01-28-13 UPDATE:Podcast Update:Time to Read Episode 82: Tracy Kidder 'Good Prose: The Art of Nonfiction'
Click image for audio link.
Here's the eighty-second episode of my new series of podcasts, which I'm calling Time to Read. The podcasts/radio broadcasts will be of books worth your valuable reading time. I'll try to keep the reports under four minutes, for a radio-friendly format. If you want to run them on your show or podcast, let me know.
My hope is that in under four minutes I can offer readers a concise review and an opportunity to hear the author read from or speak about the work. I'm hoping to offer a new one every week.
"...they should be running a much larger deficit..."
—Thomas Frank
For a young guy, Thomas Frank has been there so long that he's beyond déja vu. With books like 'What's the Matter with Kansas?,' 'The Wrecking Crew' and 'Pity the Billionaire' he has vivisected the rotting corpse of "politics as usual" so finely, so discretely, with such intelligence and style that he's quite frankly coming to an end-game.
It's always a pleasure to read his writing, and last month's entry in his column for Harper's Magazine, "Second Chance" is a great demonstration of how political prose can be elegant, beautiful to read and entertaining as well edgy and incendiary. Too often good prose is the first victim of strong political beliefs, but Thomas Frank always pays attention to the nuances of the language of those whose work he is examining.
Frank is also a great conversationalist, and I look forward to our conversations, which with some luck, I shall be able to keep on a monthly basis. This time around we talked about the prospect for Barack Obama's second term, and in particular, Frank's vision of what Obama hopes to accomplish. Do no expect a simple batch of happy hope, served up with a side dish of uncritical thinking. Expect instead the magnifying glass of history applied to the present day, in much the manner that boys with science sets focus the sun's rays on small bits of paper that they burn to a crispin.
The background to our current dilemma is, Frank says, a thirty-year shift to the hard right engineered by an increasingly ossified Republican party. And the unfortunate lesson that we have yet to learn is that what has not worked in the past is unlikely to work in the future. Frank and I discussed some of the economic myths that are currently being propagated to pacify those who would benefit most from them.
In 'Pity the Billionaire,' Frank make the point that those who brought about the financial crisis of 2008 that quite nearly plunged the world into an inescapable depression (and still might do so) have escaped blame for the actions that were only immoral and escaped punishment for the actions that were certainly illegal. Now those same people are suggesting an economic course that will be worse for most of us in the long run, while they profit handsomely in the near- and long-term.
"...it would not have been true to his character..."
— Jojo Moyes
Not every interview takes place in a studio. I spoke with Jojo Moyes about her novel, 'Me Before You' in the "Alumni Room" at the Claremont Hotel in Oakland. When I heard the name, and the location, I envisioned an urban tower. What I drove up to was more like a mountain chalet.
Inside, the appointments of the hotel were beyond luxurious, which I found heartening. Moyes deserves the best for this novel, which is outstanding in every way, especially given that at first glance, it's not the sort of book I'd be inclined to read. But when I read about the author, and then read the book, I discovered that this was exactly the sort of book I'm inclined to read; well-written, compelling, page-turning and filled with the stuff of life.
I met Jojo Moyes in the enormous lobby for the Claremont, and we set up in the Alumni Room, which proved to be a meeting room with a table and chairs and glass doors just off the lobby. She told me she'd been ill; that two hours before she had no voice. But she sounded fine at the moment, and was game to talk. I really appreciated her energy, her willingness to sit down with me. I felt honored — and glad that I'd brought the bottled water. I set up the recorder, broke out the water, and we sat down to talk about her book.
Given my review, I trust that readers can understand it was something of a challenge. How do you talk about a book when you don't want to give away anything that happens? It's possible, but difficult. Readers will learn more about the book from our conversation than then will from the review, at least with regards to subject and plot. But I think all in all, we did a fine job of having a substantive conversation about the book while keeping the best parts hidden.
And in retrospect, I have to say that this is largely because no matter what we said about the book, one could easily and quite enjoyably read 'Me Before You' simply because the quality of the writing is so high. Moyes offered lots of insights into the at-home inspirations and the real-life background that informs the novel. We talked about how she crafted this book as opposed to the way she wrote her others, comparing her experiences writing the mostly first-person narration here with her work in other novels.
08-21-15: Agony Column Podcast News Report : Senator Claire McCaskill is 'Plenty Ladylike' : Internalizing Determination to Overcome Sexism [Incudes Time to Read EP 211: Claire McCaskill, Plenty Ladylike, plus A 2015 Interview with Senator Claire McCaskill]
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Emily Schultz Unleashes 'The Blondes' : A Cure by Color [Incudes Time to Read EP 210: Emily Schultz, The Blondes, plus A 2015 Interview with Emily Schultz]
07-05-15: Commentary : Dr. Michael Gazzaniga Tells Tales from Both Sides of the Brain : A Life in Neuroscience Reveals the Life of Science
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2015 Interview with Michael Gazzaniga : "We made the first observation and BAM there was the disconnection effect..."
04-21-15: Commentary : Kazuo Ishiguro Unearths 'The Buried Giant' : The Mist of Myth and Memory
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2015 Interview with Kazuo Ishiguro : ".... by the time I was writing this novel, the lines between what was fantasy and what was real had blurred for me..."
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2015 Interview with Marc Goodman : "...every physical object around us is being transformed, one way or another, into an information technology..."
Agony Column Podcast News Report UPDATE: Time to Read Episode 199: Marc Goodman : Future Crimes: Everything Is Connected, Everyone Is Vulnerable and What We Can Do About It
