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An interview and reading with Carol Shields. A panel on Sylvia Plath with Paul Alexander and Jacqueline Rose
Eleanor Wachtel interviews Canadian author Carol Shields. Episode includes Shields reading from her book The Republic of Love.. Also - a Panel discussions on the life and death of American poet and novelist Sylvia Plath, with literary biographers Jacqueline Rose and Paul Alexander.
Arundhati Roy on love, war and the fragility of happiness
From New Delhi, India - award-winning novelist Arundhati Roy. Twenty years after her Booker Prize-winning, debut novel, The God of Small Things, she's back with a new book - The Ministry of Utmost Happiness - which explores gender identity, nationalism, Kashmiri independence, and many forms of both violence and love.
Rick Moody on his inventive new novel, Hotels of North America
Eleanor speaks with American novelist Rick Moody — author of Garden State and The Ice Storm — about travel, religion, and his inventive new novel, Hotels of North America.
From Kolkata to Mumbai, London to Berlin – Amit Chaudhuri's fiction travels off the beaten path
Amit Chaudhuri is considered one of the best Indian writers working today. A true renaissance man, he's a poet, essayist and musician, as well as the author of exquisite fiction. As the late Hilary Mantel described him, Chaudhuri "has, like Proust, perfected the art of the moment." His latest book, Sojourn - set in Berlin - is an evocative meditation on place and memory. Amit Chaudhuri spoke to Eleanor Wachtel from his home in Kolkata, India.
Pakistani novelist Mohsin Hamid on trauma after 9/11, migration and belonging
Writers & Company starts its new season from Lahore, Pakistan. Mohsin Hamid was named "one of his generation's most inventive and gifted writers" by the New York Times, and with his fifth novel, The Last White Man, he lives up to his reputation. He speaks with Eleanor Wachtel about his writing and his exploration of themes of identity, anxiety and dislocation in the post-9/11 world. *Note: The audio for this episode was recorded during the Covid-19 lockdown and contains occasional low-…
Damon Galgut probes South Africa's troubled history in his Booker Prize winner, The Promise
South African writer Damon Galgut follows a white Pretoria family through the dismantling of Apartheid in his 2021 Booker Prize-winning novel, The Promise. It was praised by the judges as "a spectacular demonstration of how the novel can make us see and think afresh." *Note: The audio for this episode was recorded during the Covid-19 lockdown and contains occasional low-level equipment-related distortion.
Catherine Lacey imagines a character without race or gender in her latest novel, Pew
American novelist and short story writer Catherine Lacey talks to Eleanor Wachtel about growing up in Mississippi and her new novel, Pew, about a mysterious stranger who makes a big impact on a small town in the American South.
In her prizewinning fiction, Sigrid Nunez deals with life — and death — with empathy and wit
American novelist Sigrid Nunez talks to Eleanor Wachtel about her latest book, What Are You Going Through, which explores love, friendship, death, grief and art in surprising and moving ways.
Gwendoline Riley's new novel My Phantoms charts the fractured ground between mother and daughter
Named one of the best working novelists in Britain and Ireland by the Times Literary Supplement, Gwendoline Riley is a master at depicting the subtle ways in which human beings can be cruel to each other — especially when they're family. She speaks with Eleanor Wachtel about her new novel My Phantoms and her award-winning previous book First Love.
In China Room, Sunjeev Sahota reimagines a family legend
To launch the 32nd season of Writers & Company, Eleanor Wachtel speaks to 2021 Booker Prize-longlisted author Sunjeev Sahota. Inspired by a story about his great-grandmother, the British writer's evocative new novel, China Room, explores themes of belonging, oppression and the pursuit of freedom, as it alternates between 1929 India and 1999 Britain. *Note: The audio for this episode was recorded during the Covid-19 lockdown and contains occasional low-level equipment-related distortion…
Brandon Taylor on his southern upbringing, being Black in the Midwest, and talking truthfully about depression
An interview with Brandon Taylor. The American author of the novel Real Life joins Eleanor in an intimate conversation about his Alabama childhood, going to graduate school in Wisconsin, and his latest book, a story collection called Filthy Animals. *Note: The audio for this episode was recorded during the Covid-19 lockdown and contains occasional low-level equipment-related distortion.
Amor Towles takes readers on an all-American road trip in The Lincoln Highway
Amor Towles, the bestselling American author of A Gentleman in Moscow, joins Eleanor Wachtel to talk about his new novel, The Lincoln Highway - an adventurous road story set in the 1950s. *Note: The audio for this episode was recorded during the Covid-19 lockdown and contains occasional low-level equipment-related distortion.
Nadeem Aslam on The Wasted Vigil
This week from Pakistan and England, nadeem Aslam. The author of Maps for Lost Lovers tackles Afghanistan in his latest novel, The Wasted Vigil (2008, Doubleday Canada).
Tim Winton on Eyrie
Australian novelist Tim Winton has officially been named a "Living Treasure" by the country's national trust. His latest novel focuses on Western Australia's resource and mining boom and its effect of the country and people.
A conversation with Mexican American author Valeria Luiselli
From Mexico and New York - and many places in between - Eleanor speaks with the virtuoso young writer, Valeria Luiselli. Luiselli is an exciting new voice and original sensibility who the National Book Foundation named one of its "5 Under 35."