New Letters on the Air
program schedule

Much like the heroine in her coming-of-age novel The Girl Who Fell From the Sky, author Heidi Durrow grew up in a biracial household. She talks about being both African-American and Danish, and how she used her own mixed experience, along with a tragic newspaper story, to create her 2010 novel. Durrow also discusses the years she spent writing the novel, which won the 2008 PEN/Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction, an award established by Barbara Kingsolver.

Poet Terrance Hayes reads from his 2010 collection, Lighthead, which won the National Book Award and was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. He talks about some of the themes in his work dealing with light, shadow, and race, and also reads from his third book, Wind in a Box. He discusses the poetic impulse and how he shapes poetry from life.

Poet, literary critic, and scholar, Evie Shockley, reads from her two poetry collections, a half-red sea, and the new black, and talks about how poetic form can bring new meaning to a poem’s subject matter. She discusses how her work pays homage to her literary mentors, yet challenges common notions about historical figures and events and what race in America means to different generations. She also shares how her poetry interweaves the personal and political, as well as the historical and imagined, in meaningful ways that challenge readers to see their heroes in new ways.

The poet James Richardson has called himself an “accidental aphorist,” but his well-crafted works are no accident. He has received awards from the Poetry Society of America and the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His 2004 book, Interglacial: New and Selected Poems and Aphorisms, was National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, and his 2010 book By the Numbers: Poems and Aphorisms, was a finalist for the National Book Award. He reads from the latter collection and explains why he thinks it’s crucial to his creative process to take “unproductive, wasted” stretches time between books. He also discusses why he prefers poetry and science fiction to novels.

After recovering from a nearly fatal accident, all Peggy Shumaker wanted to do was read. The poet, and Alaska’s State Writer Laureate, 2010-2012, eventually began to write again, and while she didn’t intend to write a memoir, her book of short pieces, Just Breathe Normally, is like one. Shumaker reads from the book and from her poetry collection, Gnawed Bones. She also discusses how writing allows her to take what she calls a kaleidoscopic look at the “broken shards” of her experience, incorporating her physical recovery from the accident with family memories and ancestral stories.

The Symphony is a poetry collective comprised of John Murillo, Dwayne Betts, Randall Horton, and Marcus Jackson. They first met at Cave Canem, the black writers’ symposium, and discovered they all had a shared love of the late African-American poet Etheridge Knight. The four bonded, kept in touch, and now present readings of Knight’s work, as well as their own. In this recording they read from their books and discuss writing about the African-American male experience, from that of an ex-convict to a magna cum laude graduate.

Fiction writer and Vanderbilt University professor Lorraine Lopez was shocked in 2010, when her book of short fiction, Homicide Survivors Picnic and Other Stories, became a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. Published by a small press, the book was up against the work of Sherman Alexie, Barbara Kingsolver, and Lorrie Moore. Lopez reads from her now recognized collection and talks about why she truly loves writing short stories, and how it differs from writing novels. Her 2011 releases include The Realm of Hungry Spirits, a novel, and a collection of essays that she co-edited, called The Other Latin@: Writing Against a Singular Identity.

A Sunday in God-Years takes its title from the notion that inside the long stretch of geologic time, human history happens in the blink of God's eye as he rolls over during a Sunday nap. Michelle Boisseau traced some of her own family history back to a Virginia plantation for her fourth collection that is centered around the long poem, "A Reckoning." Made up of 15 sections, it explores the connections between the heirs of slaveholders and slaves, and the repercussions felt in today's society.

Robert Bly, the preeminent poet, translator, and cultural commentator, reads from his 2011 poetry collection, Talking into the Ear of a Donkey. Winner of a National Book Award and two Guggenheims, Bly has published over twenty collections of poetry, and is highly regarded as a great translator of international poetry. In this recording of his reading at Rockhurst University’s Midwest Poets Series, he performs with sitartist David Whetstone and also reads from My Sentence Was a Thousand Years of Joy: Poems, his own adaptation of the Mideastern ghazal form in three-line stanzas.

Another holiday favorite, this highly anthologized short story is read by the late author Grace Paley. "The Loudest Voice" is an amusing tale about a little Jewish girl, chosen to play the lead in her school’s Christmas pageant, and her family’s reactions. Despite the story’s popularity, Grace Paley’s 1998 reading of it for New Letters on the Air was the first ever recorded.

Welsh actor Simon Harrald reads this Christmas classic by the poet Dylan Thomas, evoking the holiday sights, smells and adventures the writer experienced in the early part of the 20th century. Originally written for BBC radio, where Dylan Thomas once worked, this nostalgic look back at what seemed to be a simpler time has become a holiday favorite.

In this interview before an audience at the Kansas City Public Library, Christie Hodgen talks about her novels, Hello, I Must Be Going and Elegies for the Brokenhearted, which are populated by heartbreaking yet funny characters. Both books began as short stories so Hodgen discusses the craft of writing short and long-form fiction and why, despite her own happy childhood, her work often deals with dysfunctional families, handled with her trademark humor. She also talks about commonalities she shares with her father, poet John Hodgen.

For Thanksgiving weekend, we revisit Michael Chabon, who shares stories about family and food. Since winning the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, an epic novel that brings together the creation of Superman, Jewish myths, and forbidden love, Michael Chabon has written novels that bring science fictional elements to literary fiction. He talks about his book of essays on his creative process, called Maps and Legends, and his 2009 memoir, Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son.

Wayne Miller calls himself an “obsessive reviser” who tries editors’ patience; ironic given that he edits Pleiades: A Journal of New Writing at the University of Central Missouri, where he also directs the Creative Writing program. Miller reads from his 2011 collection, The City, Our City, and talks about how history and war shape culture and language. He also discusses the art of translation and what it can teach young poets, and shares award-winning poems from his 2006 book, Only the Senses Sleep, and his 2009 collection, The Book of Props.

Born Ramon Lofton, the poet and fiction writer took the name “Sapphire” because of its folkloric associations with beautiful, sexually empowered African-American women in literature, but also to challenge perceptions of the sassy archetype. Best-known for her 1996 novel Push, which became the award-winning 2009 film, Precious, Sapphire has also written books of poetry and prose, including American Dreams and Black Wings and Blind Angels: Poems. Sapphire's 2011 novel, The Kid, follows the son of Clarice “Precious” Jones. She reads from the book and discusses why she takes on the gritty subject matter of violence, racism, and poverty, and how language and literacy have been redemptive in her own life and the lives of her characters.

Winner of a 2011 Clarion Award for radio from the Association for Women in Communications, New Letters on the Air features poems from When She Named Fire: An Anthology of Contemporary Poetry by American Women. Edited by poet Andrea Hollander Budy, the book features 460 poems by 96 contemporary female poets. Four of those poets, Budy, Robin Behn, Michelle Boisseau, and Jo McDougall, were recorded at the Writers Place in Kansas City. The award-winning program also features archived New Letters on the Air recordings of Alice Friman and Dorianne Laux reading poems included in the highly praised anthology.

Japanese poet and fiction writer Mariko Nagai has lived all over the globe, from Brussels, Belgium, to Chattanooga, Tennessee, and her work includes characters equally diverse. Her 2007 book of poetry, Histories of Bodies, winner of the Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award, explores different types of love and desire. In her 2010 short story collection, Georgic, winner of the G.S. Sharat Chandra Prize, Nagai draws from history to depict characters facing extreme adversity. She talks about her work and reads from both books, including a Pushcart Prize-winning story originally published in New Letters magazine.

The author of three chapbooks and five poetry collections, including The Complete Book of Kong, Missouri poet William Trowbridge is unafraid of incorporating pop culture in his work, perhaps because he felt deprived of it as a child. In his 2011 collection, Ship of Fool, Trowbridge takes on the Fool archetype, leading his character through humiliations and sufferings with his signature humor. In this interview, he discusses his affinity for complex characterizations and descriptive language and his belief that comedy is as necessary as tragedy in great literature.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson talks about her 2010 debut book, The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration, winner of both the National Book Award and the Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction. She discusses writing the book, now out in paperback, which stems from over 1,200 interviews and chronicles the movement of African-Americans from 1915-1970, from the Jim Crow south to the urban North and West. She reads passages from the book, including one that reveals her own family’s experience migrating north to uncertain futures and possibilities.

Poet Ada Limon’s world changed when she won two book prizes in 2005: the Autumn House Press Poetry Prize for a collection that became her 2006 book, Lucky Wreck, and the Pearl Poetry Prize for what became her 2007 book, This Big Fake World. A California native who lived and worked in New York City for years, Limon draws inspiration from the Sonoma Valley of her childhood, the mythologies of her Mexican grandfather’s Churascan tribe, and the visual arts. She discusses her time working for magazines, and how copywriting and poetry work together for her, and reads from her 2010 book, Sharks in the Rivers.

Born in a small Arizona border town to a Mexican father and English mother, Alberto Rios is often recognized as Arizona's unofficial poet laureate. As a child he once lost the ability to speak in Spanish for several years after being punished by teachers for using the language, but today has become an honored poet in both Spanish and English. His poetry and short fiction have received numerous awards and are often anthologized. He reads from his memoir, Capirotada, selected as the One Book Arizona choice for 2009, and his tenth book of poetry that was published that same year, The Dangerous Shirt.

Fiction writer Jaimy Gordon worked on her novel, Lord of Misrule, set on a West Virginia horserace track, for over a decade before it was published in November 2010. That same month, the novel became the dark horse of the literary world by winning the 2010 National Book Award. Gordon reads from the novel and talks about the craft of writing and some of the similar threads that weave through her six books, and why this particular novel took so long to finish.

Poet, literary critic, and scholar, Evie Shockley, reads from her two poetry collections, a half-red sea and the new black, and talks about how poetic form can bring new meaning to a poem’s subject matter. She discusses how her work pays homage to her literary mentors, yet challenges common notions about historical figures and events and what race in America means to different generations. She also shares how her poetry interweaves the personal and political, as well as the historical and imagined, in meaningful ways that challenge readers to see their heroes in new ways.

The American Library Association designates September as library card sign-up month for students, so we’ve created this audio anthology of poets, novelists, and memoirists, who talk about how they found inspiration and refuge in the libraries of their youth. Judith Ortiz Cofer, Junot Díaz, Esmeralda Santiago, E.L. Doctorow, Anne Lamott and others tell stories about the importance of libraries to their development as writers and to our culture as a whole.

Peter Balakian, a poet of Armenian descent, discusses his 2010 work, Ziggurat, with former New Letters on the Air host, Rebekah Presson Mosby. The book is a poem in 45 sections that attempts to describe and map the thoughts that enter and leave a character's mind as he rides beneath Manhattan on the A-Train. It touches on everything from soul music to the war in Iraq, and gives a semi-autobiographical account of a mail runner in the World Trade Center in the early 1970s.

From his first novel, Prague, which became an acclaimed best-seller in 2002, to his most recent novel, The Tragedy of Arthur, Arthur Phillips has been writing widely varied novels about subjects that naturally pique his interest. In this interview at the Kansas City Public Library, Phillips discusses the challenges of being a full-time writer, and how he weaves metafictional elements into his newest novel (featuring a main character named Arthur Phillips), and the challenges of writing in the voice of William Shakespeare.

Anne Fortier is the latest in a long line of writers who draw on the legend of the doomed lovers, best known as William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. In her novel Juliet, recently released in paperback, Fortier follows a descendant of Giulietta Tolomei, who uncovers eerie parallels between her life and that of the “real-life” Juliet. Fortier, who was raised in Denmark, talks about writing this novel in English as opposed to her native Danish, and reflects on bilingualism and her approach to writing adventure stories.

A poet who admits that "90% of his time" is taken up by his day-job, oncologist C. Dale Young talks with New Letters editor, Robert Stewart, about the tradition of the physician-poet.  Also the poetry editor of the New England Review, Young discusses how the act of writing a poem is a political act, and what separates it from propaganda.  He reads from his second book, the 2007 collection, The Second Person, and his 2011 book, Torn.

In this interview in front of an audience at the Kansas City Public Library, Marilynne Robinson, winner of the 2005 Pulitzer Prize and more recently the 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction, discusses her classic 1980 novel, Housekeeping, as part of the NEA's Big Read program. She also reads from her most recent novel, Home, which is a sequel of sorts to the Pulitzer-winning Gilead.

A finalist for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction for his fourth novel, The Surrendered, Chang-rae Lee spent 12 years writing this story that is set partially during the Korean War.  It presents a harrowing view of the savagery of war, and draws on some his father's stories. Lee was born in Korea and came with his family to the U.S. when he was three years old.  A graduate of Yale, he won six awards for his 1995 debut novel, Native Speaker.  He teaches creative writing at Princeton, and talks about writing in first versus third person.

Lisa See’s runaway best-selling novel, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, is now a summer 2011 movie.  In this archive interview, See discusses the female characters in this novel and in Peony in Love, both set in imperial China, in the 17th and 19th centuries respectively.  Discover how these characters—and their real-life historical inspirations—dealt with life in a male-dominated, oppressive culture.  See talks about the importance of history in shaping her fiction. 

Richard Russo, known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Empire Falls, describes his writing process as “hiking without knowing where your trails are going.”  As a “late-career novelist,” he learned that when he runs out of experience, he reads the terrain and weaves a story from the clues he can see ahead.  Russo reads from his two very different novels, the epic Bridge of Sighs (2007) and the comic That Old Cape Magic (2009) and discusses his approach to writing everything from screenplays to short stories. 

Author Jenna Blum’s first novel, Those Who Save Us, is a book about Nazis and the Holocaust, and it gained popularity by word of mouth.  She talks about the power of book clubs, and shares some insight into her New York Times bestseller.  She also discusses her newest novel, The Stormchasers, released in paperback in 2011, which explores a character with bipolar disorder.  Whether it’s Nazis, mental illness, or severe weather, Blum is interested in situations which allow her to explore characters who overcome great obstacles.

For the American holiday, we present W.S. Merwin, who became the 17th U.S. Poet Laureate in 2010.   With a career spanning more than 60 years, Merwin has won nearly every major literary honor, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry twice--in 1971 and again in 2009. In this archive interview, poet and scholar, H. L. Hix, author of Understanding W.S. Merwin, talks with the poet about how his work is influenced by environmental activism. A long-time resident of Hawaii, Merwin's interest in the preservation of the islands' ecology and culture are evident in readings from his 1999 book, The River Sound, as well his 1998 novel-in-verse, The Folding Cliffs: A Narrative, a fact-based fictional tale of Hawaii's tragic 19th century history.

Author Heidi Durrow, much like the heroine in her coming-of-age novel The Girl Who Fell From the Sky, grew up in a bi-racial household. She talks about being both African-American and Danish, and how she used her own mixed experience along with a tragic newspaper story to create this 2010 novel. Durrow also discusses the years she spent writing this novel that ended up winning the Bellwether Prize for Literature and Social Change in 2008, an award established and made by Barbara Kingsolver.

For Father's Day, we'll feature father/daughter poets Willis Barnstone and Aliki Barnstone, who talk about how they influence each other's work.  Aliki's first book was published before her father's, when she was only 12 years old, but his books of poetry and translations now far outnumber hers.  They read one of their earliest collaborations, published in New Letters magazine in 1977, and Aliki reads from her 2011 book, Bright Body, and her 2009 collection of new and selected poems, Dear God, Dear Dr. Heartbreak, while Willis reads from Life Watch and one of his 501 Sonnets from The Secret Reader.

The Poet Laureate of Missouri, David Clewell, has only ever wanted to be a poet--not a novelist, or an essayist, or any other kind of writer. However, he is a proponent of creating characters, fictionalizing people from his life-- the girl who got away, the conspiracy theory-loving Uncle Bud, or the father, angry with Orson Welles for getting the best of him. In this program, David Clewell reads from his two most recent books, the 2011 collection, Taken Somehow By Surprise, and his 2003, The Low End of Higher Things.  He talks about his interest in intertwining high and low culture, and his role as his state’s poetry overlord.

Sara Gruen's first two published books, Riding Lessons and the sequel Flying Changes, were billed and marketed as mass-market "women's fiction." She broke that genre mold with her 2006 novel Water for Elephants, that was adapted into a major motion picture and released in April, 2011. Gruen talks about finding the voice for the 90-year-old man who spent his early life as a veterinarian for a traveling circus, the newspaper photograph that inspired the story, her extensive research on circuses, and how she confined herself to a closet to write this book.  Her 2010 novel, Ape House, is now out in paperback. 

A veteran of the Iraq War, Brian Turner brings the realities of battle and its impact on soldiers to life in his two books of poetry: Here, Bullet, his debut collection that won several awards, including the 2007 Poets Prize, and Phantom Noise, his critically acclaimed 2010 book. He talks about his work with New Letters magazine editor, Robert Stewart, and shares how poetry helped him survive as an infantry team leader in Iraq.

In this interview before an audience at the Kansas City Public Library, Christie Hodgen talks about her novels that are populated by heartbreaking, yet funny characters: Hello, I Must Be Going and Elegies for the Brokenhearted. Both books began as short stories, so Hodgen discusses the craft of writing short and long-form fiction, and why, despite her own happy childhood, her work often deals with dysfunctional families, though handled with her trademark humor. She talks about commonalities she shares with her father, poet John Hodgen.

Poet Terrance Hayes reads from his 2010 collection, Lighthead, which won the National Book Award and was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. He talks about some of the themes in his work dealing light, shadow, and race, and also reads from his third book, Wind in a Box.  He discusses the poetic impulse and how he shapes poetry from life.

Beth Ann Fennelly has written four books of poetry in the last decade, working in creative partnership with her husband, novelist Tom Franklin. Born in New Jersey and raised in Illinois, she talks about her relocation to Mississippi and how the south now reverberates in her work. She also discusses her life as a poet, teacher, and now mother, and reads from her books of poetry, Tender Hooks, Open House, and Unmentionables, as well as her non-fiction book, Great With Child: Letters to a Young Mother.

When Kay Ryan talked with New Letters editor Robert Stewart, he gave her a self-described "debriefing" to talk about the experience of being United States Poet Laureate from 2008-2010.  Ryan reads from The Best of It: New and Selected Poems, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2011.  She discusses the mechanics of poetry, as well as her love of riding mountain bikes on the trails near her home in Marin County, California. 

In March, 2011, a gathering of State Poets Laureate occurred in Lawrence, Kansas, where current and past holders of the post from states as far-flung as Alaska and Rhode Island gathered to read and talk about their work. This program features excerpts from the first night's reading that was kicked off by former U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser. State Poets Laureate featured from this reading include South Carolina's Marjorie Wentworth, David Romdtvet from Wyoming, Peggy Shumaker of Alaska, Iowa's Mary Swander, Missouri's Walter Bargen and Wisconsin's Marilyn Taylor, and Kansas's first, second, and third laureates, Jonathan Holden, Dennis Low, and Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg. The work of these poets is included in the 2011 book, An Endless Skyway. 

After meeting at Cave Canem, the black writers’ symposium, John Murillo, Dwayne Betts, Randall Horton, and Marcus Jackson discovered they all had a shared love of the late African-American poet Etheridge Knight.  The four bonded, kept in touch, and formed their own poetry collective called “The Symphony.”  Each poet of the collective reads from his work, and discusses writing from the perspective of the African-American male experience.

Prolific poet Anne Waldman is younger than the Beat Generation, but she did know many of its prominent voices.  She talks about her life-long friendship with Allen Ginsberg, and their role in founding the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University.  This other half of the 2010 interview at the Associated Writing Programs conference features two poems from her 2011 release of Iovis III in the book The Iovus Trilogy, included in the musical recording by her son, Ambrose Bye called Matching Half.

"April is the cruelest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land..." The famous words of poet T.S. Eliot prompted us to mix this anthology of American poets, who examine the mysteries of love in various forms. Listen to former Poets Laureate Billy Collins, Charles Simic, Rita Dove, Donald Hall and Kay Ryan, whose poetry initiative is with community colleges. We also hear from poets Randall Mann, Debra Marquart, Elizabeth Alexander, Alberto Rios, and Claudia Emerson who offer their poetic insights into the ambiguous and enticing world of love, on The Cruelest Month, a finalist for the New York Festivals International Radio Award. Find out how to celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day.

Growing up in bayou country, the poet Martha Serpas became attached to the landscape and to the culture of southern Louisiana. Not surprisingly, poems about the environment and the endangered Gulf shores permeate her work, including her 2006 collection, The Dirty Side of the Storm, and her earlier book, Côte Blanche. Raised Roman Catholic, Serpas also discusses the role religion plays in her work and in her life as a lesbian and a hospital chaplain. Her poetry is included in the environmental documentary film, Veins in the Gulf. Serpas recommends the LA Gulf Response Coalition to anyone interested in helping with environmental issues in Louisiana.

Gjertrud Schnackenberg is the author of six poetry collections, including the 2010 book Heavenly Questions, and she reads from this elegiac tribute to her late husband.  Frequently cited by other prominent poets as their favorite poet, Schnackenberg discusses the technicalities of poetry, including rhyme, rhythm, iambic pentameter, and her particular love for the semicolon with New Letters magazine editor Robert Stewart. She also reads her earlier well-known poem "Supernatural Love."

The recipient of the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary, Anna Quindlen had a long career in journalism and writing syndicated columns, especially the 1980s series "Life in the 30s," which led her to becoming an unintended voice of the baby boom generation. Quindlen moved away from journalism to write fiction full-time in 1995, and developed a successful career as a novelist. She discusses her journalistic roots and the family dynamics at play in her 2010 novel, Every Last One.

Marjorie Agosin has always felt outside of her culture. Born to Chilean parents in Bethesda, Maryland, she was actually raised in Chile until political instability forced the family to return to the United States. As a blonde-haired, blue eyed Jewish girl with a thick Spanish accent, Marjorie Agosin encountered difficulties transitioning into the North American culture, and talks about how that shaped her poetry and prose.  She discusses why she continues to write in Spanish and reads from translations of her recent books, Of Earth and Sea: A Chilean Memoir and her sensual 2010 book-length poem, The Light of Desire, her tribute to Israel.

Isabel Wilkerson, author of The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration, is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist known for her narrative nonfiction.  She talks about taking a 15-year-long break from journalism to write this book that stemmed from over 1,200 interviews with many generations of African-Americans, and show she became interested in the topic because of her family’s own experience migrating from the Jim Crow South to unknown and uncertain futures and possibilities in the urban North and West. 

In this public reading entitled "Love Letters to Generations" Angela Jackson shares some of her work from the last two decades. A poet and dramatist, she reads from her first novel that has been 40 years in the making, Where I Must Go, published in 2009. She also reads from her poetry books, Dark Legs and Silk Kisses: The Beatitudes of the Spinners (winner of the 1994 Carl Sandburg Award) and the more recent books, And All These Roads Be Luminous and The Man with the White Liver.

Just in time for Valentine's Day, husband and wife poets, Terrance Hayes and Yona Harvey talk about their work and how they balance their creative lives and family. Hayes reads poems from his 2010 collection, Lighthead, which won the National Book Award in November, while Harvey shares work from her forthcoming book, Hemming the Water. Unsentimental, yet poignant, these poems enlighten the creative process.

To kick off Black History Month, we turn to our extensive archive to present this look back at the legacy of the legendary poet Gwendolyn Brooks (1917- 2000). The first African-American to win a Pulitzer Prize for her 1949 poetry collection, Annie Allen, Brooks went on to influence generations of poets. In this compilation made from 1984 and 1988 recordings, Brooks reads from her works, including her famous "We Real Cool" poem, and talks about her childhood, her decision to leave Harper & Row for a black publishing company, and the recognition of her own mortality.

Kazim Ali, a poet of Indian heritage, talks about his Muslim faith and its influences on his work, and ways in which views of biblical characters vary in Islam. A poet who is interested in autobiographical poetry, his work builds musical narratives that weave in historical references and geography. He discusses the similarity between the Persian poet Rumi and Emily Dickinson and reads from his two books, Bright Felon: Autobiography and Cities and The Far Mosque.

Fresh from a painful divorce, travel writer Maria Finn sought solace in something that made her happy: tango lessons. In her 2010 memoir, Hold Me Tight and Tango Me Home, Finn recounts how tango slowly took over her life, until a trip to the birthplace of the dance, Buenos Aires, gave her the confidence to open her heart again. Finn discusses how she mingles memoir with history to create her non-fiction.

In this conversation at the Kansas City Public Library, Scottish-born fiction writer Margot Livesey talks about her seventh book of fiction, The House on Fortune Street. This contemporary novel about four Londoners, told from the four distinct points of view, is filled with entertaining references to literary works such as Jane Eyre and Great Expectations. Livesey reads from the novel, and talks about her approach to crafting this intricate and engaging fiction, and how it compares to her earlier books, like Eva Moves the Furniture.

"Acedia" was a once-common notion--one of the "eight bad thoughts"--but it was folded into sloth as one of the seven deadly sins and vanished from common use. Poet Kathleen Norris, author of Dakota: A Spiritual Memoir and The Cloister Walk, spent time researching acedia, the state of not caring about anything. She describes her own struggle with this negative emotion that differs from depression and explores the word in her non-fiction book, Acedia and Me.

Novelist, playwright, journalist and screenwriter, Mitch Albom has written six books, including the international bestseller, Tuesdays with Morrie.  With his most recent book, Have a Little Faith, he returned to nonfiction, tracing the stories of two very different men--one, an impoverished African-American urban pastor and the other, a suburban Jewish Rabbi--and what he learned from both of them about faith and belief. Albom reads from the book, and talks about A Hole in the Roof Foundation that it benefits.  He also discusses writing in the many different genres, and even sings one of his songs from Christmas in Detroit, a CD collection that also benefits the homeless. 

Pulitzer Prize-winning short story writer, Robert Olen Butler follows his recent story collections, Intercourse and Severance: Stories, with his novel, Hell. Making humorous bows to Dante and Virgil, Butler follows a TV newsman on his pursuit of a breaking story about Satan through this underworld inhabited with characters ranging from Henry the VIII's Anne Boleyn to George Bush. He reads from the book and also talks about his views on the creative process, which are included in his non-fiction book, From Where You Dream.

A veteran of the Iraq War, Brian Turner brings the realities of battle and its impact on soldiers to life in his two books of poetry.  His debut collection, Here, Bullet, won several awards including the 2007 Poets Prize, and his 2010 book, Phantom Noise, has been highly acclaimed.  He talks about his work with New Letters magazine editor, Robert Stewart, and shares how poetry helped him survive as an infantry team leader in Iraq.

Anne Fortier is the latest in a long line of writers who draw on the legend of the doomed lovers, best known as William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.  In her novel Juliet, Fortier follows a descendant of Giulietta Tolomei, who uncovers eerie parallels between her life and that of the “real-life” Juliet.  Fortier, who was raised in Denmark, talks about writing this novel in English as opposed to her native Danish, and reflects on bilingualism and her approach to writing adventure stories.

Chosen by Publisher's Weekly as one of the Best Books of 2009, How to Sell is a funny exposé novel about the jeweler's trade, in which author Clancy Martin worked for many years before eventually becoming an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Martin talks with New Letters on the Air's Max Mosley about writing this coming-of-age story about a 16-year-old Canadian high school drop-out, and how he weaves philosophy and autobiography into this novel that has just been released in paperback.

Richard Russo, known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Empire Falls, describes his writing process as “hiking without knowing where your trails are going.”  The author returned to New Letters on the Air to talk about everything from writing screenplays to writing novels and short stories.  As, in his words, a “late-career novelist,” he learned that when he runs out of experience, he reads the terrain and weaving a story from the clues he can see ahead.  Russo reads from his newest novels, Bridge of Sighs and That Old Cape Magic.

Author Jenna Blum’s first novel, Those Who Save Us, a book about Nazis and the Holocaust, gained popularity by word of mouth and through the power of bookclubs.  She talks about the power of book clubs, and shares some insight into the New York Times bestseller.  She also briefly discusses her newest novel, The Stormchasers, which features a character with bipolar disorder.  Whether it’s Nazis mental illness and severe weather, Blum is interested in situations which allow her to explore characters who overcome great obstacles.

Irish-born author Joseph O'Neill discusses his latest novel, Netherland, which has been favorably compared to The Great Gatsby, winning the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award. Set in New York City immediately after 9/11, the novel details how two men, a Dutch financial analyst and a Trinidadian entrepreneur, bond over the love of cricket. Raised in Holland from the age of 12, O'Neill currently resides in New York's Chelsea Hotel with his family. He discusses how he uses such details in his writing, and how his fiction was influenced by an early love of poetry.

In this interview in front of an audience at the Kansas City Public Library, Marilynne Robinson, winner of the 2005 Pulitzer Prize, and most recently the 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction, discusses her classic 1980 novel Housekeeping, which was part of the NEA’s Big Read program. 

Former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky discusses his new book of prose, Thousands of Broadways: Dreams and Nightmares of the American Small Town.  Raised in Long Branch, New Jersey, where his family has a long history, Pinsky examines American small town life, and how it plays in literature, such as in Faulkner's The Hamlet. He also reads some poetry, talks about his book, The Sounds of Poetry, and gives an update on his Favorite Poem Project that was developed during his poet laureateship:  www.favoritepoem.org.

W.S. Merwin begins his term as the 17th U.S. Poet Laureate with a reading at the Library of Congress this month, and we revisit an archive conversation with him.  With a career spanning more than 60 years, Merwin has won nearly every major literary honor, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry twice--in 1971 and again in 2009.  Poet and scholar, H. L. Hix, author of Understanding W. S. Merwin (Understanding Contemporary American Literature), talks with the poet about how his work is influenced by environmental activism. A long-time resident of Hawaii, Merwin's interest in the preservation of the islands' ecology and culture are evident in readings from his 1999 book, The River Sound: Poems, as well his 1998 novel-in-verse, The Folding Cliffs: A Narrative, a fact-based fictional tale of Hawaii's tragic 19th century history.

Poet, translator, and playwright, Valerie Martinez served as the Poet Laureate of Santa Fe from 2008 through March 2010. This year also marks the publication of several of her books, including Each and Her, a poetic exploration of the murders of young women in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico; And They Called It Horizon, poems about Santa Fe written during her tenure as poet laureate; Lines and Circles, a nonfiction anthology on understanding Santa Fe that she edited as the capstone project of her laureateship; and a new edition of her book of poems, Absence, Luminescent, which won the 1997 Larry Levis Prize.

Fiction writer Lorraine Lopez was shocked earlier in 2010 when her book of short stories published by a small press became a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, alongside such luminaries as Sherman Alexie, Barbara Kingsolver and Lorrie Moore. This Vanderbilt University professor talks why she truly loves the short story format, and how it differs from writing a novel. She also reads from her now recognized collection, The Homicide Survivors Picnic and Other Stories.

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