KPFA - Radio Wolinsky

Rebecca Makkai, “I Have Some Questions For You,” 2023

Rebecca Makkai, whose latest novel is “I Have Some Questions for You,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Rebecca Makkai is the author of three earlier novels, The Great Believers, The Hundred Year House and The Borrowers, and one collection of stories, Music for Wartime. This latest novel is a mystery of sorts that takes place in a New England boarding school and involves a murder that took place twenty years earlier, a murder in which an athletic coach was arrested and convicted, b...

John Sayles, “Jamie MacGillivray, The Renegade’s Journey,” 2023

John Sayles discusses his latest novel, “Jamie MacGillivray, The Renegade’s Journey,” along with his work as a writer and film-maker, with host Richard Wolinsky. John Sayles is best known for his work as a director, screenwriter and actor, though this is his sixth novel. Among the films he directed are Lone Star, Sunshine State, Eight Men Out, Matewan, The Brother from Another Planet, Baby It’s You and Passion Fish. His acting credits include small roles in several films, and he wrote the scr...

Joe Ngo, actor/performer, “Cambodian Rock Band,” 2023

Joe Ngo, who plays the role of Chum, the father, in “Cambodian Rock Band,” by Lauren Yee, and won an Obie for his performance at the Signature Theatre in New York, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Joe Ngo is an actor and musician, and has been performing in “Cambodian Rock Band” since its origins at the Ground Floor, Berkeley Rep’s Center for the Creation and Development of New Work in 2016 before moving on to Houston and New York. Previously he acted in regional theatre in both “King o...

Robert Olen Butler, “Perfume River,” 2016

Robert Olen Butler, author of the novel “Perfume River,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studios, October 25, 2016. Robert Olen Butler is the author of several novels and short story collections. His collection,  “A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain” won the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. The author of sixteen novels and six collections of short stories, his best-known works focus on the legacy of Vietnam, either looking at the war itself or on its aftermath in ...

Paul Auster, “4 3 2 1”, 2017

Paul Auster, 2010 Brooklyn Book Festival, creative commons. Paul Auster, author of several novels, screenplays, books of poetry and film director, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded on February 14, 2017 in the KPFA studios while on tour for his still most recent novel, 4 3 2 1. Paul Auster’s novel is an epic 850 page story of how circumstance changes us. Archie Ferguson takes four different directions in this novel: in one his family has become rich, in another they’re poor...

Luis Alfaro, playwright, “The Travelers,” 2023

Luis Alfaro, playwright, whose latest play is “The Travelers,” at the Magic Theatre in Fort Mason, San Francisco, February 15 – March 5, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Luis Alfaro is a Los Angeles-based Chicano activist and playwright, on the faculty at USC, whose plays have been performed throughout the United States and who is a former playwright in residence at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, discusses his life and career in this full hour interview. Among his previous works ...

Fay Weldon (1931-2023) I, “The Cloning of Joanna May,” 1990

Fay Weldon (1931-2023) who died on January 4th, 2023 at the age of 91, published 31 novels during her lifetime, including The Life and Loves of a She Devil, one of four novels which later became films. She was also a playwright, short story writer, television writer and non-fiction author. Richard A. Lupoff and Richard Wolinsky interviewed her in the KPFA studios in March 1990 while she was on tour for her now classic novel, The Cloning of Joanna May. Fay Weldon’s career continued for the nex...

Jane Smiley, “A Dangerous Business,” 2023

Jane Smiley, whose latest novel is “A Dangerous Business,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. The author of seventeen adult fiction novels, two short story collections, five non-fiction works plus several young adult novels, Jane Smiley is the Pulitzer Prize winning author of “A Thousand Acres,” and more recently The Last Hundred Years Trilogy. She current teaches creative writing. “A Dangerous Business” takes us to Monterey, California in the early 1850s as Eliza Ripple, newly widow...

Dennis Lim: “Tale of Cinema,” the films of Hong Sangsoo

Dennis Lim, film critic and Artistic Director of the New York Film Festival and author of “Tale of Cinema,” an examination of the work of South Korean film-maker Hong Sang-soo, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Dennis Lim was previously the the director of programming of the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Before that he was film editor at the Village Voice, and has taught at Harvard University and NYU. His first book, David Lynch: The Man from Another Place, was published in 2015. ...

Jack O’Brien, “Jack in the Box, or How to Goddamn Direct,” 2023

Jack O’Brien, theatre director and author of Jack in the Box, or How to Goddamn Direct, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Jack O’Brien has won three Tony Awards and has been nominated seven times. The former artistic director of The Old Globe in San Diego, from 1981 to 2007, he’s one of the premier directors working in America today. Among his Broadway shows are The Full Monty, Hairspray, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Catch Me If You Can and The Coast of Utopia. He directed the much lauded 2...

Suzy McKee Charnas (1939-2023), “The Vampire Tapestry,” 1981

Suzy McKee Charnas, in the 1980s. Suzy McKee Charnas (1939-2023), in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded over Halloween Weekend, 1981 at the World Fantasy Convention in the Claremont Hotel in Berkeley. Suzy McKee Charnas, who died on January 2nd, 2023 at the age of 83, was a novelist and short story writer focusing on fantasy and science fiction. Over a career that began in 1974 with her first novel, Walk to the End of the World, she wrote eleven novels and several short stories, win...

Frank Galati (1943-2023), theatre director and librettist, 2019

Frank Galati (1943-2023), who died on January 2, 2023 at the age of 79, was a giant in American theatre. A long-time member of the legendary Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, Frank Galati was winner of Tony Awards for the adaptation and direction of The Grapes of Wrath in 1990, was nominated for an Oscar for co-adapting The Accidental Tourist for the screen, and was the director of Ragtime and The Pirate Queen on Broadway. Frank Galati is also known for adapting several other works for...

Richard Adams, “The Plague Dogs,” 1978

Richard Adams in the mid 1970s upon publication of Watership Down. Richard Adams (1920-2016) interviewed in 1978 by Richard Wolinsky. First posted January 1, 2017. Richard Adams, the author of “Watership Down,” “Plague Dogs” “Shardik” and other novels, died on Christmas Eve, 2016 at the age of 96. Born in 1920, he served as a liaison officer during World War II, and later joined the civil service, rising to the rank of Assistant Secretary to the Ministry of Housing. Past the age of fifty and ...

Douglas Preston, “Lost City of the Monkey God,” 2017

Encore podcast first posted March 12, 2017. Douglas Preston, author of “The Lost City of the Monkey God” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studios, January 13, 2017. Douglas Preston has written several works of fiction and non-fiction, including a best-selling series of thrillers co-written with Lincoln Child (the Agent Pendergast series). In his latest work of non-fiction, Preston delves into the story of a lost city in Honduras, in Mosquitia, and a civilization th...

Shelley Singer (1939-2022), mystery author and KPFA book critic, 1986

Shelley Singer (1939-2022), mystery author of six Jake Samson mysteries and four Barrett Lake mysteries, and former book reviewer on KPFA, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff, recorded on November 19, 1986 at her East Bay home. Mystery and suspense novelist Shelley Singer died of heart failure on November 10, 2022 at the age of 83. The author of six mysteries, two science fiction novels, one mainstream novel and several short stories, she was a key writer in the Sister...

William Gibson, “Pattern Recognition,” 2003

William Gibson is best known as the father of the Cyberpunk movement in science fiction, beginning with “Neuromancer” in 1984 and continuing to his most recent novel, “Agency,” published in 2020. Its prequel in the Jackpot series from 2014, “Peripheral” is now an Amazon Prime TV series. On February 4, 2003, he was in the KPFA studios on the book tour for his novel, “Pattern Recognition”  and was interviewed by Richard Wolinsky. In the interview he discusses his history as a writer, and the hi...

Derek Goldman, co-playwright/director, “Remember This” at Berkeley Rep

Derek Goldman, co-playwright (with Clark Young) and director of “Remember This: The Lesson of Jan Karski,” starring David Straithairn, playing at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through December 18th, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Recorded by zencastr on November 16, 2022. “Remember This: The Lesson of Jan Karski,” tells the story of holocaust witness Jan Karski, who was sent to Poland to report back on what he’d seen. When he returned to the United States and Britain, no one belie...

Julie Powell (1973-2022), “Cleaving” and “Julie & Julia,” 2009

Julie Powell (1973-2022) was the best-selling author of  “Julie & Julia,” which was based on her blog posts in which she duplicated all of Julia Child’s recipes in the classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking. She was interviewed by Richard Wolinsky on December 16, 2009 while she was on tour for her second (and it turned out, her last) book, Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat and Obsession. Julie Powell died of cardiac arrest on October 26, 2022 at the age of 49. Shortly before her deat...

Emma Rice, playwright/director, “Wuthering Heights,” at Berkeley Rep

Photo: Steve Tanner Emma Rice, whose latest production, an adaptation of Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights” plays at Berkeley Rep’s Roda Theatre November 18th through January 1st, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Emma Rice was formerly the Artistic Director of Kneehigh Theatre, which brought several shows to Berkeley Rep, including Brief Encounter, and The Wild Bride, along with 946 (The Story of Adolpho Tips). Her new company, Wise Children, as formed in 2017 following a short sti...

Lisa Ramirez, playwright, “The Book of Sand” at Oakland Theater Project, 2022

Lisa Ramirez, playwright, “The Book of Sand” at the Oakland Theater Project, November 11 – December 4th, and Associate Artistic Director of the Oakland Theater Project, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Lisa Ramirez is a bi-coastal actor and playwright. She recently appeared in “Water by the Spoonful” at San Francisco Playhouse. Among the plays she has written are “Exit Cuckoo,” a one-person play about nannies, and “To the Bone.” During the pandemic shutdown, she presented a solo ve...

Helen Benedict, “Map of Hope and Sorrow,” 2022

Eyad and Helen. Photos: Ehab Onan Helen Benedict, co-author (with Eyad Awwadawnon) of “Map of Hope and Sorrow: Stories of Refugees Trapped in Greece,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Helen Benedict is the author of seven novels, including “Wolf Season” and “Sand Queen,” and five books of non-fiction. Her latest book, “Map of Hope and Sorrow,” co-written by Eyad Awwadawnon, a Syrian refugee who was planning to get a law degree in Damascus, is partly an oral history of refugees comi...

George Saunders, “Liberation Day,” 2022

George Saunders, author of the short story collection, Liberation Day, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. George Saunders is the highly acclaimed author of several short story collections, including “Tenth of December,”  and “CivilWarLand in Bad Decline,” and others, along with political commentary that has appeared in The New Yorker and other magazines. He won the 2017 Booker Prize for his only novel to date, “Lincoln in the Bardo.” This latest collection, “Liberation Day,” contains nine...

From the Probabilities Archive: Clive Barker, “Weaveworld,” “Hellraiser,” 1987

Clive Barker, noted horror and dark fantasy author, in conversation with the Probabilities crew, Richard A. Lupoff, Lawrence Davidson and Richard Wolinsky, recorded September, 1987 while he was on tour for his fantasy novel, “Weaveworld.” Digitized, remastered and edited in October 2022. Hosted by Richard Wolinsky. The last quarter of the 20th century was a golden age of horror novels. Leading the pack, of course, was Steven King. But there was also Peter Straub, Anne Rice, Dean Koontz and se...

Jesse Green, NY Times theatre critic, “Shy.” 2022

Jesse Green, New York Times theatre critic, and co-author of “Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Mary Rodgers (1931-2014) was the daughter of composer Richard Rodgers, and is best known as the composer of the hit musical “Once Upon a Mattress” and the novel, “Freaky Friday,” which has been adapted into various media. But she is also known as the best friend of composer Stephen Sondheim, as well as for knowing, as the book points...

Cory Doctorow, “Home Land”, 2013

Cory Doctorow, science fiction author and internet activist, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded February 9, 2013  while on tour for the novel “Home Land, ” a sequel to “Little Brother.” The author of several novels, short stories, graphic novels, essays and non-fiction works, Cory Doctorow is probably best known for his advocacy for liberalizing copyright law, and digital rights management. He served as co-editor of the blog Boing Boing until 2020, though he remains co-owner...

Glenn Frankel, “The Searchers: The Making of an American Legend,” 2013

Glenn Frankel, author of “The Searchers: The Making of an American Legend,” recorded on April 10, 2013, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. “The Searchers,” as Glenn Frankel explains at the start of the interview, is one of America’s iconic movies. Directed by John Ford, and starring John Wayne, it explores several themes in this country’s life, including racism and so-called manifest destiny. Since that time, Glenn Frankel has written two additional in-depth books about iconic Americ...

Vauhini Vara, “The Immortal King Rao,” 2022

Vauhini Vara, author of the novel,  “The Immortal King Rao,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Recorded via zencastr September 8, 2022. Vauhini Vara studied at the Iowa Writers Workshop, worked as tech reporter at The Wall Street Journal and wrote for the business section of The New Yorker. She is a contributing writer at Wired. Her upcoming collection of short stories, This is Salvaged, will be published in 2023. The Immortal King Rao tells two stories, that of a fictional tech bil...

Stephen King, “The Dead Zone,” 1979

Stephen King, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky and Lawrence Davidson, while on tour for The Dead Zone, recorded September 8, 1979 at Dark Carnival Bookstore in Berkeley, and posted in honor of his 75th birthday on September 21, 2022. At the time of this recording, Stephen King had only written a handful of books — Carrie, Salem’s Lot, The Shining and the Stand preceding The Dead Zone. There were also two novels under the pseudonym Richard Bachman, which was still a secret at the time. ...

Peter Straub (1943-2022), 1993

Peter Straub (1993-2022), in conversation with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff, recorded April 4, 1993 while on tour for his novel, “The Throat,” third in a thematic trilogy that included “Koko” and “Mystery.” Peter Straub, who died on September 4th, 2022 at the age of 79, was a master of horror and supernatural fiction whose work erased any distinction between genre and the literary world. Among his best known novels were Ghost Story, Shadowland, Floating Dragon, The Hellfire Club, an...

Stuart Woods (1938-2022), 1993

Stuart Woods (1938-2022) who died on July 22, 2022 at the at the age of 84, wrote over one hundred novels in a career spanning forty years. In this interview recorded May 10, 1993 with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff, he discusses his recent novels L.A. Times and New York Dead, as well as his career and his dealings with Hollywood. Best known for his first novel, Chiefs, published in 1981, most of Stuart Woods’ books featured a former NYPD detective turned attorney named Stone Barringt...

Salman Rushdie, “Joseph Anton,” 2012

Salman Rushdie discussing his memoir of his years in hiding from the fatwa, “Joseph Anton” with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded September 25, 2012. The recent attack on the famed author brought back memories of the fatwa issued by the Ayatollah Khomeini regarding the publication of the novel “The Satanic Verses.” The death threat forced Salman Rushdie into hiding for a decade, out of which he emerged and eventually resumed a normal life. In this wide-ranging interview, he discusses how it aff...

Joyce Carol Oates, “Blonde,” 2000

Joyce Carol Oates, author of “Blonde,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff, recorded May 3, 2000 in the KPFA studios. ​​​​​Joyce Carol Oates is one of American’s greatest writers, and one of its most prolific. Over a career that spans nearly sixty years, according to Wikipedia she’s written 58 novels, and according to Good Reads, has had 116 books published. She has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for fiction five times and has been nominated and won many other ...

Hershey Felder, “Chopin in Paris,” 2022

Hershey Felder discusses his stage show, “Chopin in Paris,” playing at TheatreWorks Mountain View August 19 through September 11, 2022 with host Richard Wolinsky. Over the past 29  years, Hershey Felder has been performing one-person plays with his piano accompaniment, focusing on a variety of different composers, including George Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein, Tschaikovsky, Beethoven and others. He has also created film versions of these and others, which can be found at his website, hersheyfe...

The Gershwin Project IV: Michael Feinstein, 1991

Michael Feinstein, American songbook performer, discussing his work as archivist for Ira Gershwin with host Richard Wolinsky, Michael Feinstein is an American singer, songwriter and classicist of the American songbook. At the age of 20, he was hired to help Ira Gershwin archive his collection of recordings and preserving unpublished Gershwin sheet music. He continued that task for the next seven years. By the 1980s he was a well known cabaret performer, and soon had several CDs under his belt...

Jonathan Lethem, Career Retrospective, 2016

Jonathan Lethem: Live Career Retrospective, hosted by Richard Wolinsky. On March 3, 2016, Richard Wolinsky had a chance to sit down with author Jonathan Lethem in front of a Berkeley audience as a benefit for KPFA. Jonathan is the author of several novels, including Motherless Brooklyn, Fortress of Solitude, Chronic City and Dissident Gardens, along with short story collections and a book of essays, The Ecstasy of Influence. The event was intended as a career retrospective; the first 45 minut...

Christopher Moore, “Razzmatazz,” 2022

Christopher Moore, author of “Razzmatazz,” “Noir,” and other novels of comic fantasy and horror, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Christopher Moore has eighteen novels to his credit, including Practical Demonkeeping, Bloodsucking Fiends, Fool and Secondhand Souls, many of which take place in San Francisco, where he now lives. Razzmatazz, his latest novel, is a follow-up to Noir, and takes us back to the City by the Bay in 1946, and the world of Chinatown and North Beach, and lesbia...

Harlan Coben, “Fool Me Once,” 2016

An interview with Harlan Coben, author of Fool Me Once. Hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Encore Podcast originally posted on April 21, 2016. From the 2016 podcast description: Harlan Coben is the best-selling author of 28 fast-paced novels of suspense and has won virtually every major award in the field. His latest book, Fool Me Once, features a protagonist suffering from PTSD. Eight of his novels feature an amateur detective in the sports field named Myron Bolitor. He also has a young adult seri...

Susan Faludi, “In the Darkroom,” 2016

Susan Faludi talks with host Richard Wolinsky about her book, In The Darkroom, winner of the 2016 Kirkus Prize and a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize. This encore podcast was first posted on October 5, 2016. In The Darkroom remains Susan Faludi’s most recent book to date. In The Darkroom is about a search for identity … specifically the identity of her father, who moved to Hungary and had a sex-change operation late in his life, and with whom she reconnected. Susan Faludi is the author of...

Peter Brook (1925-2022), legendary director, “Battlefield,” 2017

Peter Brook and Richard Wolinsky. Peter Brook (1925-2022), visionary director, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Peter Brook was one of the greatest theatrical directors of the twentieth century. Artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company for twenty years from 1962-1982, he transformed how the English speaking world looked at the plays of William Shakespeare. He is perhaps best known, during those years, for his production of “The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat ...

Garry Marshall (1934-2016), 2012

Richard Wolinsky & Garry Marshall, May 9, 2012. Encore Podcast: An Interview with Garry Marshall (1934-2016) hosted by Richard Wolinsky. First posted July 20, 2016. Garry Marshall died on July 19, 2016 at the age of 81. Over the course of his life, he was a comedy writer, actor, director, and television show-runner, creating shows such as Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, and Mork and Mindy, and directing such successful films such as Overboard, Pretty Woman, The Princess Diari...

David Sedaris, “Happy Go Lucky,” 2022

David Sedaris, whose latest collection of essays is titled “Happy Go Lucky,” in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Originally known for his commentaries on “This American Life” on NPR, David Sedaris has now written 13 books, all of which have become best-sellers, including the early “Me Talk Pretty One Day,” and later “Calypso,” “Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls,” and collections of his diaries. He has a home in North Carolina, and lives in England. In this wide-ranging interview he dis...

Christine Dwyer, actor/performer, “Ragtime” at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. 2022

Christine Dwyer, who plays “Mother,” along with characters in the ensemble, in the current production of the musical “Ragtime” at TheatreWorks Mountain View Center for the Arts, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Ragtime is based on the E.L. Doctorow novel, and concerns the changes in music, women’s rights, and the experience of Black Americans at the turn of the 20th Century. In the interview, Christine Dwyer discusses how she came to the role, the various elements that came up duri...

Christine Dwyer, actor/performer, “Ragtime” at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley

James Salter (1925-2015), “Burning the Days,” 1997

James Salter (1925-2015) was what’s known as a writer’s writer. Author of several novels, screenplays (including the Robert Redford film Downhill Racer) collections of essays and short fiction and travel works, he came on tour to Berkeley for his memoir, Burning the Days, which discussed his life as an army pilot and as a writer. He was interviewed at KPFA on October 7, 1997 by Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff. Digitized, remastered and re-edited in 2016 by Richard Wolinsky. The post Ja...

KJ Sanchez, director & co-adapter, “Romeo y Juliet,” at Cal Shakes

KJ Sanchez, director and co-adapter (with Karen Zacarias) of “Romeo y Juliet” at Cal Shakes, California Shakespeare Theatre, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded via zencastr on May 20, 2022. Playwright, actor and director, KJ Sanchez is the head of the MFA Directing Program at the University of Texas in Austin. She is founder and CEO of American Records, a theatre company founded “to make plays that chronicle our time,” focusing on documentary plays based on interviews. She is the...

Jason Minadakis, Artistic Director Marin Theatre Company, 2022; director, “The Sound Inside.”

Jasson Minadakis, Artistic Director of Marin Theatre Company and director of “The Sound Inside,” by Adam Rapp, which runs May 26 – June 19, 2022, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. In his fifteenth year as Artistic Director at Marin, Jasson Minadakis has directed numerous plays both here and elsewhere. In this interview recorded outdoors due to Covid restrictions, he discusses how Marin Theatre Company coped with the pandemic shut-down, the use of streaming, and the difficulties in r...

J.G. Ballard (1930-2009), 1988

An interview with legendary author J. G. Ballard (1930-2009), conducted for KPFA’s Probabilities radio program on May 8, 1988, digitized and re-edited in 2016 by Richard Wolinsky. This encore podcast was originally posted on May 13, 2016. J. G. Ballard, who died in 2009 at the age of 78, was one of the greatest of all British speculative fiction writers, and one of the major writers of the period known as the British New Wave. In novels such as The Crystal World and The Drowned World, and in ...

Hanya Yanagihara, “A Little Life,” 2016

A conversation with Hanya Yanagihara, author of the best-selling novel, A Little Life, hosted by Richard Wolinsky. This encore podcast was originally posted on March 17, 2016 and was recorded on February 22, 2016. Hanya Yanagihara’s 2015 novel, A Little Life, made a huge splash in the literary world. This story of a group of friends in New York , this long narrative received terrific reviews and was one of six finalists for the prestigious Man Booker Prize. A former editor for Conde Nast Trav...

Don Winslow, “City on Fire,” 2022

Don Winslow, author of “City on Fire,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded at Book Passage bookstore in Corte Madera on April 27, 2022. Don Winslow is the author of 21 novels, many of which focus on crime and the criminal underworld, including The Cartel, The Force, Savages (which became an Oliver Stone film), and The Border. His latest novel, “City on Fire,” tells the story of a mob war in the 1980s in Rhode Island using as a template the story of the Trojan War, The Iliad, the O...

Jim Harrison (1937-2016), “Returning to Earth,” 2007

Jim Harrison, who died on March 26th, 2016 at the age of 78, was one of those figures people call “larger than life.” A novelist, essayist, poet, screenplay writer and master of the novella, Harrison dealt in his work with issues such as mortality, illness, living the solitary life, redemption and absolution, work that, as the NY Times obituary said, captured the resonant, almost mythic soul of 20th-century rural America. Among his best known novels were Legends of the Fall and Wolf, both of ...