Host Christopher Merrill talks with Australian writer Julienne van Loon about her forthcoming collection of essays titled, The Thinking Woman, due out in March 2019 by NewSouth Books. Focused on six living, contemporary women thinkers, writers, and philosophers, van Loon engages with their work and their ideas on work, wonder, play, and much more. Van Loon also discusses her novel-in-progress, Instructions for a Steep Decline, and about how research can be a playful creative practice.
Dec 15, 2018•26 min
Host Kathleen Maris Paltrineri talks with Japanese poet Yoshimasu Gozo about literary translation and his recent collection from New Directions, titled Alice Iris Red Horse: Selected Poems of Yoshimasu Gozo. They also discuss the relationship of touch, sound, color, and fragment in building creative worlds as well as the poet’s transcription of poet and philosopher Yoshimoto Takaaki’s poetry as a form of honoring his work.
Nov 15, 2018•37 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Ugandan science fiction writer and filmmaker Dilman Dila about his work in teaching storytelling to filmmakers. They also talk about how his disability propelled him into becoming an artist.
Oct 14, 2018•31 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with London-based Singaporean writer Sharlene Teo about her award-winning novel Ponti. They discuss how her novel utilizes the Southeast Asian mythical creature of the Pontianak, a cannibalistic entity that kills and eats men, to explore a cultural reassignment of fear.
Sep 15, 2018•15 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Somali-Italian writer Ubah Cristina Ali Farah about how her novels tell the stories of the Somali civil war and its refugees in Italy. They also discuss her work of collecting stories from migrant women for oral history projects, and the role Somali theatre played in anti-colonial fights during the 1950s and 1960s.
Aug 14, 2018•21 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with German writer Esther Dischereit about her groundbreaking work Joëmis Tisch – Eine jüdische Geschichte [Joëmi's Table – A Jewish Story], which is a collection of thoughts, questions, and problems regarding life as a Jewish person in postwar Germany. They also discuss her collaborative creative works, and her efforts toward discovering what is revealed when examining the relationship between truth and doubt.
Jul 15, 2018•25 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Burmese poet Maung Day about defying censorship with performance art and the history of Burmese poetry as well as his translation between Burmese and English of poetry and literature.
Jun 15, 2018•26 min
Guest host Kathleen Maris Paltrineri talks with Zimbabwean and South African writer Panashe Chigumadzi about literature’s relationship to feminism, jazz, and anti-racist discourse as well as Chigumadzi’s forthcoming collection of essays, 𝘉𝘦𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘧𝘶𝘭 𝘏𝘢𝘪𝘳 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘗𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦.
May 15, 2018•36 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Hungarian writer, Kinga Tóth, about national identity, as well as her award winning project 𝘔𝘰𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘍𝘢𝘤𝘦𝘴.
Apr 15, 2018•35 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Macedonian writer, Vladimir Martinovski, about the music of verse, as well as writing in Macedonian literature.
Mar 15, 2018•32 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Kenyan writer Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor about the courage of addressing historical darknesses, as well as her first novel, Dust.
Feb 15, 2018•22 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Basque writer Kirmen Uribe about his literary achievements in The New Yorker and elsewhere, as well as his novel Bilbao-New York-Bilbao.
Jan 15, 2018•26 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Indian poet and translator Akhil Katyal about the influence of the poet Agha Shahid Ali, the technique of writing in different languages, as well as his forthcoming work, The Doubleness of Sexuality: Idioms of Same-Sex Desire in Modern India.
Dec 15, 2017•28 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Mauritian writer Shenaz Patel about the recognition of the sovereignty of Chagos Archipelago, as well as her Novel, Le Silence des Chago.
Nov 15, 2017•34 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with South African writer Zp Priya Dala about being a psychologist and physical therapist and the Black Consciousness Movement, as well as her novel, The Architecture of Loss.
Oct 15, 2017•31 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Palestinian writer Alice Yousef about the difficulties of writing in Arabic and overcoming the challenges of portraying the complicated subjects presented as a part of the Palestinian experience, as well as her poem, How to Survive an Evening in a War Zone.
Sep 15, 2017•30 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Cypriot writer Stephanos Stepanides about the complexity of the notion of home and the creative and subversive nature of literary translation, as well as his film, Poets in No Man's Land.
Aug 15, 2017•31 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Finnish writer Henriikka Tavi about the rebirth of Finnish literature, conceptualism, publishing, and her new novel that is as she says, “Gertrude Stein meets chick lit.”
Jul 15, 2017•30 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Argentinian writer Mariano Tenconi Blanco about his play, Everything would make sense if death did not exist, about the way he works with slang and voice to shape character, his admiration for Jorge Luis Borges, and the ways that he creates a procedure, or a hypothesis, around which his plays are organized.
Jun 15, 2017•33 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with New Zealand writer Courtney Sina Meredith about her latest book of stories, Tail of the Taniwha, and their underlying Pasifika Politique. They also discuss the strength Meredith receives from her family and her community, and the importance of mentorship amongst artists.
May 15, 2017•36 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Singaporean writer Tse Hao Guang about his latest poetry collection, Deeds of Light. They also discuss the challenges of defining a literature by nation or even by language.
Apr 15, 2017•28 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Chinese writer Zhou Jianing about the influence of Japanese literature on contemporary Chinese authors, her interest in urban narratives, and the disorientation that comes with writing in a rapidly growing society. She also describes translation as a peaceful language practice devoid of ego and her experience translating into Chinese the works of American authors like Flannery O’Connor, Jeanette Winterson, Alice Munro, and others.
Mar 15, 2017•27 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Sri Lankan writer Ameena Hussein about Hussein’s novel, The Moon in the Water, and its strong female protagonist. They also discuss Hussein’s sociological research on migrant Muslim women in Los Angeles, and Hussein’s role as co-founder of the Perera Hussein Publishing House.
Feb 15, 2017•33 min
Host Christopher Merrill talks with Indian writer Vivek Shanbhag about Shanbhag’s novel, Ghachar Ghochar, and the challenges of writing a story set in a rapidly changing society. They also discuss the ways memory can be built into language and the Indian writer who had an early influence on Shanbhag’s work
Jan 15, 2017•29 min
