649: Ezza Ahmed!

On this week’s show Chrissy Kolaya talks to Dobby Gibson about his latest poetry volume, Hold Everything, now out with Graywolf Press.

In this week’s show, John speaks with Jonathan Lethem about the pull of Brooklyn and obsession, the craft of guiding the reader through unusual storytelling, and bold balancing acts as storytellers.

This episode features a Drunken Odyssey takeover of Orlando's longest-running, and also only, current-events inspired reading series.

In this week’s show, John speaks with debut novelist C. Michelle Lindley's, whose The Nude is a page-turning literary meditation on the madness of the commerce of art and labor and relationships and all sorts of things.

On #649, John speaks with recent writer-in-residence at the Kerouac Project of Orlando, the poet Ezza Ahmed.

In this week's show, John talks to opera director Yuval Sharon about the past and perhaps future rebirths of opera, while advocating for the relevance of this provocative art form. Yuval's new book, A New Philosophy of Opera, is lucid, persuasive, passionate, and fun.

On this week’s show, John King talks to the two-time former poet laureate Billy Collins about his latest collection, Water, Water, and how, if the window doesn't open up for the composition of poetry, once should strive to find a trampoline in the woods, and how one can learn from the poetic breakers of decorum.

On #646, John talks to Charles Bock about his extraordinary new memoir, how to make grief readable, the everyday struggles of writing and publishing, and the sacred perfection of the film of The Princess Bride.

On #645, Jeff Shuster and John King delve into two miraculously trashy John Waters films from the 1970s, Pink Flamingos (1972) and Desperate Living (1977), to cap off our annual Schloctoberfesting.

On this week’s show, Jeff Shuster and I delve into David Lynch's first film feature, Eraserhead. We consider the existential threat of re-animated chickens, hyper-sexual surrealism, and other important matters.