6-21. California Shakespeare Theatre (Cal Shakes). No 2023 season scheduled. See website for events calendar. Center Rep: In The Heights, May 27 – June 24. Central Works The Dignity Circle a new scheme by Lauren Smerkanich June 24 – July 23. Cinnabar Theatre. Tosca, June 9 – 25. Contra Costa Civic Theatre To Master the Art by William Brown and Doug Frew, April 21 – May 21, 2023. Curran Theater: Into The Woods, direct from Broadway, June 20-25, 2023. Custom Made Theatre. Tiny Fires by Aimee Suzara, postponed to a later date in 2023. Cutting Ball Theatre. Exhaustion Arroyo: Dancin' Trees in the Ravine by W. Fran Astorga. April 13 – May 21. 42nd Street Moon. The Scottsboro Boys, May 4 – May 21, Gateway Theatre. Golden Thread See website for ongoing special events. Landmark Musical Theater. Hair, May 6 – June 4, at the Landmark, 533 Sutter, SF. Lorraine Hansberry Theatre. In The Evening By The Moonlight by Traci Tolmaire, co-created and directed by Margo Hall, June 15 – July 2, Young Performers Theatre, Fort Mason, San Francisco. Magic Theatre. The Ni¿¿er Lovers by Mark Anthony Thompson, May 3 -21. See website for other events at the Magic. Marin Theatre Company Where Did We Sit On The Bus? by Brian Quijada, May 4 – 28, Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts Upcoming Events Page. New Conservatory Theatre Center (NCTC) Locusts Have No King by C. Julian Jimenez, April 7 – May 14. The Confession of Lily Dare by Charles Busch, May 12 – June 11. Oakland Theater Project. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee, May 26 – June 18. Pear Theater. Pear Slices 2023, Original short plays. April 20 – May 14. PianoFight. Permanently closed as of March 18, 2023. Presidio Theatre. See website for upcoming productions Ray of Light: Spring Awakening In Concert, June 8-10, Victoria Theatre. Cruel Intentions: The '90s Musical, September 8 – October 1, Victoria Theatre. The Rocky Horror Show, Oasis Nightclub, October 6 – 31. See website for Spotlight Cabaret Series at Feinstein's at the Nikko. San Francisco Playhouse. Clue, based on the screenplay, March 9 – April 27, 2023. SFBATCO See website for upcoming streaming and in- theater shows. San Jose Stage Company: Grand Horizons by Bess Wohl, April 5 – 30. 2023. Shotgun Players. Triumph of Love by Pierre de Marivaux, must close April 30. Streaming on demand April 26 – May 7. South Bay Musical Theatre: Singin' In the Rain, May 13 – June 3. The Breath Project. Streaming archive. The Marsh: Calendar listings for Berkeley, San Francisco and Marshstream. Theatre Rhino Pericles by William Shakespeare, adapted and directed by John Fisher, May 26 – 27. Streaming: Essential Services Project, conceived and performed by John Fisher, all weekly performances now available on demand, New performances most Wednesdays. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. A Distinct Society by Kareem Fahmy, April 5 – 30, 2023, Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. Word for Word. Home by George Saunders, April 5-29, Z Below. See schedule for one-night readings and streaming performances. Misc. Listings: BAM/PFA: On View calendar for BAM/PFA. Berkeley Symphony: See website for listings. Chamber Music San Francisco: Calendar, 2023 Season, starting February. Dance Mission Theatre. On stage events calendar. Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Calendar listings and upcoming shows. San Francisco Opera. Calendar listings. San Francisco Symphony. Calendar listings. Playbill List of Streaming Theatre: Updated weekly, this is probably the best list you'll find of national and international streaming plays and musicals. Each week has its own webpage, so scroll down. National Theatrical Streaming: Upcoming plays from around the country. Filmed Live Musicals: Searchable database of all filmed live musicals, podcast, blog. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theater venue to this list, please write Richard@kpfa.org The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – April 27, 2023: Don Winslow – Norah Piehl appeared first on KPFA.

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Episode 82: Brooke Warner She Writes Press

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 27, 2023 20:50

Brooke Warner is publisher of She Writes Press and SparkPress, president of Warner Coaching Inc., and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What's Your Book?, and three books on memoir. Brooke is a TEDx speaker and the former Executive Editor of Seal Press. She currently sits on the boards of the Book Industry Study Group, the Bay Area Book Festival, and the National Association of Memoir Writers. She writes a monthly column for Publishers Weekly. The Storytellers hosted by Grace Sammon, focuses on individuals who choose to leave their mark on the world through the art of story. Each episode engages guests and listeners in the story behind the story of authors, artists, reporters and others who leave a legacy of storytelling. Applying her years of experience as an educator, entrepreneur, author, and storyteller herself, Grace brings to listeners an intimate one-on-one experience with her guests. Visit Grace at her website www.gracesammon.net. Contact Grace about being a guest on the show, email her at grace@gracesammon.net Follow Grace: On Facebook https://www.facebook.com/GraceSammonWrites/ On Instagram https://www.instagram.com/GraceSammonWrites/ On Twitter https://www.twitter.com/GSammonWrites On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/grace-sammon-84389153/ #TheStorytellers #Storyteller #Storytellers # Storytelling #AuhtorInterview #LetsTalkBooks #LeaveYourMark #AuthorLife #StorytellerLife #ArtofStory #AuthorTalkNetwork #BookishRoadTrip #AuthorTalkNetwork #AuthorsOnTheAirGlobalRadioNetwork #publisher #shewritespress #publisher #publishing #memoir #author #greenlight #publish #write The Storytellers is a copyrighted work © of Grace Sammon and Authors on The Air Global Radio Network.

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Episode 82: Brooke Warner She Writes Press

Authors on the Air Global Radio Network

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 27, 2023 20:50

Aviatrix Writers' Room - Hybrid Publisher Brooke Warner

Aviatrix Book Review

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 28, 2022 51:19

Brooke Warner is an author, editor, and publisher with over two decades in the industry. She is the publisher of She Writes Press and SparkPress, President of Warner Coaching Inc., and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What's Your Book?, and three books on memoir. She is a TEDx speaker and the former Executive Editor of Seal Press. She currently sits on the boards of the Independent Book Publishers Association, the Bay Area Book Festival, and the National Association of Memoir Writers. She writes a monthly column for Publishers Weekly and co-hosts the podcast Write-Minded with Grant Faulkner of NaNoWriMo. You can find her at www.BrookeWarner.com and www.SheWritesPress.com, and find her TedX talk at https://youtu.be/5a0w4KgWyP8. Sign up for the Literary Aviatrix newsletter, and find links to everything else here: https://linktr.ee/literaryaviatrix

All About Book Festivals, featuring Cherilyn Parsons

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Play Episode Listen Later Apr 11, 2022 32:16

This week's show is a love letter to book festivals—and a conversation about why they matter, how authors can pitch themselves and get involved in local festivals, and what the considerations entail for those people who are behind the scenes organizing such festivals. This week's guest, Cherilyn Parsons, is the founder and executive director of the Bay Area Book Festival based in Berkeley, California, and she's interviewed by Brooke while Grant is away, who's been a longtime board member and is the current Chairperson of the festival. Enjoy!

Wanda's Picks Radio Show

Wanda's Picks

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 28, 2021 150:00

This is a black arts and culture site. We will be exploring the African Diaspora via the writing, performance, both musical and theatrical (film and stage), as well as the visual arts of Africans in the Diaspora and those influenced by these aesthetic forms of expression. I am interested in the political and social ramifications of art on society, specifically movements supported by these artists and their forebearers. It is my claim that the artists are the true revolutionaries, their work honest and filled with raw unedited passion. They are our true heroes. Ashay! Join us at 9 AM this morning for a wonderful conversation with Ameha Molla and Rajal Pitroda, San Francisco filmmakers who won BLACK PUBLIC MEDIA’S PITCHBLACK for their documentary feature "Higher 15", which tells the story of Molla’s uncle, Kiflu Ketema, a former Ethiopian revolutionary turned lead witness in an FBI investigation against his murderous prison guard in war-torn Addis Ababa. Our next guest is Cherilyn Parsons, Executive Director and Founder of the Bay Area Book Festival starting May 1. There is a free special tribute to Lawrence Ferlinghetti this evening 5:30-6:30 PM PT We close with a rebroadcast of an interview with Dawn Monique Williams Associate Director, Aurora Theatre's production of Toni Morrison's "The Bluest Eye" (adapted by Lydia R. Diamond). Michael J. Asberry (actor) joins Dawn Monique.

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Cherilyn Parsons, The Bay Area Book Festival 2021

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Play Episode Listen Later Apr 18, 2021 56:52

Cherilyn Parsons is the founder and Executive Director of the seventh annual Bay Area Book Festival, held digitally this year from May 1 through May 9, 2021. She is interviewed by Richard Wolinsky. In this interview she presents highlights from this year's festival, focusing in on writers such as Nobel Prize winner Kazuo Ishiguro, China expert Orville Schell, Joyce Carol Oates, KPFA's Davey D, and others. She also discusses the future of the Festival, which promises to be both live and streamed in coming years. Festival video teaser Bay Area Book Festival website Bay Area Book Festival You Tube channel The post Cherilyn Parsons, The Bay Area Book Festival 2021 appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – Sept. 17, 2020: Heather Cox Richardson – Laurel Ollstein

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 17, 2020 59:57

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to announced on-line and streaming local theatre & book events Bookwaves Heather Cox Richardson, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Heather Cox Richardson is a noted historian, a Professor of History at Boston College, specializing on the Civil War and reconstruction – but in the past year she's taken on a different role, chronicling America's daily political life in a series of commentaries titled Letters from an American, which can be found on her Facebook page, as well as at heathercoxrichardson.substack.com. Earlier this year, she released a book titled How the South Won the Civil War, subtitled Oligarchy, Democracy and the Continuing fight for the soul of America. This interview with Heather Cox Richardson was recorded via zencastr.com on the morning of Friday, September 11, 2020. She discusses her daily column and how it came to be written, elements in her book, and of course, current events. Complete 62-minute interview. Artwaves Laurel Ollstein, whose latest play, “Pandora,” will be streaming on the theatreworks.org website from September 24, 6 pm – Septembre 28, 6 pm, is interviewed by host Richard Wolinsky. Laurel Ollstein is also the author of “They Promised Her the Moon,” which was produced at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley and shut down prematurely due to the pandemic. She has been a theatre and television actress, short story writer and director over the course of her career, and worked with Tim Robbins' Actors Gang in Los Angeles for fifteen years. This latest project is a theatrical retelling of the myth of Pandora, the first human woman in Greek Mythology, who was said to have opened a box which allowed all the ills of the world to escape. The production, recorded in Zoom toward the end of May, 2020, is a workshop reading featuring actors from the Bay Area and beyond, and is directed by Giovanna Sardelli, is free on-line with registration. :Special thanks to Richard Lavin for his assistance in post-production. Complete 34-minute podcast interview. Announcement Links Book Passage. Conversations with authors, all at 4 pm Pacific: Ayad Akhtar on Saturday September 19 at 4 pm, Wade Davis Sunday September 20 also at 4 pm, Al Sharpton, Thursday October 1 at 5:30 pm. The Booksmith features Lucy Jane Bledsoe Tuesday September 22 at 8 pm. Books Inc presents Laura Markham, PhD this afternoon at 4 pm Bay Area Book Festival Sunday, October 4, the Bay Area Book Festival presents Berkeley #UNBOUND, an all-day, free, virtual mini-festival — kicked off with a ticketed keynote program on Saturday night, October 3. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse The Zoomlet play Monday September 21 at 7 pm is The Logic by Will Arbery. Custom Made Theatre Sarah Ruhl's How to Transcend a Happy Marriage, recorded during its Jan/Feb run, streams September 18-20, On Demand 10 am-11 pm. Theatre Rhino Live Thursday performance conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm Thursday September 17 is Straight. American Conservatory Theatre (ACT) In Love and Warcraft by Madhuri Shekar, On Demand recording of the live production, Sept 18-25. The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa Fasthorse, live streamed September 25 to October 3, On demand October 9 to October 18. 42nd Street Moon. 8 pm Tuesdays: Tuesday Talks Over the Moon. Fridays at 8 pm: Full Moon Fridays Cabaret. Sundays at 8 pm: Quiz Me Kate: Musical Theatre Trivia. A new subscription series, Moonbeams, begins streaming on October 1. Magic Theatre. Nassim Soleimanpour gives a one-day playwriting workshop, Wed. September 26, 10 am to 2 pm. Limited availability. Shotgun Players. Josh Kornbluth's Citizen Brain, live streamed October 16 to November 8. Berkeley Rep Romantics Anonymous, live from the Old Vic in Bristol, England, a musical with book by Emma Rice, lyrics by Christopher Dimond and music by Michael Kooman, September 26 at 1 pm. And It Can't Happen Hear, a four part radio play, on October 13 at 5 pm. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Pandora by Laurel Ollstein streams September 24 to September 28. 6 pm to 6 pm. California Shakepeare Theatre (Cal Shakes) The Direct Address series continues with Resisting Shakespeare: Or, How to Fall In and Out and In and Out of Love. The series begins on September 18 at 5 pm. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts new on-line programming series featuring classes, concerts, poetry sessions and more. SFBATCO Live with Rod and Marce on Twitch TV, every Thursday at 6 pm. Aurora Theatre's A new ticketed audio drama, The Flats, written by Lauren Gunderson, Cleaven Smith and Jonathan Spector, with Lauren English, Anthony Fusco and Khary L. Moye, directed by Josh Costello, will stream this fall, date to be announced. Aurora Connects conversations every Friday, 4 pm. Marin Theatre Company Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the Marin Theatre website. Central Works The Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The September script is Strange Ladies by Susan Sobeloff. A podcast will be posted to the Central Works website on September 29. Bystanders by Patricia Milton, an audio play, streams through September 20. New Conservatory Theatre Center presents In Good Company, a podcast about life when it goes off script. The first five episodes are now available streaming. The Marsh: International Solo Fest, October 7-11. Josh Kornbluth hosts bingo every Friday at 7:30 pm Pear Theater. Lysistrata, October 8 – November 9, filmed live outdoors. Contra Costa Civic Theatre Check the webpage for theatre classes for young actors. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theatre venue to this list, please write bookwaves@hotmail.com. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – Sept. 17, 2020: Heather Cox Richardson – Laurel Ollstein appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – Sept. 10, 2020: Jonathan Safran Foer – Hershey Felder

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 10, 2020 59:59

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to announced on-line and streaming local theatre & book events Bookwaves Novelist and essayist Jonathan Safran Foer discusses his book, “We Are The Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast,” just out in trade paperback, with host Richard Wolinsky. The author of three acclaimed novels, Jonathan Safran Foer has also written “Eating Animals,” a treatise on the evils of factory farming. This new book talks about changing one's diet, cutting one's carnivore diet, as a personal step in limiting your carbon footprint, i.e. removing meat, fish and dairy products from breakfast and lunch. Complete interview Artwaves Hershey Felder, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, 2013. George Gershwin Alone will be performed live from Florence, Italy on Sunday September 13, 2020 at 5 pm Pacific. For tickets and information, go to Berkeley Rep or TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Hershey Felder has made a career of creating solo shows in which he portrays different composers performing their work on piano. His first show, George Gershwin Alone, began in 1999 at a Los Angeles workshop. He later went on to portray Leonard Bernstein, Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Frederic Chopin, Claude Debussy, and Ludwig Beethoven. This interview was recorded in the offices of Berkeley Rep on April 12, 2013, during the run of George Gershwin Alone. Photos: Hershey Felder Presents. Announcement Links Book Passage. Conversations with authors, all at 4 pm Pacific: mystery writer Rhys Bowen, today, Bill Petrocelli, author of Electoral Bait and Switch: How the Electoral College Hurts Voters, Saturday September 12, Clarissa Ward Sunday September 13, Dr. David D. Burns on depression Tuesday September 14 and Sue Miller Wednesday September 15, again all at 4 pm Pacific. And Chasten Buttegieg in conversation with Andrew Sean Greer Tuesday September 15, 5:30 pm The Booksmith features tonight Tom Phillpot tonight at 6 pm and Chuck Palahniuk (Palanik) in conversation with Richard Kadrey on Wednesday September 16 at 7 pm Books Inc presents Adrienne Young, Adalyn Grace and Maggie Tokuda-Hall, later today at 5 pm and Kevin C. O'Leary Tuesday September 15 at 5 pm . Bay Area Book Festival Sunday, October 4, the Bay Area Book Festival presents Berkeley #UNBOUND, an all-day, free, virtual mini-festival — kicked off with a ticketed keynote program on Saturday night, October 3. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse Tonight at 7 pm: Fireside chat with playwright Cleavon Smith, The Zoomlet play Monday September 14 at 7 pm is A Broken String by Lynn Kauffman Custom Made Theatre Sarah Ruhl's How to Transcend a Happy Marriage, recorded during its Jan/Feb run, streams September 18-20, On Demand 10 am-11 pm. Theatre Rhino Live Thursday performance conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm Thursday September 10 is The Drinker. American Conservatory Theatre (ACT) In Love and Warcraft by Madhuri Shekar, a live production on Zoom, this Friday and Saturday September 11-12 at 8 pm, and On Demand recording Sept 18-25. 42nd Street Moon. 8 pm Tuesdays: Tuesday Talks Over the Moon. Fridays at 8 pm: Full Moon Fridays Cabaret. Sundays at 8 pm: Quiz Me Kate: Musical Theatre Trivia. A new subscription series, Moonbeams, begins streaming on October 1. Shotgun Players. Josh Kornbluth's Citizen Brain, live-streamed October 16 to November 8. Berkeley Rep Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. Tickets on sale on the website. TheatreWorks' production of the musical Pride and Prejudice is now streaming with an Amazon Prime subscription. Pandora by Laurel Ollstein streams September 24 to September 28, free. California Shakepeare Theatre (Cal Shakes) Direct Address: Allyship and Anti-Racism, Where Are We Now? Is available streaming. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts new on-line programming series featuring classes, concerts, poetry sessions and more. SFBATCO Live with Rod and Marce on Twitch TV, every Thursday at 6 pm. Aurora Theatre's A new ticketed audio drama, The Flats, written by Lauren Gunderson, Cleaven Smith and Jonathan Spector, with Lauren English, Anthony Fusco and Khary L. Moye, directed by Josh Costello, will stream this fall, date to be announced. Aurora Connects conversations every Friday, 4 pm. Marin Theatre Company Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the Marin Theatre website. Central Works The Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The September script is Strange Ladies by Susan Sobeloff. A podcast will be posted to the Central Works website on September 29. New Conservatory Theatre Center presents In Good Company, a podcast about life when it goes off script. The first four episodes are now available streaming. The Marsh: International Solo Fest, October 7-11. Josh Kornbluth hosts bingo every Friday at 7:30 pm. Pear Theater. Lysistrata, October 8 – November 9, filmed live outdoors. Contra Costa Civic Theatre The Reading Stage: I and You by Lauren Gunderson, Monday September 14, at 7 pm on Zoom. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theater venue to this list, please write bookwaves@hotmail.com. . The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – Sept. 10, 2020: Jonathan Safran Foer – Hershey Felder appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – September 3, 2020: Gail Sheehy – Madhuri Shekar

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 3, 2020 59:58

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to announced on-line and streaming local theatre & book events Bookwaves Gail Sheehy, one of America's most distinguished journalists, known for her incisive profiles in the New Yorker and other magazines, died on August 24, 2020 of complications from pneumonia, possibly brought on by Covid-19. She was 83. One of the founders of the New Journalism, Sheehy's book, Passages, a kind of road map of life from our twenties to old age, is considered one of the most influential books of the twentieth century. In this interview with host Richard Wolinsky, conducted at Book Passage bookstore in Corte Madera, California on September 24, 2014, she talks about what would be her final book, Daring: My Passages, which takes us from her days at New York Magazine through her years as a freelance journalist, focusing on the personalities of the people she's interviewed over the years as well as on her personal life. Gail Sheehy Wikipedia page Artwaves Madhuri Shekar‘s play, “In Love and Warcraft” will be seen in live performance as part of ACT's InterAct Home Initiative, September 4-12, 2020, and then streaming September 18-25. She is interviewed by Richard Wolinsky. “In Love and Warcraft” concerns a young woman who spends much of her time in the World of Warcraft game, and on the side writes love letters for her friends. Along the way, she discovers she has feelings for one of her clients. Madhuri Shekar's other plays include “House of Joy,” which played at Cal Shakes last summer, along with “A Nice Indian Boy,” “Queen,” and “Dhaba on Devon Avenue,” which was having its premiere at the New Victory Theatre in Chicago and was shut down due to the novel corona virus. Her web TV series, “Titus and Andronicus” can be found on You Tube. She was part of the writers' room of Joss Whedon's new series, “The Nevers,” which will have its premiere on HBO. Born in California, she spent most of her formative years in Chenmai, India, and currently lives in New Jersey. Headshot: Ganesh Toasty. Horizontal photo: Niyantha Shekar Post-production: Richard Lavin. Announcement Links Book Passage.Ticketed events are Louise Penny, Saturday September 5 at noon Pacifica time, and Jodi Pico on Sunday September 6 at 4 pm Pacific. Carl Hiaasen in conversation with Dave Barry, Tuesday September 8, 4 pm. Chasten Buttegieg in conversation with Andrew Sean Greer Tuesday September 15, 5:30 pm The Booksmith features Joe William Trotter Jr. and Workers on Arrival: Black Labor in the Making of America, on Monday September 7 at 11 am and Tuesday September 8, at 6 pm, Julian Guthrie with Good Blood at 6 pm. Both are free with RSVP. Books Inc presents a book launch with Carole Bumpus and Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table, later today at 5 pm, and a talk about children's literature with author Shirin Yim Bridges and editor Amy Novesky on Wednesday, September 9 at 5 pm. Bay Area Book Festival Sunday, October 4, the Bay Area Book Festival presents Berkeley #UNBOUND, an all-day, free, virtual mini-festival — kicked off with a ticketed keynote program on Saturday night, October 3. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse ADDED SEPT 4: Monday September 7, 7 pm. Two Pigeons Talk Politics by Lauren Gunderson. Virtual table read. Free with registration. Thursday September 3 at 7 pm: Fireside chat with Susi Damilano and Stacey Ross. Custom Made Theatre UPDATED SEPT 4: Sarah Ruhl's How to Transcend a Happy Marriage, recorded during its Jan/Feb run, streams September 18-20, On Demand 10 am-11 pm. Theatre Rhino Live Thursday performance conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm Thursday September 3 is Fillmore. Other Letters created by Renaud and Carin Silkaitis, a queer and diverse take on A.J. Gurney's Love Letters, can be seen on Zoom on Tuesday September 8 at 7 pm. American Conservatory Theatre (ACT) begins a series of live then streamed ticketed productions, titled InterAct, starting on September 4 with In Love and Warcraft by Madhuri Shekar. Live productions Sept 4-5, 11-12; On Demand recording Sept 18-25. 42nd Street Moon. 8 pm Tuesdays: Tuesday Talks Over the Moon. Fridays at 8 pm: Full Moon Fridays Cabaret. Sundays at 8 pm: Quiz Me Kate: Musical Theatre Trivia. Shotgun Players. Check out the website for streamed material. Berkeley Rep Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. Tickets on sale on the website. TheatreWorks' production of the musical Pride and Prejudice is now streaming with an Amazon Prime subscription. California Shakepeare Theatre (Cal Shakes) Direct Address: Allyship and Anti-Racism, Where Are We Now? Panel discussion Friday Sept 4, 5-7 pm. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts new on-line programming series featuring classes, concerts, poetry sessions and more. SFBATCO Songs of the Golden Age, Thursday September 3, 6 pm with Rod and Marce on Twitch TV. Aurora Theatre's A new ticketed audio drama, The Flats, written by Lauren Gunderson, Cleaven Smith and Jonathan Spector, with Lauren English, Anthony Fusco and Khary L. Moye, directed by Josh Costello, will stream this fall, date to be announced. Aurora Connects conversations every Friday, 4 pm. Marin Theatre Company Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the Marin Theatre website. Central Works The Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The September script is Strange Ladies by Susan Sobeloff. A podcast will be posted to the Central Works website on September 29. New Conservatory Theatre Center presents In Good Company, a podcast about life when it goes off script. The first three episodes are now available streaming. The Marsh: Class Performances. David Ford's class members perform 20-minute monologues live streamed, next Monday September 7 and Tuesday September 8 at 7:30 pm. Pear Theater. Lysistrata, October 8 – November 9, filmed live outdoors. Contra Costa Civic Theatre Afterschool classes begin September 14. Lincoln Center Live Through September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara & Nathan Gunn. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theatre venue to this list, please write bookwaves@hotmail.com. . The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – September 3, 2020: Gail Sheehy – Madhuri Shekar appeared first on KPFA.

covid-19 america tv family california live chicago house books zoom pride moon new jersey hbo virtual soundcloud act amazon prime tickets panel searching pacific new yorker workers traditions golden age rod prejudice love letters refresh world of warcraft rsvp warcraft joss whedon antiracism new york magazine interact carousel passages transcend horizontal on demand fireside renaud kepler in love flats happy marriages fillmore pacifica nevers gurney john fisher twitch tv sheehy marce dave barry louise penny kpfa moye lysistrata madhuri in good company carl hiaasen david ford theatreworks sarah ruhl ticketed new journalism shekar lauren gunderson where are we now andronicus aurora theatre book passage julian guthrie corte madera gail sheehy latino arts shotgun players books inc bay area book festival new victory theatre hershey felder devon avenue street moon

Bookwaves/Artwaves – August 27, 2020: Roger Kahn and the Boys of Summer

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 27, 2020 59:59

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to announced on-line and streaming local theatre & book events Bookwaves Roger Kahn, who died on February 6, 2020 at the age of 92, was one of the icons in the world of baseball writing. His classic “The Boys of Summer,” about his relationship with his father and their united love for the Brooklyn Dodgers, is one of the greatest baseball books of all time. He started his career in journalism in 1948 as a copyboy for the New York Herald Tribune and within four years was covering the Dodgers for that newspaper. He moved over to Newsweek in 1956 and the Saturday Evening Post in 1963 as he revved up his career writing both fiction and non-fiction books, mostly but not exclusively about baseball, and the ups and downs of his own life. On October 13, 1993, Richard A. Lupoff and Richard Wolinsky sat down for an extended interview with Roger Kahn about his book, “The Era: 1947-1957, when the Yankees, the Giants and the Dodgers Ruled the World. “ It turned out he was a marvelous raconteur, as well as a keen historian of racism in the sport. In fact, his final book, published in 2014, was titled “Rickey and Robinson: The True, Untold Story of the Integration of Baseball.” (Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson). Dick Lupoff and Richard Wolinsky would interview Roger Kahn once more, in 1998, but that interview focused not on baseball but on a biography of boxer Jack Dempsey. After this interview, Roger Kahn would go on to write six more books, including not only the history of the early days of integration, and the biography of Dempsey, but a memoir of the people he met, a book about the view from the pitching mound, and a history of the New York Yankees improbable run for the pennant in 1978. Digitized, remastered and re-edited in 2020 by Richard Wolinsky. This interview has not aired since its original broadcast. This program was uploaded before the cancellation of several major league games protesting the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Digitized, remastered and re-edited in August, 2020 by Richard Wolinsky. This interview has not been aired since its original broadcast. Complete 68-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Announcement Links Book Passage. Conversations with Authors features Ursula Hegi on Saturday August 29, Pramala Jayapal and Sunday August 30, both at 4 pm Pacific time. The Booksmith presents Vanessa Veselka in conversation with Emma Donoghue tonight at 7 pm, at Sara Jaquette Ray on Monday August 31 at 7 pm, and the book launch for Meg Elison's new novel Find Layla on Tuesday September 1 at 7 pm. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. Bay Area Book Festival features Michael Pollan and Merlin Sheldrake on Entangled Life and the world of Fungi, which first aired on Wednesday August 26. Theatre Rhino Live Thursday performance conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm Thursday August 27 is Saint John Fisher. San Francisco Playhouse fireside chat Thursday August 27 at 7 pm is Betty Shameih with Bill English. No Zoomlet play this coming Monday. American Conservatory Theatre (ACT) begins a series of live then streamed ticketed productions, titled InterAct, starting on September 4 with In Love and Warcraft by Madhuri Shekar. Tickets on sale on the website. 42nd Street Moon. 8 pm Tuesdays: Tuesday Talks Over the Moon. Fridays at 8 pm: Full Moon Fridays Cabaret. Sundays at 8 pm: Quiz Me Kate: Musical Theatre Trivia. Shotgun Players. Live streamed Digital Brain with Josh Kornbluth begins October 16, 2020. Tickets on sale on the website. Berkeley Rep. Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. Tickets on sale on the website. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. Tickets on sale on the website. TheatreWorks' production of the musical Pride and Prejudice is now streaming with an Amazon Prime subscription. California Shakepeare Theatre (Cal Shakes) has various offerings on its You Tube channel. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts new on-line programming series featuring classes, concerts, poetry sessions and more.. Aurora Theatre. A new ticketed audio drama, The Flats, written by Lauren Gunderson, Cleaven Smith and Jonathan Spector, with Lauren English, Anthony Fusco and Khary L. Moye, directed by Josh Costello, will stream this fall, date to be announced. Marin Theatre Company Aldo Billingslea performs Three Story Walk Up by Gamel Abdel Chasen as part of the Breath Project, streaming on the site. Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the website. Contra Costa Civic Theatre presents the play Ten Out of Twelve by Anne Washburn Monday August 31 at 7 pm on Zoom. SFBATCO presents a series titled Hella Theatre with Peter J. Kuo of ACT tonight at 6 pm. It's a weekly show and this is episode three, Directing in Color. Central Works The Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. September script has not yet been announced. Lincoln Center Live Through September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara & Nathan Gunn. Public Theatre: The Line streams through the website. A radio recording of Richard II is also available through the website. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theatre venue to this list, please write bookwaves@hotmail.com. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – August 27, 2020: Roger Kahn and the Boys of Summer appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – August 20, 2020: Tony Horwitz – Mavis Gallant

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 20, 2020 59:59

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to announced on-line and streaming local theatre & book events Bookwaves Tony Horwitz (1958 – May 27, 2019) discusses his most recent book, “Spying on the South,” now out in trade paperback, with host Richard Wolinsky. Recorded May 17, 2019. The author of several books that combine scholarship, history and travel, Tony Horwitz was a one of a kind author. In “Confederates in the Attic,” he looked at Civil War re-enactors in the Deep South. In “Blue Latitudes,” he followed the path of explorer James Cook, visiting islands in the Pacific Ocean. And in “Spying on the South,” now his final book, he follows the path of the young Frederick Law Olmstead, later to design Central Park, as he went down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers all the way to the Mexican border, seeing how a century and a half has changed the landscape and the people. Ten days after this interview was conducted, Tony Horwitz died of a heart attack in Washington D.C., in the middle of his book tour. An extended 49-minute version of this interview can be found as a Radio Wolinsky podcast. Photos: Richard Wolinsky. Artwaves Mavis Gallant, who died in 2014 at the age of 91, was a Canadian short story writer who spent most of her life in France. During her lifetime, she had 118 stories in the New Yorker, which made her one of that magazine's most published writers. Along the way she did write two novels, but it was because of her shorter fiction that she was very much a writers' writer. A very private person, she only rarely gave interviews – but she did go on a book tour for her short story collection, Across the Bridge, and it's then, on October 6, 1993, that Richard A. Lupoff and Richard Wolinsky had a chance to speak with her. Wikipedia notes that her subject was frequently fascism, in particular about what she called “the small possibilities in people” which leaned them toward fascism. In a roundabout way, she discusses that in this interview. New York Review Books Classics has published several volumes of her stories, most notably The Collected Stories, which features fifty two examples of her best work, and Paris Stories, curated by Michael Ondaatje. Across the Bridge is available in an e-book edition from Amazon. Digitized, remastered and re-edited in August, 2020 by Richard Wolinsky Extended 51-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast.Transcript of a 1999 Paris Review interview with Mavis Gallant. Announcement Links Book Passage. Conversations with Authors features Susan Minot on Saturday August 22, David Sibley on Sunday August 23, and Akwaeki Emezi on Wednesday August 26, all at 4 pm Pacific. The Booksmith features Eric Hatton at 11 am and Richard Kadrey and Christopher Moore at 6 pm Pacific on Monday August 24, and poets Michael Warr and Chun Yu on Wednesday August 26 at 7 pm Pacific. Bay Area Book Festival features Michael Pollan and Merlin Sheldrake on Entangled Life and the world of Fungi, on Wednesday August 26 at 7 pm. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. Theatre Rhino Live Thursday performance conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm Thursday August 20 is Dickens. San Francisco Playhouse fireside chat Thursday August 20 at 7 pm is Louis Parnell with Susi Damilano, and Monday August 24's Zoomlet play is The Bacchae by Euripedes at 7 pm. American Conservatory Theatre (ACT) begins a series of live then streamed ticketed productions, titled InterAct, starting on September 4 with In Love and Warcraft by Madhuri Shekar. 42nd Street Moon. 8 pm Tuesdays: Tuesday Talks Over the Moon. Fridays at 8 pm: Full Moon Fridays Cabaret. Sundays at 8 pm: Quiz Me Kate: Musical Theatre Trivia. Shotgun Players. A live stream performance of Quack by Eliza Clark, through August 26 Registration required. Berkeley Rep is having a script discussion starting on Monday August 24, with Bright Half Life by Tanya Barfield, and you can purchase and read the script in advance. Another live performance by Hershey Felder, George Gershwin Alone, airs on Sunday September 13 at 5 pm. Theatreworks Silicon Valley is presenting on Women's Equality Day at 5:30 pm live streamed excerpts from the musical Perfect 36 with book and lyrics by Laura Harrington and music by Mel Marvin. California Shakepeare Theatre (Cal Shakes) has various offerings on its You Tube channel. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts new on-line programming series featuring classes, concerts, poetry sessions and more.. Aurora Theatre's A new ticketed audio drama, The Flats, written by Lauren Gunderson, Cleaven Smith and Jonathan Spector, with Lauren English, Anthony Fusco and Khary L. Moye, directed by Josh Costello, will stream this fall, date to be announced. Marin Theatre Company Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the Marin Theatre website. Central Works The Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The August script is Bamboozled by Patricia Milton. A podcast will be posted to the Central Works website on August 25. Lincoln Center Live Through September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara & Nathan Gunn. Public Theatre: The Line streams through the website. A radio recording of Richard II is also available through the website. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theatre venue to this list, please write bookwaves@hotmail.com. . The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – August 20, 2020: Tony Horwitz – Mavis Gallant appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – August 13, 2020: Robert Macfarlane – Robert K. Massie

What on Earth is Going on?

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 13, 2020 59:58

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to Announced Events Bookwaves Robert Macfarlane, whose latest book is “Underland: A Deep Time Journey”, which comes out in trade paperback on August 18, 2020, is interviewed by host Richard Wolinsky. The author of several books, including “Mountains of the Mind” and “The Old Ways,” Robert Macfarlane discusses his latest work, a travelogue through caves, glacial crevices, mines, and catacombs, as he examines the world below our feet. Extended 43-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Photos: Richard Wolinsky. Artwaves Robert K. Massie, a journalist and historian whose focus was on the Russian House of Romanov, and who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1981 for his biography of Peter the Great, died on December 2, 2019 at the age of ninety. Along with a well-received biography of Catherine the Great, he was also known for his books about Czar Nicholas, the Tsarina Alexandra, and the final days of the Romanov dynasty in Ekaterinaberg in Siberia. On November 4, 1995, Richard A. Lupoff and Richard Wolinsky had a chance to interview Robert K. Massie while he was on tour for his book, The Romanovs: The final Chapter, which dealt with events long after the Russian Revolution, from those claiming to be Romanov descendants to the disinterment of the Royal family's bones after the Soviet Union fell. Digitized, remastered and re-edited in August, 2020 by Richard Wolinsky. Extended 38-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Announcement Links Book Passage. Conversations with authors features John Shea in conversation with Phi Cousinou on Saturday, August 15 at 4 pm Pacific, and Christine Montross in conversation with Susanna Calahan on Sunday August 16 also at 4 pm Pacific. And on Wednesday August 19, Darin Strauss in conversation with Kelly Corrigan. The Booksmith features Diane Cook and her novel The New Wilderness Thursday August 13 at 6 pm,and Monday August 15 at 11 am, Aya Gruber on the relationship between the feminist movement and mass incarceration. Theatre Rhino Live Thursday performance conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm Thursday August 13 is A Death in the Family. Rhino also presents a zoom performance of Sarah Ruhl's play Dear Elizabeth, an epistolatory journey through the lives of poet Robert Lowell and lesbian author Elizabeth Bishop, Tuesday August 18, 7 pm. San Francisco Playhouse presents a live stream fireside chat with playwright Rajiv Joseph Thursday August 13 at 7 pm, and Monday August 17, 7 pm, Zoomlet play is The Mommy Assumption by Gaetha Reddy. 42nd Street Moon. Full Moon Friday on-line concert August 14 at 8 pm Pacific is Super Songs from Not So Super Shows, Part Two. Shotgun Players. A live stream performance of Quack by Eliza Clark, through August 15. Registration required. California Shakepeare Theatre (Cal Shakes) presents a panel discussion on addressing anti-blackness in non-black communities of color, Friday August 14, 5-7 pm. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts new on-line programming series featuring classes, concerts, poetry sessions and more. LGBTQ Theatre, Different Stars Live, having its world premiere on You Tube Live, Saturday August 15 at 4 pm Pacific. Aurora Theatre's Aurora Connects series of interviews, every Friday at 4 pm. August 14: Artistic Director Josh Costello and Associate Artistic Director Dawn Monique Williams. Other interviews in the series are available streaming. Bay Area Playwrights Festival works streamed through Aurora's website. Marin Theatre Company Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the Marin Theatre website. Bay Area Book Festival. Various Unbound conversations available streaming. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. Central Works The Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The August script is Bamboozled by Patricia Milton. A podcast will be posted to the Central Works website on August 25. Theatreworks Silicon Valley. Interviews and educational videos. Lincoln Center Live Through September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara & Nathan Gunn. Public Theatre: The Line streams through the website. A radio recording of Richard II is also available through the website. . The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – August 13, 2020: Robert Macfarlane – Robert K. Massie appeared first on KPFA.

family death conversations interview books zoom mind soundcloud pacific mountains soviet union pulitzer prize refresh siberia extended rhino carousel kepler quack russian revolution romanov old ways bamboozled john fisher richard ii elizabeth bishop digitized robert macfarlane kpfa john shea sarah ruhl kelly corrigan robert lowell aurora theatre diane cook latino arts darin strauss shotgun players booksmith robert k massie bay area book festival czar nicholas tsarina alexandra street moon richard a lupoff

...with Creativity, Music and Politics during COVID-19 (Ep. 98)

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 7, 2020 62:22

The coronavirus pandemic is altering our lives in ways we cannot yet comprehend, and in decades we will marvel at this transformative time. COVID-19 is not just accelerating trends that were in place beforehand, but it is creating new realities. How are artists coping? How about our politics and ideologies? Alex Green's podcast, Stereo Embers, addresses the current creative moment of the artist. He joins Ben remotely from San Francisco for a fascinating and wide-ranging conversation. About the Guest A native of California, Alex Green is the author of four books: The Heart Goes Boom (Wrecking Ball, UK), Emergency Anthems (Brooklyn Arts Press), Let The West Coast Be Settled (Tall Lighthouse) and The Stone Roses (Bloomsbury Academic). Alex is a known live moderator, interviewing authors, musicians and artists for the Bay Area Book Festival, LitQuake, A Great Good Place For Books and Green Apple Books. Over the course of his career, he's interviewed David Bowie, Maira Kalman, R.E.M., Kristin Hersh, Joshua Mohr, Stephan Pastis, Sherman Alexie, Janice Cooke Newman, and Alison Moyet. He's the host of Stereo Embers: The Podcast, a weekly long-form interview program that focuses on the creative life and the artist's commitment to their craft. The program is already one of the fastest growing podcasts on iTunes. Alex is also the host of the weekly radio show "The Heart Goes Boom," which focuses on new music coming out of the UK and beyond. Alex is the Editor of the daily entertainment site Stereo Embers Magazine (www.stereoembersmagazine.com) and he currently teaches in the English Department at St. Mary's College of California. Learn more about Alex or follow him on Twitter (@EMBERSEDITOR). Mentioned in this Conversation Whiskey Sour Happy Hour featuring Ed Helms For Emma, Forever Ago, debut album from Bon Iver "Studio Notes on Your Rom-Com, for the Coronavirus Era", a short in the New Yorker, 29 June 2020 Dune, a classic science fiction novel by Frank Herbert The Coddling of the American Mind, a book by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt Guyland: The Perilous World Where Boys Become Men, a book by Michael Kimmel Episode 26 of this podcast, featuring Professor Sulaimon Giwa discussing racism Here are some of the writers, artists and musicians we discussed: Jon Bon Jovi, Leonard Cohen, Paul Simon, Tom Waits, Joe Strummer, Raymond Carver, Ernest Hemingway, DH Lawrence, Gord Downie, Green Day ("American Idiot"), Woody Guthrie, Phil Ochs, Billy Bragg, Bob Dylan, Dead Kennedys The Quote of the Week "He was trapped in a haircut he no longer believed in." - Billy Bragg

Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 23, 2020: Dave Eggers – Suzanne Bradbeer

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 23, 2020 59:59

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to announced on-line events below program description Bookwaves Richard Wolinsky and Dave Eggers. Dave Eggers discusses his novel, “The Parade” with host Richard Wolinsky. The author of several works of fiction and non-fiction, Dave Eggers is best known for the memoir “A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius,” a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He is also the founder of McSweeney's publishing house in San Francisco, and is an acclaimed journalist who writes for The Guardian and elsewhere. “The Parade” takes place in an unnamed country as two contractors work to complete a road leading from a formerly rebellious part of the country into the capital city. In this wide-ranging interview, he also talks about Trump rallies and their surprisingly diverse audiences, and about his career as a writer and screenwriter. Recorded in the green room at KQED in San Francisco. Thanks to KQED and McSweeney's. Complete 34-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Artwaves Suzanne Bradbeer, whose comedy “Shakespeare in Vegas” will be streamed as a Zoom reading with Broadway stars Karen Ziemba and Patrick Page, July 23, 6 pm -July 27, 2020, 6 pm on the TheatreWorks website, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Suzanne Bradbeer is the author of several plays, including “Confederates,” which played at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley during the 2016-2017 season, “The God Game,” and “The House That Jack Built.” She is a member of the Ensemble Theatre, a contributing writer at Speakeasy at Joe'd Pub (The Public Theatre) in New York, and a librettist for two musicals, “Cocus and Doot” from the Virtual Theatre Company and “Max and the Truffle Pig.” “Shakespeare in Vegas” is the story of an out of work classically trained actress who is brought to Las Vegas by a shady impresario to offer Shakespearean plays to a somewhat unusual audience, and hijinks ensue. Complete 32-minute Bay Area Theater podcast. Both photos: Jeff McMorrough Announcement Links Central Works Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The July script is The Lady Matador's Hotel by Christina Garcia. A podcast with the playwright, hosted by Patricial Milton, will be posted to the Central Works website on July 28. Theatreworks Silicon Valley is presenting Shakespeare In Vegas, a new play by Suzanne Bradbeer, with Karen Ziemba and Patrick Page, directed by Giovanna Sardelli, streaming July 23-27, free. Book Passage. Conversations with authors features Mark Neepo on Saturday July 25 at 4 pm Pacific and Louise Erdrick on Sunday July 26 at 4 pm Pacific. Bay Area Book Festival. Various Unbound conversations available streaming. Aurora Theatre's Aurora Connects series of interviews, every Friday at 4 pm. July 17: Joy Carlin and Nancy Carlin. Other interviews in the series are available streaming. The Booksmith presents Anne Appelbaum and her book Twilight of Democracy on Monday July 27 at 12:30 pm and Aimee Bender on Wednesday August 5 at 5:30 pm Theatre Rhinolive performance July 23 conceived and performed by John Fisher on Facebook Live and Zoom at 8 pm is Growing Up: The World in 1976. The Death of Ruby Slippers by Stuart Bousel, available streaming. Shotgun Players. The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess,has been extended with live performances July 28- August 3 through Zoom. A live stream performance of Quack by Eliza Clark, August 6 through 9. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse. Zoomlet table read for Monday July 27 at 7 pm is Night Vision by Dominique Morrisseau, directed by Margo Hall. Registration required. Marin Theatre Company is presenting the second weekend of the Bay Area Playwrights Festival July 25-26. Go to website for tickets. Also. Lauren Gunderson's play Natural Shocks streams through Soundcloud on the Marin Theatre website. 42nd Street Moon. Live cabaret Fridays at 8 pm; Theatre quiz Sundays at 8 pm; Theatre talks Tuesdays at 8 pm, through the website. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. Lincoln Center Live Through September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara & Nathan Gunn. Public Theatre: The Line streams through the website. A radio recording of Richard II is also available through the website. . The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 23, 2020: Dave Eggers – Suzanne Bradbeer appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 16, 2020: Erik Larson, “The Splendid and the Vile”

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 16, 2020 59:58

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Bookwaves Erik Larson, author of The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Erik Larson is the author of several best-selling works of narrative non-fiction, including Dead Wake, In the Garden of Beasts and The Devil in the White City. His latest book takes us one year, from May 1940 to May 1941, a time which encompasses not only Winston Churchill's first year as Prime Minister of England, but also the Blitz, the often daily air raids by the Germans on London, Coventry and other cities, which began at the same time and ended almost to the day one year later. We follow the Churchill family's quotidian lives during that time, from watching to bombs to various wartime love affairs and break-ups, along with a look at how both the British and German governments worked during that year. In the interview, Erik Larson discusses his source material, and compares some of what went on then to what's happening today, particularly in terms of heroic and destitute patterns of leadership. Arts-Waves A ten-minute interview with Gore Vidal, from 1998, in which he discusses his film, theatre and stage work with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff. Complete 40-minute interview. Announcements. Central Works Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The July script is The Lady Matador's Hotel by Christina Garcia. A podcast with the playwright, hosted by Patricial Milton, will be posted to the Central Works website on July 28. The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is launching a new streaming service featuring full length videos of recent plays. The Copper Children plays through July 22, followed by A Midsummer Night's Dream, also through July 22. Tickets through the website. Theatreworks Silicon Valley is presenting Shakespeare In Vegas, a new play by Suzanne Bradbeer, with Karen Ziemba and Patrick Page, directed by Giovanna Sardelli, streaming July 23-27, free. Book Passage. David Mitchell, and his new book Utopia Avenue, in conversation with Michael Chabon this afternoon, July 16, at 4 pm Pacific, tickets available on their website. This weekend's conversations with authors features Miss Manners, Judith Martin on Saturday, and Amy Tan with John Muir Laws on Sunday. Bay Area Book Festival. Various Unbound conversations available streaming. Aurora Theatre's Aurora Connects series of interviews, every Friday at 4 pm. July 17: Joy Carlin and Nancy Carlin. Other interviews in the series are available streaming. The Booksmith lists its entire July on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm July 9, 2020 on Facebook Live is Dance Macabre, A Tale of the Plangue, conceived and performed by John Fisher. The Death of Ruby Slippers by Stuart Bousel, available streaming. Shotgun Players. Streaming, the folk opera Iron Shoes. Recorded in spring 2018, continuing through July 17, and The Claim, workshop production. The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess,has been extended with live performances July 17-18 through Zoom. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse. Every Monday, SF Playhouse presents Zoomlets, a series of short play table reads. 42nd Street Moon. Friday July 17 at 8 pm, Full Moon Live Cabaret: Super songs from not so super Shows, Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. Lincoln Center Live Through September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara & Nathan Gunn. National Theater At Home on You Tube: Amadeus. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 16, 2020: Erik Larson, “The Splendid and the Vile” appeared first on KPFA.

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Episode 109 Daring Darleen, Queen of the Screen by Anne Nesbet

Book Club for Kids

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 15, 2020 21:35

Summertime's the perfect time to go to the movies...even if we can't go in person. Meet "Daring Darleen, Queen of the Screen," a heroine from the early days of movie making. Taped remotely at the Bay Area Book Festival, a trio of 7th graders from Albany Middle School in northern California discuss the novel by Anne Nesbit and interview the author. Our celebrity reader is Pam Rogers from the Buttons & Figs podcast. Kitty Felde is host. To see a video of this Zoom episode, check out our website, www.bookclubforkids.org.

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Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 9, 2020: Barry Lopez – Margaret Atwood

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 9, 2020 59:59

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Announcements. Central Works Script Club, where you read the script of a new play and send comments to the playwright. The July script is The Lady Matador's Hotel by Christina Garcia. A podcast with the playwright, hosted by Patricial Milton, will be posted to the Central Works website on July 28. The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is launching a new streaming service featuring full length videos of recent plays. The Copper Children plays through July 15, followed by A Midsummer Night's Dream through July 22. Tickets through the website. Theatreworks Silicon Valley is presenting another live solo performance from Florence, Italy with Hershey Felder, Beethoven, A play with Music on Sunday July 12 at 5 pm Pacific. Tickets through the website. Moliere in the Park presents Richard Wilbur's translation of Tartuffe, starring Raul Esparza and Samira Wiley, recorded live with actors superimposed on a set, through July 12. Book Passage's Conversations with Authors features Tim Cahill, Saturday July 11 at 4 pm Pacific time and Ann Patchett Sunday July 12 also at 4 pm Pacific. And David Mitchell in conversation with Michael Chabon, hosted by Tom Barbash airs on Thursday, July 16, again at 4 pm Pacific time. Aurora Theatre's yearly fundraising event, Supernova, is open and free, on Monday July 13th. Registration required. Bay Area Book Festival. Various Unbound conversations available streaming. The Booksmith lists its entire July on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm July 9, 2020 on Facebook Live is Modjeska, San Francisco's First Superstar, conceived and performed by John Fisher. The Death of Ruby Slippers by Stuart Bousel, available streaming. Shotgun Players. Streaming, the folk opera Iron Shoes. Recorded in spring 2018, continuing through July 17, and The Claim, workshop production. The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess, July 9-12, 7 pm. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse. Every Monday, SF Playhouse presents Zoomlets, a series of short play table reads. 42nd Street Moon. A live evening of Sondheim songs, Friday July 10th on Facebook Live, featuring an array of local theatrical talent. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks. Registration required. Lincoln Center Live July 10 – September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara and Nathan Gunn. National Theater At Home on You Tube: The Deep Blue Sea. Bookwaves Barry Lopez, whose latest book is “Horizon”, now out in trade paperback, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. From Barry Lopez's website: From the National Book Award-winning author of the now-classic Arctic Dreams, a vivid, poetic, capacious work that recollects the travels around the world and the encounters–human, animal, and natural–that have shaped an extraordinary life. Taking us nearly from pole to pole–from modern megacities to some of the most remote regions on the earth–and across decades of lived experience, Barry Lopez, hailed by the Los Angeles Times Book Review as “one of our finest writers,” gives us his most far-ranging yet personal work to date, in a book that moves indelibly, immersively, through his travels to six regions of the world: from Western Oregon to the High Arctic; from the Galápagos to the Kenyan desert; from Botany Bay in Australia to finally, unforgettably, the ice shelves of Antarctica. Extended 45-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Special thanks to the Bay Area Book Festival and Cherilyn Parsons. Arts-Waves Margaret Atwood, discussing her novel “The Robber Bride,” recorded in San Francisco on November 24, 1993 with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff, from the “Probabilities” archive. The second of eight interviews with Margaret Atwood, author of such novels as The Handmaid's Tale, Alias Graceand the Oryx and Crake trilogy. In this interview, she discusses her novel “The Robber Bride,” as well as what it feels like to be a Canadian author, her views on Philip K. Dick and Ursula K. LeGuin and science fiction and genres in general, and some of the thought processes behind writing her books. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 9, 2020: Barry Lopez – Margaret Atwood appeared first on KPFA.

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Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 2, 2020: Carlos Ruiz Zafon – Rupert Everett

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 2, 2020 25:53

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Announcements. Bay Area Book Festival. Merlin Sheldrake and Michael Pollan on Entangled Life, Tuesday July 7, 2020, noon Pacific. The Booksmith lists its entire July on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am, July 7: Meredith O'Brien and Lesley Gray Streeter. July 8, 7 pm, Thea Matthews with her collection, Unearth. Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm July 2, 2020 on Facebook Live is Johnson, conceived and performed by John Fisher. The Death of Ruby Slippers by Stuart Bousel, on Zoom, July 7, 2020, 7 pm, register in advance. Shotgun Players. Streaming, the folk opera Iron Shoes. Recorded in spring 2018, starting July 3 and continuing through July 17, and The Claim, workshop production. The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess, July 9-12, 7 pm. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse. Every Monday, SF Playhouse presents Zoomlets, a series of short play table reads. Monday July 6, 7 pm: The Forgotten Place by Jeff Locker. Registration required. 42nd Street Moon presents a zoom musical theatre trivia contest on Sundays at 8 pm You can get the meeting ID on their website. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks, July 6, 7 pm Daniel Mason with Andrew Sean Greer; July 7, 6 pm, Kalyn Josephson with Shannon Price. Registration required. Lincoln Center Live July 10 – September 8, 2020: Carousel, with Kelli O'Hara and Nathan Gunn. National Theater At Home on You Tube: Les Blancs by Lorraine Hansberry. Bookwaves Carlos Ruiz Zafon, who died on June 19, 2020 in Los Angeles of colorectal cancer at the age of 55, burst onto the literary scene in 2001 with his novel, The Shadow of the Wind, first of an interrelated group of four novels titled The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, set in Barcelona, Spain, his birthplace. This interview, recorded in May, 2009, focuses on the second novel in the series, The Angel's Game. The next book in the series, The Prisoner of Heaven, came out in 2012, and the final book, The Labyrinth of Spirits, was published in 2018. There were also four young adult novels, three published after this interview. Complete 54-minute interview. Arts-Waves Rupert Everett and Richard Wolinsky. Rupert Everett in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, September 26, 2018 about the film he wrote, directed and starred in, The Happy Prince, about Oscar Wilde's final years in exile. Rupert Everett's film career took off with lead roles in the British films “Another Country” and “Dance with a Stranger” in the mid 1980s before his career took a nosedive when he came out as gay. He resurfaced in the late 1990s as a Hollywood star in the film “My Best Friend's Wedding,” a period that lasted a short time before roles again dried up. Shortly afterward, he began working on a screenplay about Oscar Wilde's final years, which finally has reached the screen as “The Happy Prince. The film stars Rupert Everett, who also served as director and screenwriter. The Happy Prince is now available for STARZ subscribers as well as On Demand. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – July 2, 2020: Carlos Ruiz Zafon – Rupert Everett appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 25, 2020: Ayana Mathis – Mart Crowley

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 25, 2020 0:32

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Announcements. Pride 2020: Playbill/Pride Plays: The Men from the Boys by Mart Crowley, directed by Zachary Quinto, streams through June 29, 2020. Pride Spectacular Sunday June 28,2020 at 5 pm Pacific. Global Pride live stream, focusing on Black Lives Matter, and featuring guests ranging from Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi to Adam Lambert and Lavern Cox and the Dixie Chicks, starts Saturday June 27, 2020 at 7:30 am Pacific time, continuing through Sunday. San Francisco Pride is hosting two days of live events, with multiple streams featuring musical guests, panel discussions and more, starting Saturday morning and continuing through Sunday. Sunday main stream special guest is singer Thelma Houston, along with W. Kamau Bell and BLM co-founder Alicia Garza. A second stream features community programmed stages The Oasis Pride Drag Show starting on Saturday June 27th at 7 pm. Theatre Rhino Post-pride Zoom community mixer with Peaches Christ on Monday June 29 , 7 pm. Register at therhino.org New Conservatory Theatre Center A Night Out with Katya Smirnoff Skyy Tues., June 30, 6 pm. Other Announcements. The Playground is presenting, in honor of Black Lives Matter, a Juneteenth Theatre Justice Project: Polar Bears, Black Boys & Prairie Fringed Orchids by Vincent Terrell Durham, Streaming through June 30th. Co-sponsored by 30 companies, including Berkeley Rep, Marin Theatre Company, Custom Made Theatre, Cal Shakes, Cutting Ball, etc. Bay Area Book Festival. Merlin Sheldrake and Michael Pollan on Entangled Life, Tuesday July 7, 2020, noon Pacific. The Booksmith lists its entire June on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am. Book Passage author events: Dominique Crenn, Sat. June 27, 4 pm Pacific; Jill Biden, Sun. June 28, 4 pm Pacific. Registration required. Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm June 11, 2020 on Facebook Live is Frank Kameny: Eyes on the Stars, conceived and performed by John Fisher. The Death of Ruby Slippers by Stuart Bousel, on Zoom, July 7, 2020, 7 pm, register in advance. Shotgun Players. Streaming: The Claim, workshop production. The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess, July 9-12, 7 pm. Registration required. San Francisco Playhouse.Every Monday, SF Playhouse presents Zoomlets, a series of short play table reads. Monday June 29, 7 pm: Rules of Comedy by Patricia Cotter. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks, June 25, 7:30 Mohsin Hamid. June 30, 7 pm: Joyce Carol Oates with Leila Lalami National Theater At Home on You Tube: A Midsummer Night's Dream. Bookwaves Ayana Mathis, author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Recorded in January 2013. The Twelve Tribes of Hattie revolves around the matriarch of a black family of the Great Migration and her children and grandchildren, and was an Oprah Book Club selection. From the New York Times review: “Hattie Shepherd, the title character of Ayana Mathis's piercing debut novel, is at once a tragic heroine with mythic dimensions and an entirely recognizable mother and wife trying to make ends meet. Her story, set in 20th-century Philadelphia, is one of terrible loss and grief and survival, a story of endurance in the face of disappointment, heartbreak and harrowing adversity.” This was a debut novel. Complete 44-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Arts-Waves Mart Crowley, author of “The Boys in the Band” and its sequel, “The Men from the Boys,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky on October 31, 2002. Mart Crowley's play The Boys in the Band, which deals with the lives of gay men in the 1960s burst upon the off-Broadway scene in 1968 and ran for a thousand performances, becoming a film directed by William Friedkin two years later. In 2002, he wrote a sequel titled The Men from the Boys, which took place 35 years later, after Stonewall and after the AIDS epidemic. It premiered at San Francisco's New Conservatory Theatre on November 9, 2002. This past year, Broadway saw a revival of The Boys in the Band, featuring Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer, Andrew Rannels and Jim Parsons. Several members of that cast, including Mario Cantone and Denis O'Hare return to their roles for a live stream of The Men From the Boys, directed by Zachary Quinto, streams through June 29, 2020 on playbill.com/prideplays Mart Crowley died of a heart attack on March 7, 2020 at the age of 84. Complete 62-minute Bay Area Theater podcast. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 25, 2020: Ayana Mathis – Mart Crowley appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 18, 2020: Judy Juanita – Bonnie Tsui

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 18, 2020 0:45

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Announcements. The Playground is presenting, in honor of Black Lives Matter, a Juneteenth Theatre Justice Project: Polar Bears, Black Boys & Prairie Fringed Orchids by Vincent Terrell Durham, June 19th at 7 pm. Via Zoom On Demand. Co-sponsored by 30 companies, including Berkeley Rep, Marin Theatre Company, Custom Made Theatre, Cal Shakes, Cutting Ball, etc. Bay Area Book Festival. Coming Together fundraiser from March with Viet Thanh Nguyen, Anthony Doerr and and RO Kwon now streaming as a benefit; available free in the future. The Booksmith lists its entire June on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am. Book Passage author interviews: Elizabeth George, Saturday June 20 at 4 pm and Jason and Paris Rosenthal Sunday June 21 at 4 pm. Registration required. Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm June 11, 2020 on Facebook Live is Wahoo, conceived and performed by John Fisher,on Facebook Live. and Lavender Scare can be streamed through the KALW website. Shotgun Players. Streaming: Arcadia by Tom Stoppard, 2018 production. The Claim, workshop production. June 20, 2020, 5 pm via Zoom, podcast. San Francisco Playhouse. Thursday June 18, 7 pm Artistic Director Bill English interviews Michael Gene Sullivan. Every Monday, SF Playhouse presents Zoomlets, a series of short play table reads. Monday June 22, 7 pm: The Jewish Wife by Bertolt Brecht, with Susi Damilano and Anthony Fusco, directed by Carey Perloff. Kepler's Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks, June 18th, 6:30 featuring Neil Shubin with Kishore Hari. Robert Reich Tuesday June 23rd at 8 pm, American Conservatory Theatre (ACT) presents Take Ten, a series of six ten-minute interactive theatre games for adults and children. National Theater At Home on You Tube: Small Island. Bookwaves: Judy Juanita, author of the novel “Virgin Soul,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded spring, 2013. Judy Juanita is a poet, novelist and playwright. In her younger days, as Judy Hart, while at San Francisco State, she served as editor in chief of The Black Panther newspaper, and lived in one of the Black Panther safe houses in 1967. Along the way she came to know such figures as Bobby Seale and Huey Newton. In 2013, her first novel, Virgin Soul, was published. It's a fictionalized memoir of her life in the black student movement and with the Panthers. This interview, recorded recorded in the spring of 2013, goes into detail about her life during the Panther days, about the relationship of the book to actual history, and about Judy Juanita's life after the Panthers. Since 2013, Judy Juanita has continued to write and teach Her collection of essays, DeFacto Feminism: Essays Straight Outta Oakland was published in 2016, and she recently had a story published in the collection Oakland Noir. Judy Juanita recently completed a second novel. Extended podcast. Bookwaves: Bonnie Tsui discusses her book, Why We Swim, which examines the human need for moving in water, from the history of swim strokes, to how physiology plays a role in swimming, to the history of swimming from ancient times in the Sahara to Rome and to the present, and how swimming became a sport. Bonnie Tsui lives in the Bay Area and swims regularly at the Albany Pool, when it's open, and also swims in San Francisco Bay. She is also the author of American Chinatown: A People's History of Five Neighborhoods. In the interview she discusses some of the topics in her book, and how the pandemic has affected Asian Americans. Recorded using internal Mac microphones on the zencastr website. Extended 34-minute podcast. Bonnie Tsui portrait photo: copyright Lindsay Skiba. By permission of the publisher. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 18, 2020: Judy Juanita – Bonnie Tsui appeared first on KPFA.

Writing to Save Your Life, featuring Chelsea Bieker

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Play Episode Listen Later Jun 15, 2020 31:30

Writing saves lives—the lives of readers and also the lives of writers. In this week’s episode we’re treated to guest Chelsea Bieker’s refreshing take on loving her own writing, how coming from a family of forgetters made her a writer, and why she chose to write her novel Godshot as a novel rather than a memoir when much of it centers on true events of Chelsea’s life. This week’s episode is an interview between Brooke and Chelsea as part of the Bay Area Book Festival’s WOMEN LIT series. Grant will be back next week.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 11, 2020: Tayari Jones – Frank Galati

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 11, 2020 59:58

Announcements. Bay Area Book Festival. A conversation between poets Jericho Brown and Nikky Finney, The Witness We Bear, in conversation with Ismael Muhammed, recorded Friday, June 5, 2020, streaming on the Bay Area Book Festival You Tube channel. The Booksmith lists its entire June on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am. Book Passage author interviews: Janine Urbaniak Reid in conversation with Anne Lamott on Saturday, June 13, 2020 at 4 pm, and Julie Lithcott Haynes in conversation with Paula Farma on Sunday, June 14, 2020 at 4 pm. You can register on the Book Passage website. Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm June 11, 2020 on Facebook Live is the Doodler Finale, the Castro Murders, Part Two with John Fisher., and Lavender Scare can be streamed through the KALW website. California Shakespeare Theatre, Friday June 12th, from 5 to 6:30 pm, Direct Address, a panel discussion on anti-racist practices and allyship. Moderated by Lauren Spencer (actor and educator). Panelists: Meredith Smith (People's Institute for Survival and Beyond), Fresh “Lev” White (Affirmative Acts Consulting), Michael Robertson (artEquity), and Jasmin Hoo (Asians4BlackLives, API Equality- Northern California). Registration page. Shotgun Players. Streaming: Arcadia by Tom Stoppard, 2018 production. The Claim, workshop production. June 20, 2020, 5 pm via Zoom, podcast. San Francisco Playhouse. Zoomlets: Short play Table Read, Mondays at 7 pm National Theater At Home on You Tube: The Madness of George III by Alan Bennett. This program features two recent interviews that resonate with the week's protests and with the push toward fascism in Washington. Bookwaves Tayari Jones, whose latest novel is “An American Marriage,” is interviewed by host Richard Wolinsky. Tayari Jones is the author of the novels Leaving Atlanta, The Untelling, Silver Sparrow, and her latest, An American Marriage (Algonquin Books, February 2018). Her writing has appeared in Tin House, The Believer, The New York Times, and Callaloo. A member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, she has also been a recipient of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, Lifetime Achievement Award in Fine Arts from the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, United States Artist Fellowship, NEA Fellowship and Radcliffe Institute Bunting Fellowship. “An American Marriage” deals with a African American spouses torn apart by the unjust arrest and imprisonment of the husband after an accusation by a white woman at a motel, and how both husband and wife deal with the following few years. Tayari Jones website. Extended Radio Wolinsky podcast. Art-Waves Richard Wolinsky & Frank Galati. Frank Galati, director of “Rhinoceros” by Eugene Ionesco, which ran last June at ACT's Geary Theatre in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Frank Galati is a long-time member of the legendary Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, and has taught at Northwestern University. The winner of Tony Awards for the adaptation and direction of The Grapes of Wrath in 1990, was nominated for an Oscar for co-adapting The Accidental Tourist for the screen, and was the director of Ragtime and The Pirate Queen on Broadway Frank Galati is also known for adapting several other works for stage and screen. “Rhinoceros” is considered to be one of the greatest works of political theatre of the absurd. Originally produced in the late 1950s, the play hearkens back to the origins of fascism and how propaganda infects the minds of citizens. Extended 41-minute Bay Area Theatre podcast. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 11, 2020: Tayari Jones – Frank Galati appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – April 30, 2020: Ann Beattie; Peter Carey

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 30, 2020 59:58

Announcements and links: Bay Area Book Festival Live Event: Anthony Doerr, RO Kwon, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Saturday May 2, 7 pm Pacific. The Booksmith May on-line schedule. Mikel Jollet, author of Hollywood Park, May 2, 2020. Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin, live from Italy. Berkeley Rep and TheatreWorks Silicon Valley Mothers Day, May 10th, at 5 pm Pacific. Magic Theatre: Don't Eat The Mangos by Ricardo Perez Gonzalez. Video of the Magic Theatre production. Streaming April 28-May 11. National Theatre Live: Frankenstein, April 30; Antony and Cleopatra, May 7. Theatre Rhino: on-line plays through Facebook live. New Conservatory Theatre Center: Off-stage to On-line. Public Theater New York: What Do We Need To Talk About?, world premiere play by Richard Nelson, through May 3rd. Bookwaves: Ann Beattie, author of the novel, A Wonderful Stroke of Luck, released this month in trade paperback, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Known primarily as one of the finest short story writers alive today, Ann Beattie also has a long and distinguished career as a novelist. Her latest work, A Wonderful Stroke of Luck, follows a group of millennials, and one in particular, as they (and he) negotiate the aftermath of 9/11 on their lives, through the following two decades of the 21st Century. Special thanks to Cherilyn Parsons and the Bay Area Book Festival. Complete 43-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast. Arts-Waves: Peter Carey, author of True History of the Kelly Gang, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded March 7, 2001. On Aprll 24, 2020, the film True History of the Kelly Gang, starring George McKay, Russell Crowe, Charlie Hunnam and Nicholas Hoult was supposed to land in theatres. Instead it's gone directly to On Demand viewing. So today's Arts-Waves features an interview recorded in 2001 with Peter Carey about his then new novel, True History of the Kelly Gang, which puts the story of Ned Kelly in the context of modern Australian mythology. This interview was digitized and reedited in April 2020, and has not been heard in nearly two decades. Peter Carey is the author of several novels, including Jack Maggs, My Life as a Fake, Parrot and Olivier in America, and most recently A Long Way from Home. He is a two-time winner of the Booker Prize. The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – April 30, 2020: Ann Beattie; Peter Carey appeared first on KPFA.

Bookwaves/Artwaves – April 23, 2020: Tope Folarin; Michael Crichton

Brave Girls with Tracy Imm

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 23, 2020 23:22

Announcement links: Magic Theatre mini-podcasts: Far Apart Art. Theatre Rhino, A Dog Dreams. Saturday April 25, 2020, 8:30 pm Pacific. Theatre Bay Area Performing Arts Worker Relief Fund. Bay Area Book Festival. Virtual author programs. #UNBOUND. Launches 5/1. Filmedonstage.com: Free streaming theatre. Updated daily. Broadway.com. YouTube: Sondheim special, Sunday April 26, 5 pm Pacific City Lights Go Fund Me; Moe's Books Go Fund Me Bookwaves: Tope Folarin, author of the novel “A Particular Kind of Black Man” is interviewed by host Richard Wolinsky. This first novel, by an up and coming Nigerian American writer, blends memoir and fiction in the tale of the son of Africans who grew up in white Utah and Texas, finding himself ethnically displaced and looking to find his roots. (Photo: Richard Wolinsky) Arts-Waves: From the Probabilities Archive: Michael Crichton, recorded December 5, 1990, while on tour for his novel “Jurassic Park,” interviewed by Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff in the KPFA studios. Michael Crichton's first novel, “The Andromeda Strain” obviously has particular resonance today. In this interview, he talks about his career and about the science behind “Jurassic Park.” Michael Crichton died in 2008 at the age of 66. (Photo: Jon Chase/Harvard University) The post Bookwaves/Artwaves – April 23, 2020: Tope Folarin; Michael Crichton appeared first on KPFA.

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Episode 100 The Storm Runner

Book Club for Kids

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 15, 2020 19:07

It’s our 100th episode! To celebrate, we travel up to the Bay Area Book Festival to tape a live show celebrating “The Storm Runner” by J. C. Cervantes. This fantasy tale with Mayan mythology is a “Rick Riordan Presents” novel. Public radio journalist Erika Quilar from KQED is celebrity reader. Our readers are 6th graders at Albany Middle School in Northern California and they quiz our author. Kitty Felde is host.

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Write On, Sister with Brooke Warner

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 30, 2019 35:04

I’m so grateful that I was able to interview California native and leading independent book publisher, Brooke Warner, for the Brave Girl podcast. Before she launched her own ventures, Brooke was the executive editor of Seal Press, one of the most enduring feminist publishing houses. She currently sits on the boards of the Independent Book Publishers Association, the Bay Area Book Festival, and the National Association of Memoir Writers. We both share a love of books, writing and the life of a creative and we talk about all of this on today’s episode. In addition to Brooke’s publishing role at She Writes Press and SparkPress, she writes a monthly column for Publishers Weekly and is the president of Warner Coaching where she mentors and coaches authors. You’ll want to check out her website to see how her publishing model works and merges the best of the traditional publishing model with new and innovative strategies for first time writers and emerging creatives. With more than 32,000 members and more than 350 groups, She Writes is the world’s largest online social community for women writers at every stage of their writing lives, working in every genre and representing every generation. In addition to her publishing work, Brooke has also written several books and her most recent book, Write On, Sister is now available on Amazon and I highly recommend it. I also recommend Brooke’s weekly podcast Write-Minded that she co-hosts with Grant Faulkner of NaNoWriMo, a community for writers. Each episode features a pep talk, a green-light moment and a writing action. You will also want to watch her TEDx video, Green Light Revolution: Your Creative Life on Your Terms that she talks about on the show. I hope you enjoy the show as much as I did creating it!

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Candace Bushnell Answers: "Is There Still Sex In The City?" Live On Stage

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Play Episode Listen Later Nov 6, 2019 33:05

Candace Bushnell gave us a reason to sit on our couch every week to soak in the stories of the women--and men--of the 90s television culture-changer "Sex and the City". Candace has written a number of books since then and her newest book is called "Is There Still Sex in the City?" This October I teamed up with Women Lit of the Bay Area Book Festival to have an on-stage conversation with Candace Bushnell, hosted by INFORUM at The Commonwealth Club of San Francisco. Bushnell kicked off the evening with an update about what she’s been up to lately, and then we got to sit down and talk--friendships, love, loss and dating over 50. Support the Inflection Point Campaign for Action with a tax-deductible donation: bit.ly/inflectionpoint

105 Brooke Warner

Stories that Empower

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 16, 2019 23:54

Previously working in traditional publishing, Brooke noticed the injustice, specifically that many talented writers do not get their due and that publishing decisions did not appear to be about the content or quality of the work. As champion for the underdogs, Brooke set out to do something about it. She established safe and trusted communities of writers and warriors that have shared values and support one another. Through her tireless efforts, Brooke has brought legitimacy to non-traditional publishing. She shares these powerful nuggets of life wisdom: - sometimes, we get in our own way and turn against ourselves - we need to be mindful not to internalize negative messages - rejection of our work is not rejection of ourselves Brooke Warner is publisher of She Writes Press and SparkPress, president of Warner Coaching Inc., and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What's Your Book?, and three books on memoir. Brooke is a TEDx speaker, weekly podcaster (Write-minded with co-host Grant Faulkner of NaNoWriMo), and the former Executive Editor of Seal Press. She currently sits on the boards of the Independent Book Publishers Association, the Bay Area Book Festival, and the National Association of Memoir Writers. She writes a monthly column for Publishers Weekly. http://brookewarner.com/ https://www.facebook.com/warnercoaching/ https://twitter.com/brooke_warner https://shewritespress.com/ https://gosparkpress.com/ tags: Brooke, Warner, She, Writes, Press, SparkPress, Warner, Coaching, author, writer, coach, TEDx, speaker, Write, On, Sisters, Green, Light, Your, Book, What's, memoir, podcast, Write-minded, Independent, Book, Publishers, Association, storiesthatempower.com, stories that empower, empowering stories, empowerment stories, stories of empowerment, stories of empowering others, self empowerment stories, stories empower, inspire, inspiring, inspiration, uplift, uplifting, upliftment, hope, light, Sean

Ann Beattie: “A Wonderful Stroke of Luck”

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Play Episode Listen Later Aug 24, 2019 43:13

Ann Beattie, author of the novel, A Wonderful Stroke of Luck, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Known primarily as one of the finest short story writers alive today, Ann Beattie also has a long and distinguished career as a novelist. Her latest work, A Wonderful Stroke of Luck, follows a group of millennials, and one in particular, as they (and he) negotiate the aftermath of 9/11 on their lives, through the following two decades of the 21st Century. Special thanks to Cherilyn Parsons and the Bay Area Book Festival for making this interview possible. The post Ann Beattie: “A Wonderful Stroke of Luck” appeared first on KPFA.

Author Jennifer Weiner on Writing a Radical Beach Read

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Play Episode Listen Later Jul 17, 2019 50:26

The times, they are a’changin’. This week on Inflection Point, I talk to author Jennifer Weiner about her newest bestselling book “Mrs. Everything”. The story is loosely based on Jennifer’s own mother, Fran, who got married, had 4 children and ultimately came out as a gay woman after Jennifer and her siblings were out of the house. Spanning two sisters’ lives from the 1950s to the night of the 2016 political election, the book raises questions about who is really making women’s choices about our own lives...are we? Or our system? How did we get where we are, and how do we move on from here? Jennifer shares the facts behind her fiction, what it takes to write a good sex scene, what hasn't changed since #metoo started, and how the personal becomes political. We spoke at Women Lit, a program of the Bay Area Book Festival on June 22, 2019 in Berkeley, California. *Thank you to our sponsors! * EO Essential Oils NATIVE Deodorant: 20% off your first purchase. Go to nativedeodorant.com and use promo code INFLECTION during checkout. Spotlyte: Spotlyte is your destination for curated, expert content helping you discover how beauty, skincare, and medical aesthetic treatments may fit into your routine. YOU! Become a supporter today—it’s tax deductible and you can help us make our next season of episodes. Support here.

Barry Lopez, “Horizon”

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 7, 2019 44:59

Barry Lopez, whose latest book is “Horizon” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. From Barry Lopez's website: From the National Book Award-winning author of the now-classic Arctic Dreams, a vivid, poetic, capacious work that recollects the travels around the world and the encounters–human, animal, and natural–that have shaped an extraordinary life. Taking us nearly from pole to pole–from modern megacities to some of the most remote regions on the earth–and across decades of lived experience, Barry Lopez, hailed by the Los Angeles Times Book Review as “one of our finest writers,” gives us his most far-ranging yet personal work to date, in a book that moves indelibly, immersively, through his travels to six regions of the world: from Western Oregon to the High Arctic; from the Galápagos to the Kenyan desert; from Botany Bay in Australia to finally, unforgettably, the ice shelves of Antarctica. Special thanks to the Bay Area Book Festival and Cherilyn Parsons. The post Barry Lopez, “Horizon” appeared first on KPFA.

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Ep 194: "Five Dollar Bill," Queer History and YA Lit with Lee Wind

Big Gay Fiction Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 24, 2019 60:28

It's the final week of Pride Month 2019. The guys wish everyone celebrating World Pride in NYC a wonderful time. Jeff talks about being homesick for New York and missing playing hockey. Pose's early season 3 renewal is praised. Will talks about the special Masterwork Experiment happening on The Story Grid Podcast where they are breaking down and analyzing the story structure of Annie Proulx's Brokeback Mountain. Jeff and author/blogger Lee Wind have an extended interview in which Lee discusses his debut YA novel, Queer as a Five Dollar Bill and how he's become engaged in discovering queer history. They also talk about the YA book blog I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell Do I Read? that Lee began over a decade ago. Lee also recommends a couple of his favorite YA books and the queer history project he's trying to jump start on Instagram. Complete shownotes for episode 194 along with a transcript of the interview are at BigGayFictionPodcast.com. Interview Transcript - Lee Wind This transcript was made possible by our community on Patreon. You can get information on how to join them at patreon.com/biggayfictionpodcast. Jeff: Lee, welcome to the podcast. It is so great to have you here. Lee: Thank you so much. I'm really excited to be here, Jeff. Jeff: Now, I recently read your debut novel, "Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill". In fact, I reviewed it back in Episode 189. And absolutely love it. Now, tell people in your own words what this YA novel is about. Lee: So it's all about the fact that I don't have a time machine. When I went...in 2011, I went to a game in summer camp kind of weekend. And there was a guy talking about the letters that Abraham Lincoln wrote Joshua Fry Speed that convinced him that Abraham was in love with Joshua. And I just thought he was full of it. Like how could that have been possibly been true? It's the first time I heard about it. And I went to the library, and I got the letters and I read them and because the emotions Lincoln speaks about are the same emotions I experienced when I was closeted in dating girls and sort of judging it the right thing to do, but not feeling it, I had this moment of sort of goosebumps, and I was like, "Oh my gosh, I think maybe Lincoln was in love with speed." And I thought, "Oh, if I had a time machine and go back and tell my 15-year-old self that the guy on Mount Rushmore, the guy on the $5 bill, the guy on the penny, was maybe in love with another guy, I think it would have changed my whole life. I don't think it would have taken me until I was 25 years old to fully come out. I think it would have been a game changer. But I don't have a time machine. So "Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill" is my paying it forward. I'm a writer, I wanted to write the story about a 15-year-old who's closeted and bullied and dating a girl because he kind of judges it's the right thing to do, but he doesn't feel it. And then he's assigned a book report on Lincoln and he gets the same book that I got from the library, he reads the actual letter, where Lincoln is asking his best friend, after the best friend has gotten married to a woman, "Are you now, in feeling as well as judgment, glad you're married as you are? From anybody but me, this would be an impudent question not to be tolerated, but I know you'll tolerate it for me." And he ends the letter saying, "Please tell me quickly, I feel very impatient to know." And we don't have Joshua's answer, because Mary Todd burned all the letters on that side of the correspondence. But we do know it was only four weeks later that Abraham had married Mary. So to me, it felt like wow, that, like what would happen if a kid today found that out and decided that he wants the world to know? Because everyone loves Abraham Lincoln in our country. And he thought, "Well, okay, so if he tells - the main character, Wyatt - if he tells the whole world that Abraham Lincoln was in love with another guy, he thinks it's going to change how everyone feels about gay people, cue the songbirds and the rainbow and happy ending." I do think if in our culture today if someone was to go really viral with the information that Abraham Lincoln was, wrote these letters and was in love with Joshua Fry Speed, I think there would be a huge conservative backlash and media firestorm. And that's really that what I wanted to show in the novel, how this Wyatt, how Wyatt, this main character makes his way through this incredible maelstrom of fury that he's ignited by just sharing what actually is part of American history. And then to kind of ratchet the stakes up even further, I wanted to make it, like, how was it important for a teenager today? Why is Abraham Lincoln important? So I kind of situated him in Lincolnville, Oregon, a town I kind of made up. His parents own the Lincoln Slept Here Bed & Breakfast. And when the economy of the town kind of starts to tank and they're threatened with losing their business, they bring in a civil rights attorney to help and she has an openly gay son and sparks fly between the two teens. But the main character Wyatt can't do anything about it. Because gay kids saying Lincoln is gay is really different than a straight kid saying Lincoln is gay. And he's faced with his choice, does he follow his heart and see if something might be happening with this guy, Martin? But the cost of that is letting this secret fade back into history, and nothing will ever change in our world. Or does he sort of sacrifice himself and his own happiness, and persist with the story that Lincoln was indeed in love with another guy and see if he can change the world a little bit, even though it won't change for him? So that's the story of "Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill". Jeff: And I feel like even before I read this book that I had heard, you know, some of the rumblings that Lincoln may have had a relationship, may have been gay. So I think it kind of dances around the edge of what some people know, because I can't even begin to tell you where I heard it or anything else, just that it had been kind of back there somewhere in the memory of I don't know, something. Does that even make sense? Lee: Well, it's been a big thing on "Will & Grace", the revived series. They've been doing a whole run on jokes about Jack doing a one-man play called Gaybraham Lincoln, which is sort of all about Lincoln being gay, which I think has been good on the one hand, because it's letting more people know that this is something that people are talking about, but it's also doing so as if it's a farce, as if it's not true at all, and completely made up in a complete flight of fancy on the part of this bigger than life character. When in fact, if you read the letters, it is remarkable how to me it feels so clear that Lincoln was in love with Joshua. Jeff: What was your process for researching the history? Because there's more in here than just the letters themselves. There's a lot of Lincoln history, there's comparisons drawn between Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr. In my review, you know, I kind of likened it a little bit, you know, you go see "Hamilton" and you get this big infusion of history, while you're wildly entertained. What was kind of your process around gathering all the pieces you needed? Lee: Well, first of all, thank you for comparing it to "Hamilton." That is like the best compliment ever. I need to embroider that on a pillow or something. I did a lot of research. I started out with the letters and then I realized that I just didn't know enough. I looked around and I live in Southern California. And it turns out in Redlands, California, there is an Abraham Lincoln Memorial shrine and museum. And it's like a three-room edifice that has display cases and a gift shop. And so many of the things that ended up being part of the bed and breakfast that Wyatt's parents own were kind of taken from that real-world experience of going to this place and seeing that they actually had, you know, civil war chess sets. And they had, you know, little teddy bears that were gray or blue. And they had, you know, Confederate Flag and a Union Flag. And that was hugely helpful. And then just starting to dig in deeper to some of the things I discovered there, there's a whole sort of subplot about how Wyatt feels that there's no one he can actually talk to. And so he's developed this strange internal dialogue with this image of a soldier in the background of one of their display cases. And I actually have a photo of it from when I went to this Lincoln shrine. And it was there, it was behind all these ammunitions. And I don't know that my gaydar works 150 some years later, but definitely, there's somebody in that, they're one of the soldiers in that photo does look like he could be gay. And I thought, "Wow, what if this was the only way that Wyatt felt that he could have somebody that recognized who he was, and how sad that was that he didn't really have a friend?" And that was why I was excited to create the character of Martin so he had somebody. Jeff: Were you a history buff all along? Lee: No, I hated history. And I'm sure that they're all these teachers that are like hitting their foreheads in shame right now. But like, honestly, I never had a history teacher that kind of got me excited about the stories of history, because I really feel like the way we teach history today, and my daughter's in 10th grade right now and her history textbook could have been my history textbook from the 1980s, where basically, it's the stories of rich, white, straight, cis-gendered, able-bodied men from Europe. And, you know, history is more than that. There are the stories of disabled people and people of color and women and men who loved men and women who loved women and people who looked outside gender boundaries in history. And I kind of feel like, we have to crack that facade of that false facade of history and let people know that that there's all this amazing light and you can see yourself in history. And, you know, Lincoln and Joshua are just sort of like the tip of the iceberg. There's, you know, Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok, there's Mahatma Gandhi and his love for this German Jewish architect, Hermann Kallenbach. There's the pharaoh Hatshepsut in Egypt, there is Safa, there's so many stories that impact us today. But we don't really know them because they don't get taught, or when they are taught, they're not taught in a sort of, queer inclusive or respectful manner. So I kind of feel like now I love history. And in fact, I wrote this novel, but as I was writing the novel, there was so much history, there was so many things that came up, so many more pieces of evidence, so many more pieces of the pie, things that made me surprised, like, I didn't really know that Lincoln was sort of a racist, even though he's credited with freeing all the slaves, he had this whole plan that he signed off on with Congress at that time to sort of, you know, explore shipping all black people back to Africa. And I didn't know that. And the deeper I dug, when I found a piece of information that kind of contradicted what I knew, I really wanted to find a way to include it in the story. Because I feel like that's what we should be doing when we find things that show that history is complex, and that people are not black and white, that it just makes it all so much more real and so much more relatable. And if we can see reflections of ourselves in the past, like if we know that there were men who love men in the past, then we can believe that we have a place at the table today. And if we know that we have a place at the table today, we can envision a future that is sort of limitless. And I want that for everyone that doesn't feel like their history is included. I want it for all the women and all the people of color and the disabled people and the women who love women and the people who lived outside gender boundaries, too. Because that's, you know, we call it LGBTQAI+ or QUILTBAG or whatever. But really, the job is about being an ally to other people. And me as a gay man, I have to think, "Well, how can I be an ally to everybody else?" And hopefully, they're thinking the same thing. And that's how we start to create societal change. Jeff:: That is wildly profound. And especially, given that this episode of the podcast is dropping in the last week of June, as you know, the queer community celebrates Stonewall 50. Lee: Oh, yeah. Well, you know, I love that we're celebrating Stonewall, I love that the gender non-conforming people that were there, the transgender people, the drag queens are getting some respect now that they were part of that and they were in fact, the leaders of standing up to the police finally. But for many, many years, Stonewall had a banner, the Stonewall Inn had a banner outside that read "Where Pride Began". And I think that's really misleading. And we talk in the queer community in America as if that's where pride began, right. Like, pride, "Hey, we're celebrating 50 years of Stonewall, Hooray." But wait a minute, Karl-Maria Kertbeny came up with the word homosexual 100 years before Stonewall. Right? Like Lincoln and Speed were writing these letters to each other 20 years before that. You know, you can go back thousands and thousands of years and there's this beautiful story from China before China was unified, where the State of Wey that the guy that ruled it, his name was Duke Ling and he had a guy he loved his name is Mizi Xia. And they were walking through the orchard one day and Mizi Xia picks a peach off a tree and starts to eat it. And halfway through, he stops because it's so delicious. He wants to share it and he gives the half eaten peach to the Duke and the Duke makes a really big deal out of it. Like, "I can't believe your love for me is so profound that you would sacrifice your own happiness to give me the peach." And something about that moment captured the imagination of people in that pre-unified China. And for over 1,000 years, the way in Chinese that they said gay love was love of the half-eaten peach. Like we have this amazing, amazing history. And we just need to kind of breakthrough that facade and let all this amazing rainbow light shine through. So that's kind of what I feel my mission is to kind of let people know that we have all this amazing history, and we can start to dive into it. Jeff: Is this all history? Because you mentioned earlier that you're not, you weren't a history buff and you hated history. Have you gathered up all of this new knowledge since you were researching to write "Queer as Five-Dollar Bill"? Lee: Yeah. So while I was writing "Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill," like I mentioned, there was just so much stuff that came up, so much evidence that I was like, "I can't really cram all this into a novel, because at the end of the day, the novel is really about a kid today." And I didn't want it to feel like a historical novel. I wanted it to be this page-turner. So I realized that maybe it was two books, maybe there was the novel. But what if there's a nonfiction book as well that presents the primary source materials, like a popup video thing on MTV or VH1, whatever it was, helps interpret, or at least how I interpret the thing? So like, there's all this talk about Shakespeare's Sonnets, and how, while they're very rarely taught, over 100 of the sonnets, Shakespeare wrote to another guy. And these are love sonnets that include really, really famous lines that we all recognize, like, "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day. Thou art more worthy, yet more temperate." That's a line that Shakespeare wrote to another guy. For hundreds of years, they had changed the pronouns of that in one of the folios. So it ended up being that for hundreds of years, people thought that Shakespeare wrote all those poems to a woman, to the Dark Lady. But when "The Riverside Shakespeare" came out, the editor of that section, he talked about how, "Well, we've restored the sonnets to their original, you know, pronouns, but you shouldn't mistake that, you know, the affection men felt for each other in the 1500s was nothing like the homosexual attraction today." He wrote this in 1970s. And I'm like, "Really? Really?" Because, you know, "A man in hue all hues in his controlling, Which steals men's eyes and women's souls amazeth," it sounds pretty romantic to me. So what I realized what I wanted to do is to create a book that wouldn't be just a book about Lincoln and Speed, but it would be a book about the broader thing, about men who love men and women who love women and people who lived outside gender boundaries. So there's 15 chapters. One is about Lincoln and Speed, one is about Shakespeare. And then there's, like, you know, a bunch of other amazing people in history, and it really presents the primary source material. And I'm really excited because today - that we're recording this - is the day that I'm signing the contract for that book with a publisher. Jeff: Oh, that is exciting. Congratulations. Lee: Thank you. It's been a long journey, long and crazy journey. Because the book originally was set up at one of the big five publishers, and I worked on it for a year and a half with them. It was approved, we were talking cover design. And then two weeks after our current president was elected, they canceled the book. I think they were concerned that it was going to be too controversial. They just didn't have the courage to proceed. And that was really devastating. And it took a long time to find a new home for it. There were a lot of shenanigans, a lot of plot twists. The agent I had had at the time turned out to be a criminal who, well, she was telling all her clients she was submitting things and that they were having all these pending book deals. She was lying. And the book was never submitted anywhere. Even after it was returned, the rights were returned to me. And the novel, "Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill" ended up getting crowdfunded because I thought that I was being, well, stonewalled by the children's book industry and they didn't want word to get out about Lincoln and Speed so much so that no one would even respond to the submissions. So I crowdfunded it. I have a blog, I think we're talking about that a little bit later. But I have a bunch of people that know who I am and what I was trying to do, and they all supported me to not just publish the book professionally, but also, what I wanted to do is raise enough money to donate at least 400 copies of the novel to LGBTQ and allied teens, and the Kickstarter funded in six days, it was amazing. And then it went on for another 24 days. So we ultimately raised enough money to give away 910 copies. So that's been really, really gratifying. Jeff: That's incredible. I mean, it's really one of the great things about publishing today is that there's really no more gatekeepers out there. Anybody can publish, get it on Amazon, get an audiobook done, etc, and get their messages out there. Lee: There still is the thing, though, that being with a traditional publisher, you generally can reach more, especially when we're talking about like middle grade, you know, or books, where you go into libraries, which I think that this nonfiction book really is a, you know, hopefully, it'll sell like hotcakes. But also, I do think that to get it adopted more broadly into schools and into libraries, I think that coming from an established publisher is really useful and really helpful. So I'm excited about that. I do think that yeah, that there are many, many fewer boundaries than there used to be - or barriers than there used to be. But at the same time, we have the additional challenge that while access to the marketplace has never been easier, the marketplace has never been bigger. So getting noticed in a marketplace, where there's over a million books that are published every year now in the U.S., is a challenge. And that's why it's so important to have safe places to find out about these things, like your podcast, and my blog. Jeff: Yes, absolutely. To spin back on "Five-Dollar Bill" a little bit and talk a little bit more about it. What were your inspirations for both Wyatt and Martin and the type of teenagers they would be? Lee: When I was growing up, or when I was coming out, I think it felt like you couldn't be gay if you lived anywhere except for one of the big cities like San Francisco or New York. And I really wanted to have a character that felt connected to nature. And that one of the thematic subplots would be, 'Could he be himself where he was? Could he be himself in small town America, in a rural community, was there a way through for him to be successfully himself and authentic?' I feel like I spent so much of my life being inauthentic, that I want to do everything I can to help teens be authentic now. So on the one hand, Wyatt was the study of a kid that was on a journey to be authentic and Martin was the flip side of that. Martin was the character that already was authentic, and was already reaping the benefits of that level of confidence. And you know, as soon as you, for me, when I came out, it was like this huge burden off of me. And suddenly, I realized the weight of it was on everyone else, right? Like, if they had a problem with it, that was their problem. But it wasn't me hiding or holding back, or pretending or acting, which I did for so long. My husband and I have a joke, where when you go to a Starbucks or something, they're always like, "What's your name?" And every time my husband changes his name. Like he just makes up different names every single time. And they ask me and I'm always Lee because it took me 25 years to even start to like myself and to accept myself. And I finally got here. And I'm like, "Yeah, I'm not anybody else. I am me. I am Lee." It's funny. I take a spin class and as a motivational thing the spin instructor does, "Who do you want to be today?" I'm always like, "Me, I want to be me." I spent so long being other people. And then also, it was really cool when I was creating Martin's character, to think about him being African American. And that being an opportunity for me to talk about the complexity of Abraham Lincoln and him not being so perfect and explore those themes a little more. And it's funny because I hear from a lot of people how much they love Martin. And yeah, he's pretty lovable. Jeff: Yeah, I really liked them both in their individual ways. For sure Wyatt...I grew up, I spent like middle school, high school, college in Alabama. So I could totally relate to where Wyatt was in his journey like he knows, but there's no way he's telling anybody. And I didn't have a Martin for a best friend. So I also loved Martin, because he was the ideal friend to have for Wyatt in the moment to show him what could be. Lee: Yeah, exactly. Jeff: What do you hope the audience takes away from this kind of history/fiction mashup? Lee: So I think a lot about words, you know, being a writer, and I think that the word homosexual isn't helping us. I think that if we, because we're so reactive and weird in our culture, in America about sex, and we are obsessed with it, and we don't want to acknowledge it. And especially we don't want to talk about it to teens. So when we talk about homosexual rights and homosexual history, all straight people are hearing, you know, to paint with a broad brush, is they're thinking about sex and that we have sex differently than they do and how do we have sex. And I just don't think that's particularly helpful. And I think that if we talked about love as sort of the binding element that makes me and my husband and our teenage daughter a family, or the love between you and your husband, if we talked about HomoLOVEual rights and HomoLOVEual history, I think we'd have a very different cultural conversation. So what the tagline of my book is, "What if you knew a secret from history that could change the world?" And I love this because it gets a little meta. But it's the challenge that Wyatt faces, right? He finds out the secret about Abraham Lincoln writing these letters and maybe being in love with Joshua Fry Speed. And he decides that he's going to tell the world because it could change the world. And then it's the same challenge that I faced because I knew the secret from history and I thought this drumming sense of responsibility, like I had to share it, I had to get it out in the world. And because I wasn't getting anywhere with traditional publishing, I thought, "Okay, well, I'm going to crowdfund it, I'm going to get it out in the world, myself." And then what I am really excited about is that it's also the challenge that the reader faces. Because when you've read the book, or you even heard me talk about the book, you know that there is something more to the story of Abraham Lincoln that has been taught to you. And it's that first crack in that facade of history. And it makes you think, "Well, wait a minute, when you see the picture of Mount Rushmore, or when you pick your kid up at the Lincoln middle school, or you're driving on Lincoln Boulevard, you know, does it occur to you that, you know, our culture has not shared that part of who Lincoln is? And does it make you feel a little more pride about the fact that you know what, we do have history, queer people, and we need to lean into it? And we have the opportunity to because there are hundreds of years of historians that are going to argue with us and that are going to say, "Yeah, yeah, it's not true. It was very typical for men to share beds on the frontier." Not that Springfield, Illinois was the frontier. But for four years, you know, Abraham and Joshua shared a bed long after Abraham could afford his own bed. "Well, it was cold." Okay, yeah. But they shared a bed for four years. It's not proof. But it's interesting. And I think that as all those things add up, we can all make our own determination of what we think, you know. Is it important for me that I convince the world that Abraham Lincoln was in love with Joshua Fry Speed? No. I think a lot about Anne Lamott, she's a writer, and she writes about writing. She has a beautiful book called "Bird by Bird". And in that book, she talks about lighthouses, and how they don't run all over an island looking for boats to save, they just sort of stand there and they shine. And I think a lot about that. Like, I need to be a lighthouse. Like I found out this amazing, cool stuff about history, and how it relates to today, and how empowering it is. And I just want to shine. And if people are interested, they can come closer to the light. And if they're not interested, no worries, you know, watch out, there's some rocks over there. Jeff: Any chance of a sequel? Because I know I would love to see more of Wyatt and Martin at some point Lee: I haven't really come up with a good angle on a sequel, I had this funny idea for...one of the other pieces of history that really struck me was Mahatma Gandhi and the story of his love for Hermann Kallenbach. And we talk a lot about Gandhi having this sort of breakthrough where he talked about it doesn't matter whether you pray facing left and I pray facing right - I may have that reversed. We're all praying to the same God. Like he had this huge breakthrough, not just in terms of, you know, a peaceful protest, Satyagraha. He changed our world in such profound ways. And at the same time, he was in love with this German Jewish architect named Hermann Kallenbach. And if he was in love with a Jewish guy, like that's actually really interesting and really germane. Like maybe that's why he had that inspiration, that insight about it doesn't matter who you're praying to, because it's, we're all sort of bonded by this sense of spiritual connection. Like, that's really exciting. And I feel like there's so many stories like that, like Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok. Eleanor Roosevelt was the woman that after, you know, her husband died, she went to the UN and became this advocate for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And would she had done that if she didn't have this experience of being in love with another woman, and feeling that sort of outsider status, while at the same time being this empowered woman in our world? History starts to open up like a flower. So I don't have an exact idea for a sequel for Wyatt and Martin, but I will put it in the hopper as ideas. Reason I brought up Hermann Kallenbach and Mahatma Gandhi was that I thought, that would be an interesting thing to talk about a kid finding out about that, and how that would have changed their life. And then about, "Wait, that's the exact same story over again, I don't need to do that. I already wrote that." So for now, I'm going to focus on the nonfiction piece and some other fiction writing that I want to get to that, actually, I'm very inspired by your book too, by the "Codename: Winger" series, because I love the idea of mashing up a gay teen with a sort of spy thriller. Jeff: And I can't wait to read what you might do with that. So please, bring that to the marketplace. Lee: Thank you. I keep thinking, "Is there a way I can get gay history in here somehow?" I haven't figured that either yet. But, you know, I'll work on it. Jeff: You'd mentioned earlier that you've got your blog, which I was so excited to find right around the same time as finding the book. You've been a YA blogger for more than a decade now. I believe you said it'll be 12 years in September. And the blog is called "I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I Read?" What led you to starting that? Lee: Thanks. Yeah, there was no safe space to find out what were the books with queer characters for kids and teens. And I remember, there was a review on Amazon for a really sweet picture book called "The Family Book" by Todd Parr. And it's sort of a cartoon-y book. And there's like one page, it says, "Some families look alike." And it's a bunch of dogs that they all have similar features. "Some families look different." And it's a tree with all these different kind of animals in it. "Some families adopt children." And it's a bunch of ducks. And on the back of one duck is a penguin. And then you turn the page and it's, "Some families have two moms or two dads." And it's a picture of two women and two men. And then it continues, and there was a review, pretty high up that said, "If you tear out the page with the two moms and dads, then this is a lovely book on diversity." And I thought, "Wow, way to miss the entire point of what diversity is." And I got so upset and so hurt, you know, because I'm a gay dad. And I thought this was an amazing book for my daughter, but also for all of my daughter's classmates to see and recognize, "Yeah, yeah, you know, some families do have two moms and two dads." And to Amazon, that wasn't hate speech, it didn't violate their terms of service, it was just somebody's opinion. Albeit kind of, you know, nasty, or at least I interpreted as nasty. And it got me thinking about how there really needed to be a safe place online, where a kid could go and find out what are the books that were out there. And when I started, there were maybe 30 books total that were inclusive of LGBTQ characters and themes for kids and teens. And what's happened over the years is that by keeping this curated safe space, where I'm not vetting all the books, but I'm making sure that no nastiness is happening on the site. We have over 500 books now in many, many categories. And it's been really exciting to see that sort of explosion of content. And yet, it's that sort of similar problem again. Like now, suddenly, there's so much content, how do you make your way through it? How do you find the things that you want? So the idea behind it was to post about the books, what's queer about the books, and then let readers add their own reviews. There hasn't been a lot of review, there's just too many places for people to leave reviews these days. So I don't see a lot of that. But I also didn't want to make it, you know, "Lee's favorite book site" because I think that that has a limited value, I thought that there was more value in it being a site that felt really comprehensive. And that's what I aim for. And then it just became a place where I could talk about the stuff that I really care about, that I want queer and allied teens to know about. And over the years, what I've discovered is that the readership is split into thirds. There's about a third, queer teens and queer and allied teens on it. There about a third of librarians and teachers and people that work with LGBTQ teens. And then there's a whole bunch of adults that are sort of reading the books for themselves and sort of healing their inner teen. And I think that there is a healing that happens. Every time I read a queer book that has a happy or even a hopeful ending, there's a healing that happens. And I think maybe that's part of why romance as a genre is so popular. I know Will was saying in a previous episode that people get on his case for like ruining the ending, but it's all romance, you know it's going to be a good ending. And I think maybe that's why people turn to it. So I know how empowering it is for me when I read something where I see a reflection of myself, and it's a positive thing. Because when I was growing up, there was nothing to read, nothing positive. The only queer characters were like evil pedophile villains, it wasn't particularly helpful. Jeff: Yeah, that's, unfortunately, the case in the history that you and I have from that era when we were growing up. In the decade-plus that you've been running the site, other than just more YA, how have you seen it all evolve? Lee: There's more, and there's better and there's deeper, and there's less preachy and there's room for it all. It's funny, there was a kind of push a few years back for...well, maybe we're beyond the coming out story. And I kind of got my dander up a little bit on that. And I felt like, "Well, we're never going to be beyond the first love story when it's, you know, a straight romance. So, Andrew Solomon has this great book that he wrote called "Far From the Tree" and it's a nonfiction piece. And he talks about how, you know, when your identity is...where you're the apple that does fall far from the tree, or falls from the tree and rolls across the, you know, down the hill and across the orchard, when you're queer, most likely your parents were not. And so you have this moment where you have to find your sense of community outside of the family that you grew up in. A lot of other identities, you share that. Like, usually, like me, I was raised Jewish and so I would, you know, my parents were Jewish. So I sort of shared that identity. For all of our identities, we sort of are either sort of close to the tree or far from the tree. And when you're far from the tree, there's more work involved. So coming out, I think is going to continue to be this universal thing. Because just like, you know, my daughter has two dads, but she's straight. So in a funny way, she's going to have to, you know, she had a bit of a coming out where she had to tell us, sort of, you know, abashed, hoping that we'd be okay with it, that she was straight. And we had a good laugh about it. Because it's not that big a deal for us. We just want her to be her authentic self and to be happy. So we do want to have coming out books, and we also want to have books where being gay, like your character Winger, Theo, where it's the least interesting thing about him. I loved when you said that in your interview. Because yeah, we want those stories, too. It's like in acting, right? In improv, the rule is yes/and. So we want these books, and we want those books. We want the fantasy, we want the romance, we want the science fiction, we want all of it because truly, if you look at the numbers of books that are published - traditionally there about 5,000 books published a year for kids and teens. And then, if you look at the world of self-publishing, let's say that 5,000 are doing it really beautifully. And the books are indistinguishable with the quality of that from traditional publishing. That's 10,000 books a year, a year. And you have all those years going back too. So what we want is the opportunity to sort of have all of those books and right now we still only have like 500. So we have a long way to go. We need lots more books, we need lots more voices, we need people writing their own voices, stories, we need more diversity included in everybody's stories because truly, you're not going to have a classroom today that doesn't include someone that's LGBTQ, we need it all. Jeff: That's very true. Given that you had the blog, did you always see yourself eventually writing the YA novel that you did? Or did that just kind of manifest itself because you have the story to tell? Lee: I've always been a writer. I've written...I remember one summer when I was like between 9th and 10th Grade in high school, I was like, "I'm going to write a novel." I sometimes think of those poor characters still trapped in the broken space station that was orbiting the Earth. And I'm like, "Oh man, I have to do something with that someday." I don't think I will. I've always written. I think that for the last 14 years, I've really focused on writing for kids and teens. I also write picture books and middle grade. And when I found out this thing about Lincoln and Speed, it really inspired me to focus on writing that as a novel. I think that the blog has been a way to have my voice heard in a more direct way, and not wait for somebody to tap me on the shoulder and say, "Okay Lee, we're ready for what you have to share." So that's been really empowering. I remember, when I started the blog, there were very few people reading it, and I would get all excited, I'd be like, and I'd tell my husband, "Hey, 15, people went to my blog today." And I was so, so excited. And now, all these years later, we passed 2.6 million page loads. I get between, you know, 15,000 to 25,000 page views a month. It's remarkable, and humbling, and also a really cool responsibility to continue to maintain this safe place. And at the same time, I'm trying to keep writing and work on the new stuff, which has been really a good thing, because balancing the day job and the blogging, there's a lot but I have stories I want to tell. And I'm going to keep trying to tell them. Jeff: Good. Yeah, keep putting it out there. Because we always need more, to be sure. For people who haven't seen the site yet, and we're certainly going to link to it in the show notes. It has an amazing hero image across the top of the superhero. Where did that come from? And where did the name come from? For folks who might question the name too, because I have a pretty good idea where the name came from. But let's hear it from you. Lee: Sure. So "I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I read?" is a play on words of something we chanted in Act Up in the '80s and '90s. The chant was "We're here. We're queer. Get used to it." And I thought, well, my issue is a little more "What the hell do I read?" Because I felt so starved for any books that included somebody like me. I mean, you know, I grew up and I really and truly thought I was the only person in the world that felt the way I felt about other guys. And which was super ironic, because I have an older brother, who's five and a half years older, and he's gay too, but we never spoke about it. We are the children of immigrants and when my parents came from Israel, they sort of brought all their homophobia with them. And the American culture at the time was super homophobic, especially where we lived outside Philadelphia. It was not a safe place. And it's so amazing to think that you can grow up and feel like you're the only person and everything I read, I was obsessed with the series by Anne McCaffrey called the Dragonrider series. And there was this super between the lines, sort of thematic thing that you could maybe interpret that there was gay stuff happening in that world, but you had to really stretch for it. And looking back, I think, well, maybe that's why I was so obsessed with that book, with that series, because there was some faint, not even mirror reflection, but like the gleam of a tarnished piece of silverware. I was like, "Wait, wait, maybe that's me." So that's where "I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I read?" came from. The image happened a few years later. I had been running the site for about two years, it had been doing really well. And I realized I wanted to have a customized image. And yet, it's a pretty wordy title. So I realized I needed an image that didn't have any additional words to it. So I contacted someone I knew, an artist I knew, Jim DeBartolo. And, I said, "Look, I need an image that says empowerment." And he came up with this sort of superhero moment of like ripping the denim shirt off. And there's this sort of T-shirt underneath with the sort of superhero logo, which is the website, which is leewind.org. And it was funny. We tried to play with the sort of partial face that you see, we tried to, you know, could we make it a person of color? Could we do some things with you, know, the physique? But ultimately, it was sort of an avatar of me, and it took me years to admit it that's sort of what of course it is, it's an avatar of me, but I don't have that good a jawline. But at least in my mind, I think that it's been this sort of symbol of empowerment. And that's really what I hope that people get from visiting the site, from reading anything I write. I want them to feel empowered. Jeff: I like that. That's a great story behind that. Lee: Thanks. Jeff: So relying on your...I'm going to call it a YA expertise because of the site that you run. What are three or four titles of current YA that you would recommend our audience to take a stab at? Lee: Sure. So I have to start with "Carry On" by Rainbow Rowell. I know it's not super recent. But this is the gay Harry Potter book that I wanted so badly. And I was so frustrated that JK Rowling didn't include Dumbledore as being gay in the canon. It sort of was outside the books that that revelation happened and you can go back and sort of, you know, read subtexts and stuff. But I really was hoping that there would be some sort of, you know, on the page, queer love or something, and it didn't happen, there was really nothing. And, you know, Rainbow Rowell, she wrote two books, one about the girl that writes the fan fiction, which is called "Fangirl", which is really good. And then there was this book, which was the fan fiction, that ended up being a huge success on its own, called "Carry On". And I don't want to say too much, but it is absolutely brilliant. And if you are queer, or love queer stories, and you had any connection to Harry Potter, and that sort of world of magic, you've got to go read this. It's just wonderful. Jeff: Excellent. Her books have been on my TBR forever. And I actually need to take the leap and read them. Lee: Read this one first. It's just you will be so happy you did. Jeff: So you mentioned the nonfiction that you've just signed the contract on and other stuff noodling around in your head... anything else you want to shout out that's coming up soon for you? Lee: So there are a bunch of things percolating. But nothing has come to full boil yet. So I will let you all know when it does. Jeff: That is fair. I can't wait to hear what they are. Because I think that, yeah, having read the one book from you, I'm looking forward to reading so much more. So where can people keep up with you? There's leewind.org as we talked about, which is the "I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I read?" site. Anyplace else people should be looking for updates? Lee: Yeah. I mean, I'm playing around with Instagram. I'm trying to do this thing. I had the idea that we could do a #queerhistoryiseverywhere. And I wanted people to upload photos of Abraham Lincoln or the word Lincoln wherever they saw it and just start posting it on Instagram. It hasn't exactly caught on yet. But I still like that idea. Jeff: Maybe our podcast listeners will play along with that. Lee: Oh, yeah, that would be really fun. And also, I mean, as, you know, more queer history happens. I was speaking at the Bay Area Book Festival recently and someone came up after my panel and they said, "Did you know that Bābur from the Bāburnāma when he was a teen he was in love with another boy?" I was like, "Really?" Totally, I have sitting on my desk right next to me right now the "Bāburnāma" and indeed, when he was 18, he was in love with this other boy. And it's so exciting to find out this stuff. So I feel like because it's been hidden, the more we can crowdsource this information and share it and then all amplify each other. I think it's very, very exciting. Jeff: Very cool. So we will link to all that stuff, the books we talked about - everything else - in our show notes. And Lee, I'm so glad we got the opportunity to talk, spread the word a little bit more about this book and the website and thank you for all you're doing to get more out there about YA literature too. Lee: Thank you, Jeff. I really want to say thank you to you and to Will. I'm really a fan of the podcast and getting to be on it as a real thrill. So thanks.

america god american new york amazon california history new york city europe israel earth china hell state san francisco africa chinese philadelphia lgbtq oregon alabama jewish illinois congress african americans harry potter wind tree hamilton southern california speed martin luther king jr starbucks shakespeare mtv kickstarter queer congratulations human rights grade pride month abraham lincoln mount rushmore springfield gandhi jk rowling vh1 stonewall dumbledore mahatma gandhi eleanor roosevelt carry on winger fangirl tbr confederate flag redlands anne lamott albeit act up universal declaration dollar bill world pride queer history stonewall inn safa rainbow rowell german jewish will grace hatshepsut lgbtqai andrew solomon wey dark lady anne mccaffrey jeff lee satyagraha ya lit mary todd todd parr jeff yeah i'm here quiltbag union flag jeff good jeff oh lincolnville bay area book festival jeff so lorena hickok jeff yes jeff is lee so lee thanks lee well jeff now lee there

The End of Human Trafficking May Begin With Radical Empathy - Julia Flynn Siler

mission real estate nonprofits disrupts morse code bay area book festival

Play Episode Listen Later May 22, 2019 50:21

In 19th Century San Francisco's Chinatown only 1 in 10 people were women, and most of them were forced into prostitution, trafficked by criminal tongs. In today’s episode, meet the Scottish sewing instructor Donaldina Cameron and the women she collaborated with and helped escape from sex slavery between 1870 and 1930. This week, Julia Flynn Siler talks with Lauren about her new book “The White Devil’s Daughters: The Women Who Fought Slavery in San Francisco’s Chinatown”. Prepare yourself for bomb scares and bubonic plague quarantines, court cases and crowdfunding efforts. Join us in what is, ultimately, a conversation about standing up to a broken society, and how women can help women rise up. Recorded at the Bay Area Book Festival in May 2019 as part of their Women Lit programming.

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Nonprofit disrupts SF real estate / Bay Area Book Festival / Morse Code

Crosscurrents

Play Episode Listen Later May 3, 2019 26:49

First up, a non-profit in the Mission helps low-income families by digging into real estate. Then, this weekend is the Bay Area Book Festival and we meet the woman who walked away from her day job to start it. And, we'll go back in time — to when radio first got its start.

Who Benefits from the Militarized Border?

KPFA - Against the Grain

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 30, 2019 59:57

The US-Mexico border is often in the news. But what's usually missing is the cost of the border, both in human terms, and in terms of the political economy of the region itself — the deep entanglement of the livelihoods of people who live in places like Douglas, Arizona with the border industrial complex. Scholar Aaron Bobrow-Strain discusses the militarization of the border and its connection to deindustrialization and economic abandonment. Resources: Aaron Bobrow-Strain, The Death and Life of Aida Hernandez: A Border Story Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019 Aaron Bobrow-Strain at the Bay Area Book Festival, May 4th, 2019 Walla Walla Immigrant Rights Coalition The post Who Benefits from the Militarized Border? appeared first on KPFA.

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The Bay Area Book Festival, 2019

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Play Episode Listen Later Apr 25, 2019 35:00

Cherilyn Parsons Cherilyn Parsons, the founder and executive director of the Bay Area Book Festival, talks about the festival with host Richard Wolinsky. The Bay Area Book Festival will be held May 4-5, 2019 throughout venues within walking distance in downtown Berkeley, and features such luminaries as Robert Reich, Joyce Carol Oates, Kim Stanley Robinson, Tayari Jones, Esi Edugyan, Jonathan Kellerman, and many other authors in over a hundred venues. For more information on the Fair, go to https://www.baybookfest.org/ The complete interview can be found as a Radio Wolinsky podcast. The post The Bay Area Book Festival, 2019 appeared first on KPFA.

Who Gets to Be Seen as an Artist?

KPFA - Womens Magazine

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 22, 2019 59:57

We speak with two powerful artists: Nell Painter, a prominent historian and author of the New York Times Bestseller, The History of White People, didn't do what many people do when they retire. At 64, after retiring from Princeton University, she entered art school, receiving a BFA from Mason Goss School of Art at Rutgers, and then heading to the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design for an MFA in painting. There, she developed a new appreciation for formalism, while coming to terms with the fact that age was the defining element of how her young classmates saw – or didn't see – her. She'll be speaking at the upcoming Bay Area Book Festival about her memoir, Old In Art School, a National Critics' Circle Award Finalist, and about her understanding of how race, gender and age affect who gets to be called an artist. She'll also be joining a panel on The Legacy of Adrienne Rich and the Shape of Our Feminist Future. BBQ Becky & Permit Patty go on trial! Jovelyn Richards, host of The Space Between Us on Women's Magazine, brings her play, 9-1-1 What's Your Emergency? The Verdict to La Pena next weekend, April 26-27. The first act of 9-1-1 What's Your Emergency? premiered at La Peña Cultural Center in September 2018 as an artistic response to the local 9-1-1 calls that made BBQ Becky and Permit Patty infamous on a national level. In this second act, framed as a courtroom drama, Jovelyn asks, should these calls be seen as hate crimes? You – the audience – get to weigh in on the verdict. The show will be performed with a multicultural cast and a jazz orchestra. In our interview, we discuss how sexism blends with white supremacy to lead white women to call the cops on Black and Brown people's expressions of love and intimacy. Jovelyn's shows always sell out so get your tickets early. The post Who Gets to Be Seen as an Artist? appeared first on KPFA.

Gloria Steinem & Favianna Rodriguez at the Castro Theatre

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 27, 2019 51:14

This special episode features my live conversation with activist, writer and feminist organizer, Gloria Steinem and Oakland-based artist and activist Favianna Rodriguez. The legendary Gloria Steinem is the author of several best-selling books, was a founding editor of and political commentator for New York Magazine and a founding editor of Ms. Favianna Rodriguez’s art and collaborative projects address migration, economic inequality, gender justice, and ecology. Favianna is also the Executive Director of CultureStrike, a national arts organization that engages artists, writers and performers in migrant rights. Gloria, Favianna and I spoke on stage at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco on February 21st, 2019 as part of Women Lit, a program of the Bay Area Book Festival. Gloria’s book of essays--now in its third edition--and the occasion for our conversation--is called “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions”--and there is no better or more timely theme! In this conversation we talked about the ongoing fight for equality, how much has changed--or not--since Gloria wrote those essays between the 1960s and the 1990s...and how to create the future we envision! This live event was made possible in part by EO essential oils bath and body care products and of course, my home station KALW in San Francisco, and PRX. Giving is a radical act. Help keep these podcasts coming:inflectionpointradio.org/contribute.

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There Is No Peak Fury - Rebecca Traister, Author of "Good And Mad: The Revolutionary Power Of Women’s Anger"

women stitcher fury berkeley peak revolutionary new york times bestseller radiopublic inflection point rebecca traister mad the revolutionary power bay area book festival

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 24, 2018 50:49

There’s a reason that women are angry. Since the founding of this country, we have been faced with men in power who are set on shutting us down, and shutting us out. Revolutionary fury isn’t just for the founding fathers. And ladies, even though we’ve been stewing in our ever-growing anger for the past 242 years, we have just begun to fight. Listen to my conversation with Rebecca Traister, author of the New York Times Bestseller, Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women’s Anger. This conversation was recorded live in Berkeley, CA on October 10th, 2018 as part of Women Lit, a program of the Bay Area Book Festival. Want to show your support for Inflection Point? Here are few ways: Financial: Go to inflectionpointradio.org/contribute. Emotional: Come on over to The Inflection Point Society, our Facebook group of everyday activists who seek to make extraordinary change through small, daily actions. Sensational: Subscribe to “Inflection Point” to get more stories of how women rise up right in your feed on Apple Podcasts, RadioPublic, Stitcher and NPROne. And give us a 5 star review!

59 – Bonus: Alice Waters

Bite

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 8, 2018 45:51

In late April, Tom Philpott sat down with Alice Waters and Jonathan Kauffman at the Bay Area Book Festival in Berkeley, California. Some have described Alice Waters as “the most important figure in the culinary history of North America.” Her new book, “Coming to my Senses,” is a juicy memoir about her life up to the opening of her historic restaurant Chez Panisse. San Francisco Chronicle food writer Jonathan Kauffman is the author of “Hippie Food: How Back-to-the-Landers, Longhairs and Revolutionaries Changed the Way We Eat.” Alice and Jonathan duke it out over the ongoing influence of hippie food.

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Greil Marcus

Method To The Madness

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 27, 2018 30:21

Bay Area music critic and culture historian, Greil Marcus, discusses The Slits and former Slits guitarist Viv Albertine's new memoir as well as his fascination with The Manchurian Candidate.Transcript:Lisa Kiefer:Method to the Madness is next. You're listening to Method to the Madness, a biweekly public affairs show on KALX Berkeley, celebrating Bay Area innovators. I'm your host, Lisa Keifer, and today I'll be speaking with Bay Area native and resident Greil Marcus. Greil's has been writing about music and culture for the last 40 plus years, and today we're going to be talking about an event coming up as part of the Bay Area Book Festival. He'll be speaking with Viv Albertine, formerly of the seminal girl punk band, the Slits, on Sunday, April 29th at 3:15 PM at the David Brower Center, Goldman Theater, right here in Berkeley at 2150 Allston Way. Viv Albertine wrote a debut memoir in 2014 that was shortlisted for the National Book Award. Her new book is called To Throw Away Unopened. We'll be talking about that and much, much more.Did you ever see The Slits live?Greil Marcus:Nope.Lisa Kiefer:When did you first hear the Slits?Greil Marcus:You know, I heard the Slits, I was in England in 1980, and I went over there to do a story about the Raincoats and the Gang of Four and Essential Logic early in 1980, and met everybody, and in some cases had formed lifelong friendships out of that trip. And somebody handed me a record there. Yeah, it was called Once Upon a Time in a Living Room. It was the Slits official bootleg, or maybe, I don't know how official it was. It was on Y Records, and it was just the rawest stuff I'd ever heard in my life. I knew who the Slits were, I was aware of them. I heard their first album and it didn't knock me out, but this destroyed me.The first song, Once Upon a Time in a Living Room, starts off with one of them saying, "You're ready?" And someone else is, "Ready?" And then they just burst into laughter, and then there's this tremendous guitar chord coming down and that's it. There is just this storm of guitar noise with the most joyous back and forth, up and down yelping all through. It really is a song, even though at any given moment you, depending on how you're hearing it, it absolutely is noise. But there is a song, there is a musical theme. There are words, not that you could ever make them out. And I just thought it was the purest expression of punk I'd ever heard and I still do.Speaker 3:You're ready? Ready! Oh, no. (singing)Greil Marcus:I just fall over. How could anybody have the nerve to do this?Lisa Kiefer:They had no role models. It was so fresh. And I wonder, has there been anything so fresh as that period of time where the Sex Pistols emerged? They came on the scene, it was a short time, then they're gone. Do you think there's been anything quite like that?Greil Marcus:Yeah, there are analogies. There are parallels, maybe. Elvis at Sun Records in 1954 and '55. It was a similar explosion of creativity, and it brought people from all over the south to knocking on that same door saying, "Let me in. I want to make records too." And a lot of those people became legends, and there's creativity going on in hip hop, just unlimited. There are no borders. There's no bottom, there's no top. It's not just Kendrick Lamar, it's not just Kanye West. There is a group in Edinburgh called the Young Fathers, which is just tremendously playful and experimental, and at the same time, dead serious.Speaker 4:(singing)Greil Marcus:And I'm just talking about the few things I know, but in terms of coherence, with punk in England you have a time, you have a place, you have a scene, you have all different kinds of people who know each other, who are topping each other, who are learning from each other. Viv Albertine of the Slits, I want to be a guitarist. Well, she finds people who can show her how to be a guitarist, and there isn't envy and there isn't fear. I don't want to teach her, you know, she may end up outshining me. There isn't that spirit and it doesn't last very long. None of them. And yet that kind of camaraderie and a desire to speak and a desire to be heard, that was really what punk was all about, at least as I hear it. That was replicated all over the world and still is.One of the best stories about punk I ever heard was from a friend of mine who was spending time in Andalusia in Spain, and she's fluent in Spanish, and she was sitting in a cafe, and these kids came up to her and they said, "You're American, right?" And she said, "Yes." "But you speak Spanish." And she said, "Yes." And they said, "Well, we're punkies, and we have the Sex Pistols album, but we don't understand any of the words. Could you translate these songs for us?" So she did. And that led them, this little group of people who were trying, they didn't know if they wanted to form a band, if they wanted to put out a magazine, if they just wanted to do disruptive things in public, put on hit and run plays.That led them to rediscovering the history of their own town. The anarchist history of their own town, which had been completely erased and buried. And they started talking to older people, and they started digging into the libraries, and they realized that they were the heirs of a tradition that was being reenacted on this Sex Pistols record. And it gave them this tremendous sense of pride and identity. Now they didn't form a band, they didn't make any records, and yet that is a punk story. That is a story about a punk band, band of people as true and as inspiring as any other.Lisa Kiefer:It's a way of being, like as you've pointed out in many examples in Lipstick Traces, one of my favorite of your books.Greil Marcus:Oh, thank you.Lisa Kiefer:And I find myself going back to that. I mean I bought it when it came out, and the Lester Bangs collection that you edited.Greil Marcus:Sure.Lisa Kiefer:That I continue to go to, and that really opened my eyes. I was listening to this kind of music and I saw the cover and I thought, oh, this is a book about the Sex Pistols. So I start reading it and really it wasn't, but it educated me on the history, all the movements that I considered to be punk. From the Priests going up on Easter Sunday in 1950 and saying, "God is dead."Greil Marcus:In Notre Dame.Lisa Kiefer:Somewhere in France.Greil Marcus:Easter Mass in Notre Dame.Lisa Kiefer:And then, 10 years later, and John Lennon saying, "We're more popular than Jesus." I mean, this has been happening along the way.Greil Marcus:Yeah. And what was so fascinating to me, and the stories I end up trying to tell in Lipstick Traces was that it involved all sorts of people who were not unaware of each other, but are doing the same work, speaking the same language in different formal languages, whether it's English or French or German or whatever it might be.These are people who never met, who, if you told them, if you told the Dadaist Richard Huelsenbeck in the 1970s just before he died, that his real inheritors, his real soulmates were these people across town, he was living on the Upper West Side in Manhattan, people across town called the Velvet Underground, he might say, "I have all their albums." Or he might say, "Leave me alone. I'm a serious psychoanalyst." Who knows? But these people weren't aware of each other, and yet they are following in each other's footsteps and taking inspiration from other, whether they know it or not.Lisa Kiefer:Let's talk a little bit about what's going on Sunday and your conversation with Viv, her first memoir, and now I want to talk a little bit about musician memoirs. I love literature deeply and it's kind of my guilty pleasure to read all of these rock memoirs or whatever, whether it's Keith Richards, Kim Gordon. Have you read Kim Gordon's?Greil Marcus:Sure.Lisa Kiefer:Viv's first one, which is called Clothes, Clothes, Clothes, Music, Music, Music, Boys, Boys, Boys, it was so entertaining. I was so engaged and I didn't expect to be.Greil Marcus:You know, it's a marvelous book.Lisa Kiefer:You called it the best punk book ever.Greil Marcus:I think it is. I think if you want to get a sense of what impelled people, what drove people to step out of their shells, their shyness, their manners, their politeness and reinvent themselves and the joy they felt in doing so for a very brief period of time, this book will show you that, not just tell you, but show that to you, like no other book or film that I'm aware of. But you know, the title really sums up Viv Albertine, I think. Clothes, Clothes, Clothes, Boys, Boys, Boys, Music, Music, Music, which is what her mother once said. "That's all you care about. Clothes, clothes, clothes and boys, boys, boys and music, music, music." And she's, "Yeah, that's right." And there's a wonderful scene at the end of the book. She's in her fifties, she's been married and divorced, she has a daughter, she has this boyfriend and their relationship is not working.And at one point he just explodes, and he grabs her by the neck, and he's shoving her face into the carpet on the floor and she really feels he's trying to kill her, and she's struggling and she's thinking, but she takes you right into her head at that moment. And she says, "Here's a man who I've introduced to my mother and my daughter, who I've cooked for, who I've dressed. I've done everything for this person. And here I am wearing an applique blouse." And she goes and tells you exactly what clothes she's wearing at this moment. And he's pounding my face into the carpet. And she says, "You know, there's just no pleasing some people," and she has that sardonic attitude. But what have you got here? While there's no music in that scene, but you got the boys and you got the clothes, and there's an appendix that tells you what she was wearing and what she was listening to and who she was involved with in any given point of time in the many years covered by this book.The only analogy to that is a Jan and Dean album, the wonderful surf doo-wop group from the 50s and 60s, and it's a collection, and on the back of the album there's a concordance matching the car and girlfriend that Jan or Dean had at the time any given record was released. And what's really fascinating as you read through this is that both the cars and the girlfriends are constantly shifting back and forth between the two of them. They both have Corvettes. One gets a Porsche, the other gets a Maserati. One is going out with Jill, the other's going out with Debbie, and then Debbie is going out with the other one. It's just so funny to read. And so is Viv Albertine's book.Lisa Kiefer:Yeah, she starts her book saying, "I don't masturbate and I never had a desire to masturbate." That's how she starts the book. Later she's talking about Ari Up, who is their vocalist, that she takes a wee right on the stage. I mean, that had to be the first time ever for a girl band to, she had to go and that's where she did it. She was stabbed a couple of times. Really vivid, and you just get this idea that she was so courageous and brave and honest. She's talking about when she first started listening to T. Rex. And why? Because he was a little less aggressively masculine. And I can remember the same thing happened to me in my little town in the Midwest. No one was listening to T. Rex. They did not understand what I liked about Marc Bolan and I loved him, so I've really connected with this book on many levels.Greil Marcus:Yeah, and one of the things that I find so moving in her new book, it's called To Throw Away Unopened, which is another book. I hate to think of them as memoirs because both of these books are so imaginatively constructed, and they really are about things outside the writer's life. The writer is living in a world. The world is present in these books. I think of them as much more ambitious intellectually than memoirs. What happened to me, this all really happened. You should care about it. Why should I care about this? I don't care about this. You have to make me care.This is a book revolving around the death of her mother in 2014, which was at the time that she published her first book, and her conflicts with her sister, and the mystery of her parents' marriage and why it broke up, and who her parents really were. Things that she began to find out after her mother died. Putting all this stuff together, and yet you are always aware of a particular individual fighting to maintain her sense of self, which is constructed, which is self-conscious, which is real, but which could disappear and shatter at any time.There's one incident early on in the book, where she's talking about going to pubs, playing her songs. You know, she's got her guitar, she goes to places, she plays songs because she wants to be heard. She's not making money doing this. She's not supporting herself doing this. It's something she absolutely has to do. And she's in one pub, and there's a bunch of guys right up front who are really drunk and loud-mouthing and shouting and paying no attention to her at all, making it impossible for anybody else to pay attention to her. And there are people there who want to, and impossible for her to pay attention to what she's supposedly doing. So she asked him, "Could you maybe go to the back, maybe go to the bar. I'm trying to get these songs across." And they ignore her. They didn't even say (beep) you. Sorry, we're on the radio.Lisa Kiefer:I'll bleep.Greil Marcus:They don't say a word to her, they just ignore her. And so she gets up, she puts her guitar down, she gets up, she walks over to their table, she picks up a mug of ale, which is the closest thing to her, and she simply sweeps it across the faces of these four guys sitting at the table, and they look at her, absolutely stunned. And then she picks up another mug and she says it was a Guinness, which, this is Viv Albertine as a writer. Every detail is important. It's a Guinness. That's interesting. It's going to be thicker. It's going to stay in clothes more. It's actually going to be more unpleasant to have that thrown in your face.And she throws that in their face and she says, "Your punk attitude, it comes back to you when you need it." And there's a way in which that is sort of the key as I read it anyway, to this new book, as it comes back to you in terms of the the responsibility you have to not back down, to stand up for yourself, but also to stand up for things you believe are right and in jeopardy, to fight when you have to. And to be relentlessly honest, and not pretend you don't care when you do or that you do care when you don't.Lisa Kiefer:I've read her first book. The second isn't out yet. So are they going to be selling it on Sunday?Greil Marcus:Well, she's on a book tour.Lisa Kiefer:So I assume it'll be there.Greil Marcus:So presumably, you don't go on a book tour unless you've got a book that people can go out and get.Lisa Kiefer:And it is the Bay Area Book Festival.Greil Marcus:Yeah.Lisa Kiefer:So, it sounds like you think it's as strong as the first book, which was nominated for a National Book Award.Greil Marcus:It's very different. It's very different, and as writing, it certainly is strong. Whether the story is smaller in terms of the room that makes for the reader, maybe it is, I'm not sure. Viv Albertine is a remarkable person who's done exceptional things in her life, who has a tremendous sense of humor, who has a sense of jeopardy and danger.You can hear it in her music and you can feel it coming off the pages that she writes. I don't know what we're going to talk about. I don't know what this will be like. I just know that as someone listening to the record she made, seeing her play live, reading her books, that she is just a person who can go in any direction at any time. I saw her in 2009 at the Kitchen in Brooklyn, at a show with the Raincoats. She was opening for them, just herself and her electric guitar. Most of what she did was tell stories on stage, was talk. She played songs, but she was mainly telling stories, and it was the most entertaining and diverting and compelling stuff I'd seen in a long time. I was just hanging on every word, and she was both funny and sardonic and cruel to herself and anybody she might be talking about.And at one point she made some reference to how she looks. She was, I think, 54 then. She looked about 30. There was just no question. You say, "Is this real? Is this happening?" And she said, "Yeah, yeah, I know, it's the curse of the Slits." Well, one thing I'm going to ask her is, "What do you mean by that?" You know, the Fountain of Youth? What's going on here? You know, I met her once in, I think, 1991 in England.Lisa Kiefer:When she was doing films. She's a director.Greil Marcus:Yeah, she was a TV director. We were introduced and I said, "My God, you're Viv Albertine?" I'm like, wow. And she was saying, "No, I just, you know, I'm just doing this little TV crew." And I said, "No, this is a big deal for me to meet you." Well, it will be a big deal for me to meet her again.Lisa Kiefer:If you're just tuning in, you're listening to Method to the Madness, a biweekly public affairs show on KALX Berkeley, celebrating Bay Area innovators. Today I'm speaking with Greil Marcus, music critic and culture historian.You've written a monogram on The Manchurian Candidate sometime ago, and you introduced it as part of a film series at the Pacific Film Archive this week. What is your fascination with this Frankenheimer film?Greil Marcus:Well, I saw it when it came out in 1961, saw it at the Varsity Theater in Palo Alto with my best friend. I was 16 and came out of that movie shellshocked. I had never seen anything like it. The only analogy was, I guess the year before seeing Psycho in a theater across the street in Palo Alto. And when that chair turns around at the end of the movie, and you see this mummy, I think you could have peeled me off the ceiling of the theater. But that movie, ultimately it was a puzzle. It was a game. It was a tease for the audience. It wasn't about anything real. You didn't carry it with you. It wasn't like a waking bad dream. It wasn't like a bad conscience that this movie was passing onto, and that's what The Manchurian Candidate was. It was shocking in every way I could possibly account for, and at 16 couldn't begin to account for.I realize now that I had never seen a movie that so completely went to the edges of possibility of the medium itself. What I mean by that is I understood what movies could be after seeing The Manchurian Candidate, and I had never even thought the movies could or couldn't be anything before. The question wasn't even there. The only comparable experience was seeing Murnau's Sunrise quite a few years later and say, "Ah, now I understand this is what movies were meant to be, but almost never are."Lisa Kiefer:With Trump as our president, it's almost like he could be the Manchurian Candidate.Greil Marcus:Well, you know, since John McCain was first running for president and he was, you know, remember he was a prisoner of war and he was beaten and he was tortured. He was filmed, essentially confessing. And there were many people who began to spread rumors about him that he was, and this phrase was used, the Manchurian Candidate, that he had been brainwashed in Vietnam.And he had come back here as a kind of sleeper agent. And somebody once said to him, "How do you make decisions?" And he said, "Well, I just turn over the Red Queen," which is one of the clues in The Manchurian Candidate.Lisa Kiefer:Yeah, I brought one with me. I was going to try and brainwash you.Greil Marcus:Yes, exactly. The Queen of Hearts. That is a crucial marker in the film. But it wasn't that it was showing us a conspiracy to destroy our country, which is part of what the movie is about. And that we would then say, "Oh my God, this could happen. This is so scary. This is so terrible." Over the years, this is 1961 or '62, Kennedy, John F. Kennedy was involved in the making of the movie. He and Sinatra discussed it. Kennedy wanted Lucille Ball to play the role of the mother that Angela Lansbury ended up playing. Kennedy was weighing in on the casting.He and Sinatra were close at that time. Sinatra's the lead in the movie. Kennedy is assassinated in 1963, Malcolm X was later. It was Malcolm X who said that with Kennedy's assassination, the chickens had come home to roost. And then we just go through the decades, it's just a panoply of disaster, whether it's Wallace, whether it's Reagan, whether it's Malcolm X, whether it's Martin Luther King, whether it's RFK, and going on and on to Gerald Ford, two assassination attempts on him, and into the present.As each of these things happened, the movie comes back to people with more and more reverberation because the story, the sense that our politics don't make sense. This is that everything is happening in a world beyond our control, knowledge or even our abilities to comprehend.Lisa Kiefer:And there are so many secrets that we aren't able to know about.Greil Marcus:Yeah, this gets more and more present. So when you end up with a president, a candidate, and then a president who is at the very least beholden to, and at the very worst, under the control of another country, it's almost as if you can't make the Manchurian Candidate argument because it's too trivial. Well, this movie said, but that's what we carry around our heads.But what's shocking about the movie? I want to get back to that because if people haven't seen it, it was unavailable for many years. It was essentially, it wasn't banned in any legal sense, of course, but you couldn't see it for many, many years. It just felt wrong after Kennedy's assassination and it played on TV after Kennedy was assassinated, but then Sinatra controlled the movie. He pulled it. It didn't come out in video. It didn't show on late night TV. It didn't show in revival screenings. It just wasn't there.You could tell people about it as a kind of legend. Now it's available. People can watch it in any way they want, at any time they want. And one of the things that happens in this movie is violence. Violence that from the very first moment is wounding, is disturbing, is hard to take, and it's absolutely in your face. I mean that literally, the movie puts blood splatters in your face. It happens in a way that you're just desperate, as the movie is going on, for it not to go where you know it's going to go. This is not a movie with a happy ending. This has one of the most awful endings that I know. It is an ending of complete despair and self-loathing and hopelessness. The last words of the movie is Sinatra. "Hell, hell, hell!" That's how the movie ends. And there's a thunderclap. Bang. That's it. And you just walk out of there...Lisa Kiefer:Stunned.Greil Marcus:... and it's like your world has been taken away from you. None of this would matter if this movie wasn't made with tremendous glee and excitement on the part of the director and the writer and the editor and the cinematographer and Lawrence Harvey and Frank Sinatra...Lisa Kiefer:Great cast.Greil Marcus:... and Angela Lansbury and Janet Leigh and on and on and on. All these people are working over their heads. They've never been involved in anything that demanded so much of them, that is making them feel, this is what I was born to do. Can I pull this off? Can I make this work? Can I convince people this is who I really am, that I actually would do these terrible things, and going past themselves. None of the people in this movie, to my knowledge or the way I see it, ever did anything as good before or after.They never did anything as innovative. They never did anything as radical. They never did anything as scary. And whether or not they felt that way about their own work in their own lives, don't have any idea, but I don't think so.Lisa Kiefer:I do want you to mention your website, which I have found to be very interesting. What is that?Greil Marcus:Well, there's a writer named Scott Woods who lives in Canada, and he approached me a number of years ago and asked if he could set up a website to collect my writing and just be a gathering place. And I said, "Sure." It's greilmarcus.net, and he just immediately began putting up articles, old things I'd written, recent things I'd written in no particular order, no attempt to be comprehensive, at least not right away. He did it with such incredible imagination and flair, but he started a feature a few years ago. It has the rather corny title of Ask Greil where people write in and ask me questions, and it could be about a song, or a band, or politics, or history or anything, or novels, movies. And I just answered them. I answered them all immediately because if I didn't, they'd pile up and I'd never get back to them. Is Donald Trump a Russian agent? Well, here's why he might be, and that's a complicated argument. So I take some time to talk about it.Lisa Kiefer:Thank you for coming onto Method to the Madness and being our guest here at KALX.Greil Marcus:Well, thank you. It's a thrill to be on your show.Lisa Kiefer:That was musicologist Greil Marcus. He'll be in conversation this Sunday, April 29th at 3:15 with Viv Albertine, formerly of the Slits. This is part of the Bay Area Book Festival in partnership with the San Francisco Chronicle. They'll be speaking at the Goldman Theater of the David Brower Center at 2150 Allston Way. Tickets are $10 ahead.You've been listening to Method to the Madness. You can find all of our podcasts on iTunes University. We'll be back in two weeks. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

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The Bay Area Book Festival 2018: Cherilyn Parsons