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A curated selection of videos, including book trailers, brief interviews, and other literary curiosities updated daily.
"With first drafts, the best feeling, and sort of the rarest, is when I also don't know what's going to happen.... It's a wonderful pleasure, you're writing the way a reader reads." In this video from the Chicago Humanities Festival, Karen Russell speaks with Time Out Chicago's Laura Pearson about her process. Russell shares how she found her agent Denise Shannon in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
"I have a good poker face because I'm half dead inside." Colson Whitehead reads excerpts from his new book, The Noble Hustle, chronicling his experience preparing for, and then competing in, the World Series of Poker. Read Kevin Nance's interview with Whitehead—on how he met his agent Nicole Aragi—in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
"I think of a book as an extended hand, it's a gesture, from someone who has attempted to make meaning out of their own experience." Author Alex Gilvarry speaks with Scott Cheshire about his debut novel High as the Horses' Bridles—the story of a child preacher, his faith, and his vision of the end of the world. An interview with Cheshire by Victor LaValle is in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
"Life, in general, is both comic and tragic. In every moment of real sadness, you can almost find something hysterical to laugh at." Debut novelist Mira Jacob discusses The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing with tuxedo-clad five-year-old Zakir. Jacob was interviewed by Amanda Eyre Ward for the just-released July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
"Every so often, he woke up and found himself further down the path, though the terrain was nearly identical." Ohio author Eric Shonkwiler's debut novel, Above All Men, was published by Midwestern Gothic back in March. Read more about the indie press in a previous installment of Small Press Points.
David Julius Caesar Salad sets up his manual typewriter in New York City's Central Park, prompting passersby to pick a subject. It's poetry on demand: He types out the poem while patrons wait on the benches nearby, and reads the poem to them when he's finished.
The Library of Congress announced today that Charles Wright is the new U.S. poet laureate. In this clip, Wright, the author of nearly two dozen poetry collections, most recently Caribou (FSG, 2014), reads his poem "Together" for PBS NewsHour.
Courtney Maum's debut novel, I Am Having So Much Fun Here Without You, was released yesterday by Touchstone, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. Maum was interviewed by Maggie Shipstead for the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, coming soon.
The recipient of this year's Jackson Poetry Prize, Claudia Rankine, was honored last night at a reception hosted by Poets & Writers, Inc. In this video from the Split This Rock Poetry Festival, Rankine reads from her book Citizen: An American Lyric, forthcoming from Graywolf Press in October. "And you are not the guy but still you fit the description because there is only one guy who is always the guy fitting the description."
"My mother taught me this trick. If you repeat something over and over again it loses its meaning." In this short film, poet Phil Kaye performs his poem "Repetition," a personal piece about his struggles as a child dealing with his parents' divorce (including developing a stutter) and the power of words.
