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Anne Michaels, bestselling award-winning author of Fugitive Pieces and The Winter Vault, speaks on her mysterious and breathtaking new novel, Held. Anne Michaels is a world-renowned novelist and poet. Her books are translated into more than fifty languages and have won dozens of international awards, including the Orange Prize, the Guardian Fiction Prize, and the Lannan Award for Fiction. Among many other honours she is a Guggenheim Fellow, has received honorary degrees, and has served as Toronto's Poet Laureate. Her novel Fugitive Pieces was adapted as a feature film. Her most recent books include All We Saw, Infinite Gradation, and Railtracks (co-written with John Berger). In 2020, her novel Fugitive Pieces was chosen as one of the BBC's 100 Novels that Shaped the World.
Best known for Fugitive Pieces, Canadian novelist and poet Anne Michaels talks to Susie about her new novel Held. With a cast of characters spanning over a century, in Held Michaels explores favourite themes: memory, trauma, grief and the healing power of love. Anne Michaels' books are translated into more than fifty languages, winning international awards, including the Orange Prize and the Guardian Fiction Prize.
Neil Jordan is an Oscar and double BAFTA-winning director who has achieved success both with his arthouse work and in Hollywood. He won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for The Crying Game and his films have been nominated for multiple Oscars and BAFTAs. His movies include Mona Lisa, Interview with the Vampire, Michael Collins and The End of the Affair, and he has directed the TV series The Borgias and Riviera. He is also an acclaimed writer and won the Guardian Fiction Prize for Night in Tunisia. His new novel, The Well of Saint Nobody, is out now. Here Neil discusses his career, the differences between writing novels and making movies, the dying art of independent film-making, working with global stars including Brad Pitt, Liam Neeson, Tom Cruise and Robert De Niro, and he reveals his passions outside of work.
In this episode, I chat with author Michael Moorcock about growing up in London during WW II, his life as a journalist, writing Gloriana, Or The Unfulfill'd Queen, and his latest music. Michael Moorcock is one of the most important and influential figures in speculative fiction and fantasy literature. Listed recently by The Times (London) as among the fifty greatest British writers since 1945, he is the author of 100 books and more than 150 shorter stories in practically every genre. He has been the recipient of several lifetime achievement awards, including the Prix Utopiales, the SFWA Grand Master, the Stoker, and the World Fantasy, and has been inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame. He has been awarded the Nebula Award, the World Fantasy Award, the John W. Campbell Award, the British Fantasy Award, the Guardian Fiction Prize, and has been shortlisted for the Whitbread Award. He has been compared to Balzac, Dickens, Dumas, Ian Fleming, Joyce, and Robert E. Howard, to name a few.Michael Moorcock's MiscellanyThe Faery Queene, Edmund Spenser Gloriana: Or, the Unfulfill'd Queen, Michael Moorcock Gormenghast, Mervyn PeakeSexual Politics, Kate MillettHonoré de BalzacLive At The Terminal Café, Michael Moorcock & The Deep FixByzantium Endures: The First Volume of the Colonel Pyat Quartet, Michael MoorcockLaughter of Carthage: The Second Volume of the Colonel Pyat Quartet, Michael MoorcockJerusalem Commands: The Third Volume of the Colonel Pyat Quartet, Michael MoorcockVengeance of Rome: The Fourth Volume of the Colonel Pyat Quartet, Michael MoorcockThe Citadel of Forgotten Myths, Michael Moorcock Support the showThe Bookshop PodcastMandy Jackson-BeverlySocial Media Links
SF Said is a British children's writer with a Middle Eastern background. He was born in Beirut and spent his early childhood in Jordan.His first novel, Varjak Paw, illustrated by Dave McKean, was published in 2003. It was the winner of the Nestle Smarties Book Prize. The sequel, The Outlaw Varjak Paw, won the Blue Peter novel. His third book, Phoenix, was shortlisted for the Guardian Fiction Prize.SF Said was selected to represent the U.Uk for the IBBY Honour List for 2016.SF joined Nikki Gamble In The Reading Corner to talk about his most recent novel, Tyger.About Tyger'There are three doors that I may show you. You will find a different kind of power behind each one...'Adam has found something incredible in a rubbish dump in London. A mysterious, mythical, magical animal. A TYGER.And the tyger is in danger. Adam and his friend Zadie are determined to help, but it isn't just the tyger's life at stake. Their whole world is on the verge of destruction.Can they learn to use their powers before it's too late?
In this episode of “Keen On”, Andrew is joined by Alan Judd, the author of “A Fine Madness: A Christopher Marlowe Murder Mystery”. Alan Judd is the author of eleven novels and two biographies. He previously served as a soldier in the British army and as a diplomat in the Foreign Office. Judd is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and has won numerous awards including the Guardian Fiction Prize and the Heinemann Award. He currently writes for The Spectator and The Daily Telegraph. Visit our website: https://lithub.com/story-type/keen-on/ Email Andrew: a.keen@me.com Watch the show live on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ajkeen Watch the show live on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ankeen/ Watch the show live on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lithub Watch the show on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/LiteraryHub/videos Subscribe to Andrew's newsletter: https://andrew2ec.substack.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In conversation with Sapphire The National Poet Laureate of Scotland from 2016 to 2021, Jackie Kay is the author of the celebrated poetry collections Life Mask, Off Colour, and The Adoption Papers, winner of the Scottish Arts Council Book Award. She is also the author of Red Dust Road, a coming-of-age memoir of being a mixed race adopted daughter of communists in 1970s Scotland, as well as several plays, children's books, and the novel Trumpet, winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize. A fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, she is the chancellor of the University of Salford in Manchester, England. In her latest book, Kay combines history with personal narrative to offer a layered account of the life of the ''Empress of the Blues'' Bessie Smith. Sapphire is the author of the acclaimed novel Push, which was adapted into the Academy Award–winning film Precious. She is also the author of the novel The Kid and three collections of poetry. (recorded 9/30/2021)
Welcome back to What the Hell/Heaven Are We Doing?, the series where the Laureate for Irish Fiction, Sebastian Barry, asks big questions of fellow writers about the nature of their shared craft. What is the purpose of writing? Find out what author Tom Kilroy thinks in this episode. Thomas Kilroy was born in Callan, Co Kilkenny in 1934. He served as play editor at the Abbey in 1977 and was appointed Director of Field Day Theatre Company in 1988. Kilroy was Professor of English at UCG and has published a number of academic essays and studies. In 1989, he resigned his professorship, to concentrate fully on writing. His many awards include the Guardian Fiction Prize, the Heinemann Award for Literature, the AIB Literary Prize and an Irish PEN Award. Thomas Kilroy is a member of the Royal Society of Literature, the Irish Academy of Letters and Aosdána. He was honoured with a special Lifetime Achievement Award at the ESB/Irish Times Theatre Awards in 2004. He lives in County Mayo. The Laureate for Irish Fiction is an initiative of the Arts Council in partnership with University College Dublin and New York University.
Poet, playwright, and novelist Jackie Kay is the current makar (the National Poet of Scotland) and previous winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize. Born in Edinburgh to a Nigerian father and Scottish mother she was then adopted and grew up in Glasgow. Her play The Lamplighter has recently been reissued and follows five characters sold into the British slave trade: in the process she explores Scotland's often overlooked role in this. She ran the Makar to Makar online performance project during lockdown when literary festivals were cancelled. She also has a book on the blues singer Bessie Smith due out next year.
Jim Crace is the prize-winning author of eleven previous books, including Continent (winner of the 1986 Whitbread First Novel Award and the Guardian Fiction Prize), Quarantine (1998 Whitbread Novel of the Year and shortlisted for the Booker Prize), Being Dead (winner of the 2001 National Book Critics Circle Award) and Harvest (shortlisted for the 2013 Man Booker Prize and winner of the International Dublin Literary Award and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize). His latest novel is The Melody. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Kirsty Young's castaway is the poet and writer Jackie Kay. Born in Edinburgh in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father, she was adopted as a baby by a white Scottish couple, Helen and John Kay, and grew up in Bishopbriggs, Glasgow. Her father worked for the Communist Party and her mother was the Scottish secretary for CND. She began to write seriously at the age of 17 when recovering from a moped accident, and while reading English at the University of Stirling she became a feminist and politically active in the arena of gay and lesbian rights and racial equality. Her first book of poetry, the partly autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991 and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. She won the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, the Guardian Fiction Prize for Trumpet and in 2010 published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her biological parents. She is now Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University and Chancellor of Salford University and was appointed Makar - Scotland's Poet Laureate - in March 2016. Producer: Cathy Drysdale.
Kirsty Young's castaway is the poet and writer Jackie Kay. Born in Edinburgh in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father, she was adopted as a baby by a white Scottish couple, Helen and John Kay, and grew up in Bishopbriggs, Glasgow. Her father worked for the Communist Party and her mother was the Scottish secretary for CND. She began to write seriously at the age of 17 when recovering from a moped accident, and while reading English at the University of Stirling she became a feminist and politically active in the arena of gay and lesbian rights and racial equality. Her first book of poetry, the partly autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991 and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. She won the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, the Guardian Fiction Prize for Trumpet and in 2010 published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her biological parents. She is now Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University and Chancellor of Salford University and was appointed Makar - Scotland's Poet Laureate - in March 2016. Producer: Cathy Drysdale.
Poet Jackie Kay takes us on a journey through her past, along the red dust road. Jackie is the Scots Makar and Chancellor of the University of Salford. Jackie Kay was born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father. She was adopted at birth and was brought up in Glasgow, studying at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and Stirling University where she read English. The experience of being adopted by and growing up withing a white family inspired her first collection of poetry, The Adoption Papers. Her first novel, Trumpet was awarded the Guardian Fiction Prize. Inspired by the life of musician Billy Tipton, the novel tells the story of Scottish jazz trumpeter Joss Moody whose death revealed that he was, in fact, a woman. Her dramatised poem, The Lamplighter was shortlisted for the 2009 Saltire Society Scottish Book of the Year Award. Her Maw Broon Monologues, performed at the Tron Theatre in Glasgow, and combining rhythmic verse and music, were shortlisted for the 2010 Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry. Red Dust Road (2010), a memoir about meeting her Nigerian birth father, was shortlisted for the 2011 PEN/Ackerley Prize. In 2006, she was awarded an MBE for services to literature. 5x15 brings together five outstanding individuals to tell of their lives, passions and inspirations. There are only two rules - no scripts and only 15 minutes each. Learn more about 5x15 events: 5x15stories.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/5x15stories Facebook: www.facebook.com/5x15stories Instagram: www.instagram.com/5x15stories
JACKIE KAY was an adopted child of Scottish/Nigerian descent brought up by white parents in Glasgow, a heritage she explored in Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her natural parents. She is one of Britain’s best-known poets, appearing frequently on radio and TV programmes on poetry and culture. She has won the Signal Poetry Award, the Guardian Fiction Prize and was the British Book Awards Decibel Writer of the Year for her collection of short stories Wish I Was Here.
JACKIE KAY was an adopted child of Scottish/Nigerian descent brought up by white parents in Glasgow, a heritage she explored in Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her natural parents. She is one of Britain’s best-known poets, appearing frequently on radio and TV programmes on poetry and culture. She has won the Signal Poetry Award, the Guardian Fiction Prize and was the British Book Awards Decibel Writer of the Year for her collection of short stories Wish I Was Here.
Her books include the highly acclaimed Regeneration trilogy: Regeneration (made into a film of the same name), The Eye in the Door (winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize) and The Ghost Road (winner of the Booker Prize). She came to Edinburgh to unveil her latest story, Toby's Room, the sequel to her acclaimed novel Life Class. Toby is 'missing, believed killed' on the battlefields of France, but his sister begins to question how he died – and why. Pat Barker's unforgettable stories highlight the emotional traumas of the First World War and her new book is a dark, compelling story of human desire, wartime horror and the power of friendship. She discusses her work with acclaimed broadcaster and journalist Allan Little in this event, recorded live at the 2012 Edinburgh International Book Festival.