Michael Silverblatt

Last updated
Michael Silverblatt
Born (1952-08-06) August 6, 1952 (age 71)
Queens, New York, United States
Nationality American
Occupation(s)Broadcaster, radio personality

Michael Silverblatt (born August 6, 1952), a literary critic and American broadcaster who hosted Bookworm , a nationally syndicated radio program focusing on books and literature, from 1989 to 2022. [1] He recorded over 1600 interviews with authors and other literary figures, including David Foster Wallace, Salman Rushdie, William Gass, W.G. Sebald, and John Ashbery.

Contents

Bookworm was broadcast by Los Angeles public radio station KCRW.

Early life

A lifelong voracious reader, Silverblatt was born in Queens, New York, into a Jewish family, attended SUNY Buffalo, majored in English, then entered postgraduate studies at Johns Hopkins University but dropped out. [2]

Later, he moved to Los Angeles with the intention of becoming a screenwriter. But after impressing KCRW's general manager during a discussion of Russian poetry at a dinner party, he was offered his own radio show. [3]

KCRW Bookworm

On Bookworm, Silverblatt interviewed a variety of writers, including such contemporary authors as W. G. Sebald, T. C. Boyle, David Foster Wallace, William Gass, Zadie Smith, Steve Erickson, Lorrie Moore, Joy Williams, Tao Lin, Joshua Cohen, Maggie Nelson, Dave Eggers, Ann Beattie, Karl Ove Knausgaard, and Richard Powers. He called his interviews "conversations" and did not use prompts or question sheets. Critics and interviewees noted Silverblatt's well-preparedness; he always read his interviewee's work in advance.[ citation needed ]

Underwritten by the Lannan Foundation, Bookworm was distributed free of charge to around 50 U.S. radio stations. [4] Silverblatt worked on the show unpaid for its first five years. [5]

Literary critic

Silverblatt coined the term transgressive fiction. [6]

Silverblatt's Los Angeles Times review of William Gass's The Tunnel was blurbed on the cover of its paperback release: "The most beautiful, most complex, most disturbing novel to be published in my lifetime." [7]

Silverblatt wrote an introduction to a reissue of Kenward Elmslie's The Orchid Stories. [8]

In 2018, Silverblatt was the inaugural recipient of the Deborah Pease Prize, awarded by A Public Space magazine for being a "figure who has advanced the art of literature". [9]

In 2023, The Song Cave published Bookworm: Conversations with Michael Silverblatt, [10] a selection of notable interviews by Silverblatt.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ha Jin</span> Chinese-American writer

Jin Xuefei is a Chinese-American poet and novelist using the pen name Ha Jin (哈金). Ha comes from his favorite city, Harbin. His poetry is associated with the Misty Poetry movement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carlos Fuentes</span> Mexican writer (1928–2012)

Carlos Fuentes Macías was a Mexican novelist and essayist. Among his works are The Death of Artemio Cruz (1962), Aura (1962), Terra Nostra (1975), The Old Gringo (1985) and Christopher Unborn (1987). In his obituary, The New York Times described Fuentes as "one of the most admired writers in the Spanish-speaking world" and an important influence on the Latin American Boom, the "explosion of Latin American literature in the 1960s and '70s", while The Guardian called him "Mexico's most celebrated novelist". His many literary honors include the Miguel de Cervantes Prize as well as Mexico's highest award, the Belisario Domínguez Medal of Honor (1999). He was often named as a likely candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature, though he never won.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William H. Gass</span> American fiction writer, critic, philosophy professor (1924–2017)

William Howard Gass was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, critic, and philosophy professor. He wrote three novels, three collections of short stories, a collection of novellas, and seven volumes of essays, three of which won National Book Critics Circle Award prizes and one of which, A Temple of Texts (2006), won the Truman Capote Award for Literary Criticism. His 1995 novel The Tunnel received the American Book Award. His 2013 novel Middle C won the 2015 William Dean Howells Medal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William T. Vollmann</span> American writer and journalist

William Tanner Vollmann is an American novelist, journalist, war correspondent, short story writer, and essayist. He won the 2005 National Book Award for Fiction with the novel Europe Central.

William Joseph Kennedy is an American writer and journalist who won the 1984 Pulitzer Prize for his 1983 novel Ironweed.

<i>Infinite Jest</i> 1996 novel by David Foster Wallace

Infinite Jest is a 1996 novel by American writer David Foster Wallace. Categorized as an encyclopedic novel, Infinite Jest is featured in Time magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels published between 1923 and 2005.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">KCRW</span> Public radio station in Santa Monica, California

KCRW is a National Public Radio member station broadcasting from the campus of Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California, where the station is licensed. KCRW airs original news and music programming in addition to programming from NPR and other affiliates. A network of repeaters and broadcast translators, as well as internet radio, allows the station to serve the Greater Los Angeles area and other communities in Southern California. The station's main transmitter is located in Los Angeles's Laurel Canyon district and broadcasts in the HD radio format. It is one of two full NPR members in the Los Angeles area; Pasadena-based KPCC is the other.

Grand Street was an American magazine published from 1981 to 2004. It was described by The New York Times as "one of the most revered literary magazines of the postwar era."

Stephen Michael Erickson is an American novelist. The author of influential works such as Days Between Stations, Tours of the Black Clock and Zeroville, he is the recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters award, the Lannan Lifetime Achievement Award and a Guggenheim fellowship.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Larry McCaffery</span> American author and professor

Lawrence F. McCaffery Jr. is an American literary critic, editor, and retired professor of English and comparative literature at San Diego State University. His work and teaching focuses on postmodern literature, contemporary fiction, and Bruce Springsteen. He also played a role in helping to establish science fiction as a major literary genre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lydia Davis</span> American novelist

Lydia Davis is an American short story writer, novelist, essayist, and translator from French and other languages, who often writes short short stories. Davis has produced several new translations of French literary classics, including Swann's Way by Marcel Proust and Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert.

Allan Gurganus is an American novelist, short story writer, and essayist whose work, which includes Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All and Local Souls, is often influenced by and set in his native North Carolina.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christopher Sorrentino</span> American writer (born 1963)

Christopher Sorrentino is an American novelist and short story writer of Italian and Puerto Rican descent. He is the son of novelist Gilbert Sorrentino and Victoria Ortiz. His first published novel, Sound on Sound (1995), draws upon innovations pioneered in the work of his father, but also contains echoes of many other modernist and postmodernist writers. The book is structured according to the format of a multitrack recording session, with corresponding section titles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tao Lin</span> American novelist

Tao Lin is an American novelist, poet, essayist, short-story writer, and artist. He has published four novels, a novella, two books of poetry, a collection of short stories, and a memoir, as well as an extensive assortment of online content. His third novel, Taipei, was published by Vintage on June 4, 2013. His nonfiction book Trip: Psychedelics, Alienation, and Change was published by Vintage on May 1, 2018. His fourth novel, Leave Society, was published by Vintage on August 3, 2021.

Alexander Louis Theroux is an American novelist and poet. He is known for his novel Darconville's Cat (1981), which was selected by Anthony Burgess for his book-length essay Ninety-Nine Novels: The Best in English Since 1939 – A Personal Choice in 1984 and by Larry McCaffery for his 20th Century's Greatest Hits list.

<i>The Tunnel</i> (novel) 1995 novel by William H. Gass

The Tunnel is a 1995 novel by the American author William H. Gass. The novel took 26 years to write and earned him the American Book Award of 1996, and was also a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner award.

Tom Lutz is an American writer, literary critic and the founder of the Los Angeles Review of Books.

<i>Just Kids</i> 2010 book by Patti Smith

Just Kids is a memoir by Patti Smith, published on January 19, 2010, documenting her relationship with artist Robert Mapplethorpe.

<i>My Back Pages: Reviews and Essays</i>

My Back Pages: Reviews and Essays by Steven Moore is a collection of book reviews that were originally published in periodicals from the late 1970s onward.

<i>Bookworm</i> (radio show) KCRW show hosted by Michael Silverblatt

Bookworm is an interview radio show hosted by Michael Silverblatt and produced by KCRW. The show featured interviews and discussions with authors and other literary figures. The show ran from 1989 to 2022, syndicated nationally on NPR.

References

  1. George, Lynell (April 20, 1997). "The Reader". Los Angeles Times. p. E1. Retrieved March 7, 2022 via Newspapers.com.
  2. George, Lynell (April 20, 1997). "The Reader". Los Angeles Times. p. E4. Retrieved May 9, 2022 via Newspapers.com.
  3. Canto, Minerva (October 23, 1999). "Bookworm". The Item (Sumter, SC). Associated Press. p. E4. Retrieved May 9, 2022 via Newspapers.com.
  4. "Bookworm". Nrcdxas.org.
  5. Davis, Kristy (October 2009). "The Consummate Reader". O, The Oprah Magazine .
  6. Word Watch December 1996 from The Atlantic Monthly
  7. March 1995 from Los Angeles Times
  8. October 25 2016 from The Paris Review
  9. "Silverblatt Wins Inaugural Pease Prize". PublishersWeekly.com. Retrieved 2023-11-16.
  10. March 31 2023 from Kirkus Reviews