Date: 2015-10-11
Name(s): Rushdie, Salman, Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Live onstage at the Banff Centre - Eleanor talks with Salman Rushdie about his 12th novel, Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights, inspired by 1001 Nights. Like Scheherazade, Rushdie, the irrepressible storyteller, has also lived on the brink of destruction.
Date: 2015-02-01
Name(s): Harvey, Samantha, 1975-, Rabinovitch, Sandra, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Samantha Harvey's latest novel, Dear Thief - inspired by Leonard Cohen's song "Famous Blue Raincoat" - is described as a strange and exhilarating journey. James Wood, in his New Yorker review, says that the book is unlike anything he's recently encountered.
Date: 2011-03-13
Name(s): Bakewell, Sarah, 1963-, Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: This week on Writers and Company, Eleanor Wachtel speaks with England's Sarah Bakewell about Michel de Montaigne, who lived in south-western France from 1533 to 1592. Described as a "one-man literary revolution," it has been said that he was the first writer to make his own personality the subject of his writing. Sarah Bakewell has produced the first full biography of Montaigne in English in almost fifty years, called How to Live: Or, A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at…
Date: 2023-04-02
Name(s): Bakewell, Sarah, 1963-, Rabinovitch, Sandra, Swailes, Katy, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: English writer Sarah Bakewell is the author of engaging, accessible books about thinkers, from existentialists such as Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre to the 16th century French philosopher Michel de Montaigne – a work which won the National Book Critics Circle Award. In her new book, Humanly Possible: seven hundred years of humanist freethinking, inquiry, and hope, Bakewell examines the centuries-long tradition of humanist thinking through the ideas and observations of a range of…
Date: 2020-02-02
Name(s): Broom, Sarah M., Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Today, from New York and New Orleans, Sarah Broom. Her memoir, The Yellow House won the National Book Award and it was named by the NY Times one of the five best non-fiction books of the year. The Yellow House recounts the political, social and racial history of New Orleans –with all its greed, bad planning, and indifference-- alongside family memories, struggles, and love.
Date: 2019-03-03
Name(s): Moss, Sarah, Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: In her new novel, Ghost Wall, Sarah Moss connects ancient Britons of the Iron Age to the foundation myths of the Brexit crisis. She talks to Eleanor Wachtel about the influence of northern, isolated places on her life and work.
Date: 2006-10-08
Name(s): Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor, Waters, Sarah, 1966-
Description: This week on Writers and Company, host Eleanor Wachtel talks with Sarah Waters, a novelist described as one of the best story-tellers alive today. Their conversation ranges from Waters' award-winning "lesbo-Victorian romps" to her latest book, The Night Watch, set in the grey days of Britain during - and just after - the Second World War.
Date: 2014-02-02
Name(s): Rabinovitch, Sandra, Shteyngart, Gary, 1972-, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Eleanor Wachtel speaks with one of America's funniest immigrant satirists, Gary Shteyngart. When he was 5, his grandmother gave him a piece of waxy Russian cheese for every page he wrote. It must have been excellent training, because now he's written a touching new memoir, Little Failure.
Date: 2012-06-17
Name(s): Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor, Welsh, Irvine
Description: This week on Writers & Company: Eleanor Wachtel talks to Scotland's Irvine Welsh at the Luminato Festival in Toronto. It's been almost twenty years since his first novel Trainspotting made him a controversial bestseller. Now, he's written a prequel, called Skagboys.
Date: 2015-02-15
Name(s): O'Hagan, Andrew, 1968-, Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Eleanor speaks with Scottish novelist and essayist, Andrew O'Hagan, who's been called "the best essayist of his generation." His latest book, a novel, is called The Illuminations. "One of [life's] complications is that bad people aren't often understood to be bad people. The morally dubious sometimes rule the world." - Andrew O'Hagan
Date: 2015-01-25
Name(s): Burnside, John, 1955-, Stinson, Mary (Producer), Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Eleanor speaks with the Scottish novelist, short-story writer, poet and memoirist John Burnside. One critic has said of him If I had to be marooned on a desert island with a stranger, that stranger would be John Burnside. She even said he's her perfect companion: for his poetry, which she called the finest Britain today. He has a new memoir called I Put a Spell on You.
Date: 2013-09-22
Name(s): Forna, Aminatta, Rabinovitch, Sandra, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Aminatta Forna has first-hand knowledge of civil war. Her father was hanged in 19175 by the regime in Sierra Leone, on false charges of treason. Forna writes about civil war in her latest book - this time about Yugoslavia.
Date: 2008-10-26
Name(s): Feldman, Susan, Morgan, Peter, 1963-, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: This week, Eleanor Wachtel speaks with English playwright and screenwriter, Peter Morgan. Two years ago, Helen Mirren won the best actress Oscar for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II in the movie, The Queen. And Forest Whittaker won best actor for his role as the Ugandan dictator, Idi Amin, in The Last King of Scotland. Less conspicuous was the man who wrote both movies - Peter Morgan. His latest play, Frost/Nixon will be released as a movie in December.
Date: 2017-02-19
Name(s): Barry, Sebastian, 1955-, Rabinovitch, Sandra, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: Eleanor speaks with Irish novelist Sebastian Barry about his family's influence on his fiction and his latest, award-winning book, Days Without End. It follows the story of a young Irish-American immigrant who becomes a soldier in 19th century America.
Date: 2018-02-04
Name(s): Howell, Tom, Lelio, Sebastián, 1974-, Wachtel, Eleanor
Description: An interview with Sebastián Lelio. The Chilean director of the hit film 'Gloria' and the Oscar-nominated 'A Fantastic Woman' talks to Eleanor Wachtel about casting transgender actor Daniela Vega, and why he's attracted to stories about the complex lives of women.
