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Writers Center Stage

Goldberg photo and link
Myla Goldberg

Lethem photo and link
Jonathan Lethem

Whitehead photo and link
Colson Whitehead
Nancy Pearl photo and link to our Pearl's Picks page
with Nancy Pearl
 

Young Literary Icons: A Discussion 

Ohio Theatre • 3.3.09

 

Missed the show? 
Read what the Plain Dealer had to say 

 

This program featured up-and-coming authors
Myla Goldberg, Jonathan Lethem, and Colson
Whitehead. Bestselling author and National
Public Radio book reviewer Nancy Pearl 
moderatee the discussion.

 

  • Myla Goldberg’s bestselling novel Bee Season, garnered popular and critical acclaim and was adapted into a 2005 award-winning film.
  • Prolific author and MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant” recipient Jonathan Lethem’s recent novels include You Don’t Love Me Yet 
    and the bestsellerThe Fortress of Solitude.
  • Author and MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant” recipient Colson Whitehead has been praised for his inventive writing style. He is best known for the novel The Intuitionist.

  


 

Myla Goldberg   |    Jonathan Lethem   |    Colson Whitehead

 

 

 

Goldberg photo and link to catalog listingMyla Goldberg

 

Online Biography of Myla Goldberg


Websites - Myla Goldberg
 


Bold Type 
Goldberg discusses Bee Season, its characters and her writing.

NPR Interview 
Goldberg talks about her second novel, Wickett’s Remedy, set in
Boston during the 1918 flu epidemic. (Audio 8 min.)

Powell’s Ink Q & A
Goldberg answers imaginative questions like what fictional character
she’d most like to date.

“Song for Myla Goldberg” 
How many novelists have a song written for them? Watch live concert
footage of The Decemberists performing their “Song for Myla Goldberg.”
(Video 4 min.)

 

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Works by MYLA GOLDBERG

 

Book cover and catalog link
Bee Season 

Nine-year-old Eliza Naumann is considered an unspectacular
child -- until she surprises everyone by winning her school
spelling bee. But just as Eliza begins to shine,
her family starts falling apart.

 


Book cover and link to catalog
Time's Magpie: A Walk in Prague

Myla Goldberg lived in Prague in 1993, just as the process of
Westernization was getting under way. In 2003, she returned
to see what the pursuit of capitalism had wrought and to observe
the integral ways in which Prague's character had endured.

 


Book cover and link to catalog
Wickett's Remedy

Lydia's husband quits medical school to create a mail-order patent
medicine called Wickett's Remedy, and just as Lydia (an Irish American
shopgirl) begins to adjust to her husband's new vocation, the Spanish flu
epidemic of 1918 begins, while the illegitimate offspring of the Remedy,
QD Soda is transformed into a soft drink empire by Wickett's ex-partner.



 

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Lethem photo and link to catalog Jonathan Lethem

 

Online Biography of Jonathan Lethem


Websites - Jonathan Lethem


 

Lethem’s Home Page 
Highly entertaining and creative home page. Log on just to see what the ego is doing in the glove compartment (log on; you’ll see).

Powell’s Interview 
This in-depth interview covers his early works through The Fortress of Solitude (2003), his most autobiographical novel.

BBC Interview 
Listen to Lethem on John Wayne, memory and hyperreality – all topics in The Disappointment Artist, his 2005 collection of essays. (Audio 7 min.)

Harper’s: The Ecstasy of Influence 
Lethem questions the sanctity of copyright, asserting that no creative work is truly, completely original.

 

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Selected Works by JONATHAN LETHEM 

 

Book cover and catalog link
The Disappointment Artist: And Other Essays 

In a volume he describes as “a series of covert and
not-so-covert autobiographical pieces,” Lethem
explores the nature of cultural obsession.

 


Book cover and link to catalog
Fortress of Solitude

Dylan Ebdus grew up white and motherless in downtown
Brooklyn in the 1970s, where entertainment includes muggings
along with  stoopball. Dylan has one friend, a black teenager,
also motherless, named Mingus Rude.

 


Book cover and link to catalog
You Don't Love Me Yet

Lucinda Hoekke works for the Complaint Line where she meets
and falls in love with one of the complainers. She is also in a
rock band. When she suggests some of the Complainer's
philosophical musings to the lyricists the band takes off
and the Complainer insists on joining the band.

 

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Whitehead photo and catalog linkColson Whitehead

 

Online Biography of Colson Whitehead

 

Websites - Colson Whitehead

 

Whitehead’s Home Page 
Keep up with what he’s doing, reading and thinking via his blog.

Interview by Nancy Pearl  
Whitehead discusses his writing career with NPR commentator Nancy Pearl.
Pearl asks questions that uncover the interesting stories behind his books.
(Video 29 min.)

“I Write in Brooklyn. Get over It.”  
Whitehead skewers the hype about writing in Brooklyn, saying it’s
not much different than writing anywhere else.


BookVideos: “Sag Harbor” 
Whitehead takes you to the streets of Sag Harbor, NY – where he spent summers
as a teen in the ‘80s – to talk about his upcoming novel, Sag Harbor.
Look for it in April 2009. (Video 4 min.)

 

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Works by COLSON WHITEHEAD

 

Book cover and catalog link
Apex Hides the Hurt 

The town of Winthrop has decided it needs a new name. 
In a culture overwhelmed by marketing, the name is
everything  and the efforts of our hero, a nomenclature
consultant, may result in not just a new name for the town,
but a new and subtler truth about it.

 


Book cover and link to catalogThe Intuitionist

As two factions at the Department of Elevator Inspectors--
the Empiricists and the Intuitionists--wage war on each other,
Intuitionist Lila Mae, the first black elevator inspector, faces
bedlam when an elevator freefalls on her watch and the
mysterious notebooks from the founder of Intuitionism
suddenly appear.

 


Book cover and link to catalog
John Henry Days

On assignment for a travel website, J. Sutter, a young
African-American freelance journalist, heads for West Virginia
to cover the "John Henry Days" festival in honor of the new U.S.
postage stamp honoring John Henry and discovers the real-life
story of John Henry and its relevance to his own life and times.

 

coming this April...

Book cover and link to catalog
Sag Harbor

Growing up for Benji has been very confusing. He is the only
black kid in an all-white school, but in the summer he spends
his time in Sag Harbor, which is an all-black community. Will
Benji find a way to make sense of his two different worlds,
or will he be stuck in his own awkwardness?

 

 

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