Lucy Sante on An Anthology of New York Poets (ed. Ron Padgett & David Shapiro)

For the final episode of our 2026 season, Mike talks with Adam Erlich Sachs (recipient of a 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction) about the historical Kantian thicket of Heinrich von Kleist's Michael Kohlhaas, translated by Michael Hoffman. Adam Ehrlich Sachs is the author of three works of fiction—Gretel and the Great War (2024), The Organs of Sense (2019), and Inherited Disorders: Stories, Parables, and Problems (2016). The recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Literature (2018) and an American Academy in Berlin Fellowship (2019), Sachs lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with his family.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Mike chats with S. Shakthidharan (or Shakthi) about Hilda Rosner's translation of Siddhartha, Herman Hesse's classic novel of self-discovery and enlightenment. S. Shakthidharan was born in Sri Lanka and raised in Sydney, Australia, where he currently lives. His plays include Counting and Cracking (with Eamon Flack) and The Wrong Gods. Shakthidharan is the recipient of the Green Room Award for Outstanding New Australian Writing (2024) and the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award and Prize for Drama (2020), among other honors.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Prize Director Michael Kelleher talks with 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Nonfiction recipient Kei Miller about Yuval Noah Harari's sprawling and sometimes controversial book Sapiens and about how humanity is fiction (and vice-versa). Kei Miller is a Jamaican poet, essayist, and novelist, shortlisted for the Costa Poetry Award and winner of the prestigious Forward poetry prize for his collection The Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion. His most recent book is the essay collection Things I Have Withheld, out in 2021. His story collection Fear of Stones was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book, and his most recent novel, Augustown was a finalist for the PEN Open Book Award, and won the Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the Prix Les Afriques, and the Prix Carbet de la Caraïbe et du Tout-Monde. In 2010, the Institute of Jamaica awarded him the Silver Musgrave medal for his contributions to Literature and in 2018 he was awarded the Anthony Sabga medal for Arts & Letters. He has taught at the Universities of Glasgow, Royal Holloway and Exeter and, in 2019, he was the Ida Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor to the University of Iowa.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Mike talks with 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction recipient Gwendoline Riley about Mark Van Doren's rangy, American, and endlessly-re-readable Shakespeare. Plus, a good Top 5 list of Shakespeare's plays!Gwendoline Riley was born in London. She is the author of seven novels, including First Love, My Phantoms, and most recently, The Palm House.   In 2018, the Times Literary Supplement named her one of the twenty best British and Irish novelists working today. She won the 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction.The Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast is a production of Literary HubHosted by Michael KelleherTheme music by Dani LencioniProduced and edited by Drew BroussardSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Mike Kelleher talks with Joyelle McSweeney, recipient of a 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Poetry, about Anne Carson's vibrant translation of Euripides's Iphigenia Among the Taurians and what it means to see a different side of a well-known story. Joyelle McSweeney is the author of ten books of poetry, drama and prose, a well-known critic, and a vital publisher of international literature in translation. Winner of a Guggenheim Fellowship for Poetry (2022) among other honors, McSweeney is also co-founder and co-editor of Action Books. She is currently Chair of the English Department and the William P. and Hazel B. White Professor of English at the University of Notre Dame.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Christina Anderson, a 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize recipient for Drama, talks with Michael Kelleher about Wallace Shawn's seminal, strange, and recently-revived 1990 monologue The Fever.Christina Anderson is a playwright, tv writer, screenwriter, and educator. Her work has been produced across the country including theaters such as Berkeley Rep, Goodman Theatre, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Portland Center Stage, and Yale Rep. A Tony nominated writer for Outstanding Book of a Broadway musical, Anderson has received the Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award, the Horton Foote Prize, the United States Artists Fellowship, MacDowell Fellowship, Lily Awards Harper Lee Prize, Herb Alpert nomination, Barrymore Nomination for Outstanding New Play, and New Dramatist residency. She’s taught playwriting at Rutgers University, SUNY Purchase, Wesleyan University, Yale School of Drama, and served as the interim Head of Playwriting at Brown University. An avid photographer for nearly ten years, the Magnum award review described Christina's work as "compelling" and "poignant." Since 2019, she has produced hip hop instrumentals under the moniker Purely Magenta.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Karen Solie, recipient of a 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Poetry, talks with prize director Michael Kelleher about Nobel laureate Tomas Tranströmer's Selected Poems.The Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast is a production of Literary HubHosted by Michael KelleherTheme music by Dani LencioniProduced and edited by Drew BroussardSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The new season of The Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast kicks off with Lucy Sante, recipient of a 2026 Windham-Campbell Prize for Non-fiction, talking with Prize Director Michael Kelleher about the long-out-of-print and tremendously influential An Anthology of New York Poets, edited by Ron Padgett and David Shapiro.The Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast is a production of Literary HubHosted by Michael KelleherTheme music by Dani LencioniProduced and edited by Drew BroussardSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Winter comes once again to an end, or something close to it — and so too does our winter mini-series, with Marina Carr (recipient of a 2017 Windham-Campbell Prize for Drama) chatting with prize director Michael Kelleher about Virginia Woolf's 1927 novel, To the Lighthouse.Marina Carr was born in 1964 and grew up in County Offaly. She graduated from UCD in 1987. Her plays include Low in the Dark, This Love Thing, Ullaloo, The Mai (Best New Play, Dublin Theatre Festival), Portia Coughlan (Susan Smith Blackburn Award), By The Bog of Cats (Irish Times/ ESB Award for Best New Play), On Raftery’s Hill,  Woman and Scarecrow, a version of Hecuba, and Gilgamesh. She has been Writer-in-Residence at Trinity College, the Abbey Theatre, Princeton University and was the first John McGahern Writer-in-Residence in St Patrick’s College, Drumcondra/DCU. Marina Carr is a member of Aosdána and lives with her family in Dublin.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The winter mini-season rolls on with Michael R. Jackson, recipient of a 2021 Windham-Campbell Prize for Drama, talking to prize director Michael Kelleher about Sam Greenlee's 1969 cult-classic novel, The Spook Who Sat By the Door. Michael R. Jackson is the writer and composer of the Pulitzer and Tony-winning A Strange Loop as well as White Girl in Danger. Most recently, he wrote the libretto for Consequences in Sue (which just premiered in Philadelphia). He also wrote lyrics and co-wrote the book for the musical adaptation of the 2007 horror film Teeth with composer and co-bookwriter Anna K. Jacobs. He holds a BFA and MFA in playwriting and Musical Theatre Writing from the NYU Tisch School of the Arts. He has received a Jonathan Larson Grant, a Lincoln Center Emerging Artist Award, an ASCAP Foundation Harold Adamson Award, a Dramatist Guild fellowship, and was the 2017 Williamstown Theatre Festival Playwright-In-Residence. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.