The combative broadcaster’s memoir mixes engaging snapshots of his early career with some score-settling and a robust defence of his interviewing styleJohn Humphrys is the first to admit he doesn’t deal well with authority. He inherited it from his father, who refused to use the service entrance at the grand houses where he worked as a French polisher and, as a child, once watched his aunt get a humiliating dressing-down from the vicar for missing church. Humphrys had his own brush with condescending authority figures when he was in hospital with a cyst on his spine at 13, and an “arrogant posh bastard consultant” told his retinue of trainees it was because he didn’t wash regularly. “I don’t like being defined or told what to do, whoever is in charge,” he notes, a stance that has proved useful for grilling politicians (he has interviewed eight prime ministers), though it has also landed him in hot water.His memoir mixes engaging snapshots of his early career and analysis of the evolution of broadcasting with diatribes and petty score-settling. The early chapters tell of his passage from teen lackey on the Penarth Times in Wales, where his main task was standing outside the local church taking the names of those attending weddings and funerals, to being the first journalist on the scene at the Aberfan disaster, near Merthyr Tydfil, in which 116 children and 28 adults died after a colliery tip collapsed. Later he became a BBC foreign correspondent, reporting on the 1971 war... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2019-10-10 06:30:10 UTC ]
Flatiron signs a novel by Whiting Award winner Caitlin Greenidge, Legacy Lit nabs a memoir by podcaster Jonathan Conyers, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-10-14 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Prince Shakur’s debut memoir When They Tell You to Be Good starts with an argument between him and his mother which recalls the image of his father’s murder, a man he never got to know. In unflinchingly honest detail Shakur traces his own journey of self actualization as a queer, Black Jamaican... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2022-10-13 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Her win also marks the ascendancy of the memoir as the leading genre of our time. Continue reading at New Yorker
[ New Yorker | 2022-10-09 17:07:05 UTC ]
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“A woman is a useful symbol for the splay of land on which such a free man saunters.” Rachel Richardson on Thoreau, running, and the pleasures of not quite knowing where you’re going. | Lit Hub Memoir In praise of multiple narrators: Rubén Degollado recommends Dawnie Walton, Tommy Orange, Juan... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-07 10:30:18 UTC ]
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Jada Pinkett Smith's memoir will take readers on 'a rollercoaster ride from the depths of suicidal depression to the heights of personal rediscovery.' Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-06 19:59:48 UTC ]
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The French writer, who was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, blurs the line between fiction and memoir with spare prose she has characterized as “brutally direct.” Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-10-06 16:13:27 UTC ]
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“Cheever drank. Roth womanized. My grandfather wrote quietly in his office for 60 years.” Alison Fairbrother on learning lessons—in writing and life—from her grandfather, E.L. Doctorow. | Lit Hub Memoir Nina Totenberg reflects on her long friendship with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a champion of “small... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-06 10:30:07 UTC ]
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As Tony Montana would probably say if he were a literary agent: In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the memoir. That’s right! Al Pacino is reportedly in talks to sell his first memoir […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-05 14:49:52 UTC ]
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David Ulin talks with Lynne Tillman about "Mothercare," her memoir on managing her mother's decline — just as he begins a similar journey. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-09-29 13:00:09 UTC ]
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“Love and writing are the only two things in the world that I can bear, the rest is darkness.” Read from Annie Ernaux’s lovelorn 1988 diary. | Lit Hub Memoir Why do we overuse (ecstatic!! hyperbolic!!!) language? Emily McCrary-Ruiz-Esparza investigates. | Lit Hub The slow decline of glory:... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-09-27 10:30:29 UTC ]
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Companies providing ghostwritten autobiographies for people wanting to share histories have seen surge in trade since CovidBrian Lewis grew up on a tough council estate after arriving in Britain as part of the Windrush generation. At the age of eight he developed an interest in chess and joined... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2022-09-24 14:00:06 UTC ]
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Random House and Celadon announce upcoming editions of the House Select Committee’s January 6 report, Currency takes on a memoir by YouTuber and former banker Gary Stevenson, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-09-23 04:00:00 UTC ]
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“It took months of OCD treatment and two Brené Brown books to understand there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in writing—there are only decisions.” Elissa Bassist reflects on treating her writers’ block by treating her OCD. | Lit Hub Memoir Sometimes, altering the canon is a good thing: How The Rings... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-09-16 10:30:58 UTC ]
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Anne Heche died in August of injuries she sustained from a fiery car crash. She published her first memoir, "Call Me Crazy," in 2001. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-09-15 21:01:10 UTC ]
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Javier Zamora talks about "Solito," his harrowing memoir about journeying from El Salvador to the U.S. as an unaccompanied 9-year-old. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-09-15 14:00:30 UTC ]
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Jann Wenner might just as accurately have called his doorstop of a memoir “I Am Very Rich, and All My Friends Are Extremely Famous.” Continue reading at The Washington Post
[ The Washington Post | 2022-09-15 13:55:59 UTC ]
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A refreshingly intimate account of Enninful’s rise from refugee status to editor-in-chiefEdward Enninful’s memoir gives the impression of someone in perpetual motion. He has, after all, made the journey from refugee to the hallowed offices of Condé Nast, becoming the editor-in-chief who brought... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2022-09-15 10:00:43 UTC ]
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Start Publishing’s Viva Editions imprint will release Anne Heche’s memoir 'Call Me Anne' on January 24. An award-winning actress, Heche died in August in a car crash in Los Angeles just as she was completing the book. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-09-14 04:00:00 UTC ]
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The cartoonist’s Ducks is a devastating memoir about life in the oil sands of northern Alberta, Canada. Continue reading at Wired
[ Wired | 2022-09-13 11:00:00 UTC ]
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“Life’s Work” is a memoir of outrageous youth, creative obsessions and ruinous habits. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-09-12 15:07:05 UTC ]
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