Between The Covers : Conversations with Writers in Fiction, Nonfiction & Poetry

Four novellas, in four different genres—science fiction, horror, teen romance, and a western—Stag Dance not only interrogates genre, but gender through genre. Written over a ten year period, Torrey Peters&#8217; new book spans a decade when her own views and insights about gender were themselves changing. Placing these four novellas in conversation with each other like this now, raises all sorts of questions about identity and the construction of a self, as Peters puzzles out, through genre, the inconvenient aspects of what she calls her &#8220;never-ending transition—otherwise known as ongoing trans life.&#8221;  We look at questions of audience and risk, of writing into the taboos within one&#8217;s own community, and what it means that Torrey is less interested in exploring the binary between men and women, masculine and feminine, than the one between cis and trans, raising the question whether it is even a binary at all. We discuss the overdetermined transition narrative within trans literature and look at limit cases of cis gender performance from Kim Kardashian to Karl Ove Knausgaard to Ernest Hemingway&#8217;s late-in-life exploration of gender fluidity within his work. Whether talking about  Shakespeare or Taylor Swift, this boundary-defying conversation explodes the distinctions between high and low culture, and like her work itself, it will make you laugh, make you think, and make you reconsider what is possible. 
For the bonus audio archive Torrey contributes a reading of the first thing she wrote after she transitioned: &#8220;How To Become A Really Really Not Famous Trans Lady Writer,&#8221;  This joins incredible readings from everyone from Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore to CAConrad and is only one thing to choose from when you join the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter. You can check it all out at the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page.</a>
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-torrey-peters-stag-dance-conversation">BookShop</a> for today&#8217;s conversation.
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/torrey-peters-stag-dance/">Torrey Peters : Stag Dance</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Torrey Peters : Stag Dance

Today&#8217;s guest, one of Australia&#8217;s most celebrated and daring writers, Michelle de Kretser, discusses her latest uncategorizable book Theory & Practice (one she describes as 80% fiction, 15% essay and 5% memoir). Theory & Practice is a book that is wildly erudite and erotic at the same time, both an engrossing, immersive read and one that is constantly experimenting with and breaking form. A book that dwells in the contradictions between what we believe and what we do. And one that uses, as a lens, the liberatory power of Virginia Woolf&#8217;s published words alongside her often snobbish, racist, and antisemitic private ones, not only to explore this contradiction but also questions of gender, race, class and colonialism more broadly. You&#8217;d be just as correct, however, to call it a book about love, sex, shame and jealousy, set on a university campus in the 1980s at the height of deconstruction&#8217;s hold on the minds of its thinkers there.
If you enjoyed today&#8217;s conversation consider joining the Between the Covers community, receiving supplemental resources with each and every episode, and being able to choose from a wide variety of other gifts and rewards as well. You can check it all out at the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-michelle-de-kretser-conversation">BookShop</a> for today&#8217;s conversation with books from everyone from Ursula K. Le Guin to Shirley Hazzard to Virginia Woolf.
The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/michelle-de-kretser-theory-practice/">Michelle de Kretser : Theory &#038; Practice</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Michelle de Kretser : Theory & Practice

In late October 2023, weeks into Israel&#8217;s bombing of northern Gaza, the novelist Omar El Akkad retweeted a video taken by a Gazan man. This video showed a lifeless moonscape with endless empty streets of rubble, every building, one to the next, a hollow blown-out shell of itself. No people, no animals, the only sound the strained breath of this man stumbling through this indiscriminately obliterated city that was once a home. El Akkad captioned his tweet with the words: &#8220;One day, when it&#8217;s safe, when there&#8217;s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it&#8217;s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this&#8221; a tweet that has now been viewed over ten million times. Despite El Akkad&#8217;s past as a journalist, one who reported on some of the most notorious and fraught moments in recent U.S. history—whether embedded in Afghanistan, down at Guantanamo Bay, or reporting from Ferguson, Missouri—it was the aftermath of October 7th that was a turning point for him in relation to the West and its notions of humanism and liberalism. Together we discuss his debut work of nonfiction that resulted from this, that many characterize as his breakup letter to the West. We look at the role of language in providing cover for the middle, the centrist, the well-meaning liberal to look away and the power of language to create a climate of dehumanization, allowing the unspeakable to seem tragic but necessary.
For the bonus audio archive Omar contributes a reading of one of his favorite poems by Jorie Graham. This joins everyone from Isabella Hammad reading Walid Daqqa to Roger Reeves reading Ghassan Kanafani, to Zahid Rafiq reading Franz Kafka. If you enjoyed today&#8217;s conversation consider joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter. You can find out about all the benefits and rewards of doing so, including how to subscribe to the bonus audio, at the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-omar-el-akkad-conversation">Bookshop</a> for today&#8217;s episode.
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/omar-el-akkad-one-day-everyone-will-have-always-been-against-this/">Omar El Akkad : One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Omar El Akkad : One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This

Feminist and literary theorist, playwright, philosopher, memoirist and novelist Hélène Cixous returns to the show to discuss her latest genre-defying hybrid work of prose. Written during the first year of the pandemic, Rêvoir explores the effect of pandemic confinement on time, the effect of pandemic time on writing, and what plagues and confinement show us about the nature of time, memory, dreams, history, language, home, flight, cats, love and death. Struggling to find purchase on her own writing within the timelessness of that year, she conjures and contemplates the works of everyone from Thucydides to Kafka, Shakespeare to Shackleton, to uncover how literature always begins with an ending, always opens with no way forward. What does Cixous mean that language is haunted by writing? That it is not just the writer who writes, but the words themselves?  Join us to find out!
For the bonus audio, enjoy a long-form conversation with Cixous&#8217; translator, the poet Beverley Bie-Brahic. Given that Cixous breaks the norms of form, syntax and punctuation, not in predictable or consistent ways, but from a place of instinct and intuition, and given that her playful use of homophones in French, an essential quality of her writing that often leads where her writing ultimately goes, Cixous&#8217; writing presents some unusually difficult challenges for a translator. Something we explore with Bie-Brahic in this conversation. To learn how to subscribe to the bonus audio archive and about all the other potential benefits and rewards of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter, head over to the show&#8217;s <a style="background-color: #ffffff;" href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-helene-cixous-revoir-conversation">BookShop</a> for today&#8217;s episode.
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/helene-cixous-revoir/">Hélène Cixous : Rêvoir</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Hélène Cixous : Rêvoir

Poet Aria Aber&#8217;s debut novel Good Girl , set in the club scene of Berlin, is a book brimming over with sex and drugs and music, true. But really at its heart it is a book of self-making and unmaking, of self-destruction and self-discovery, where 19 year old Nila navigates the irresolvable dialectics of being a second generation Afghan-German immigrant, finding home neither in the world of her family nor in Germany at large. A book coursing with desire and shame, flight and pursuit, Good Girl is ultimately about the desperate need to find oneself and one&#8217;s home, whatever the cost. Where home might not be a place or a people at all, but the world of art and literature itself.
For the bonus audio archive Aria contributes a reading from Palestinian writer Yasmin Zaher&#8217;s debut novel, The Coin. This joins Isabella Hammad reading from Walid Daqqa&#8217;s prison writings, Zahid Rafiq reading Kafka, Rabih Alameddine reading Fernando Pessoa, Dionne Brand reading Christina Sharpe and much more. To learn how to subscribe to the bonus audio and the other potential benefits and rewards available when you join the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter, head over to the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-aria-aber-conversation">BookShop</a> for today&#8217;s conversation.
The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/aria-aber-good-girl/">Aria Aber : Good Girl</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Aria Aber : Good Girl

Today&#8217;s guest Zahid Rafiq discusses his debut short story collection The World With Its Mouth Open, eleven remarkable stories set in modern-day Kashmir. Prior to writing fiction Rafiq was a journalist and we explore the ways the stories he tells now, and the stories he wrote then, differ and overlap, We look at how fiction can contain the unsaid, the unknown even; how it can create space for silence, and, unlike journalism, tell the stories behind the stories. We explore the relationship of art and politics, especially when writing stories about ordinary lives and ordinary days, stories often described as quiet and understated, when they are, at the same time, set in one of the most contested and militarized places on earth.
For the bonus audio archive Zahid contributes a reading from the writings of one of the most important writers for him, Franz Kafka. He reads from the chapter &#8220;Waiting for Klamm&#8221; from his novel The Castle. To learn how to subscribe to the bonus audio archive and about all the other potential rewards and benefits of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter head over to the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-zahid-rafiq-conversation?new-list-page=true">BookShop</a> for today&#8217;s conversation.
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/zahid-rafiq-the-world-with-its-mouth-open/">Zahid Rafiq : The World With Its Mouth Open</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Zahid Rafiq : The World With Its Mouth Open

We started 2024 with <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/tin-house-live-denis-johnson-2003/">an archival recording</a> of Denis Johnson from the first ever Tin House Writers Workshop in 2003. That episode was a three-part episode: Denis Johnson reading from the manuscript of his novella Train Dreams, then being interviewed by Chris Offutt, and finally, Denis, Chris and Charles D&#8217;Ambrosio performing the first act of his play Psychos Never Dream. It turns out Denis returned to the Tin House workshop the following year, the summer of 2004. It seems a fitting way to round out the year to have the last episode of 2024 be an archival recording of his return. This episode is a two-part episode. The first half is a reading from the manuscript of what would become his National Book Award-winning novel Tree of Smoke. The second half is an extended interview of Denis by Charles D&#8217;Ambrosio. A deep dive into Johnson&#8217;s process and philosophy, and into questions of craft and influence.
If you enjoy today&#8217;s episode, consider joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter. You can find out about all the potential rewards and benefits of doing so at the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page.</a>
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/tin-house-live-denis-johnson-2004/">Tin House Live : Denis Johnson : 2004</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Tin House Live : Denis Johnson : 2004

How can a novel set during one brief moment near the end of Herman Melville&#8217;s father&#8217;s life, a moment lost to history and now fully overshadowed by his son&#8217;s enduring literary legacy, become a portal to discuss the world entire? Melvill is a novel about reading and writing, about parenthood and legacy, about madness and memory, about time and ghosts and the dead who never die. Jorge Luis Borges once called Moby Dick an &#8220;infinite novel,&#8221; one that &#8220;page by page, expands and even exceeds the size of the cosmos.&#8221; And today&#8217;s conversation with Rodrigo Fresán seems animated by this very spirit. Somehow a conversation about Herman Melville&#8217;s father not only becomes a deep meditation on Moby Dick but also, at the very same time, at the very same moment, a meditation on Argentinian literature, on imagination and place, on style and plot, on vampires and footnotes, on Borges, Bolaño, Bob Dylan, Vladimir Nabokov, and on and on into the infinite cosmos.
For those subscribed to the bonus audio archive, today&#8217;s contribution is a long-form conversation with Melvill&#8216;s translator Will Vanderhyden. We explore Will and Rodrigo&#8217;s ongoing collaboration and friendship, the challenges and joys of translating Rodrigo&#8217;s work and Will&#8217;s own journey as a translator. To learn more about the bonus audio and the other potential benefits of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter head over to the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-rodrigo-fresan-conversation?new-list-page=true">Bookshop</a> for today&#8217;s episode.
The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/rodrigo-fresan-melvill/">Rodrigo Fresán : Melvill</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Rodrigo Fresán : Melvill

What does it mean that a life can not only be animated by books but destroyed by them? That a self can be not only made by reading, but unmade by it? Dionne Brand&#8217;s latest book of nonfiction Salvage: Readings from the Wreck returns to formative texts from her own reading life in order to model a more aware and  liberatory way of reading, of thinking, of being, in relation to them. We explore what we can salvage from the wreck, the wreck that is the book before us, the wreck that is us before the book.
For the bonus audio archive Dionne reads selections from the work of Canisia Lubrin and Christina Sharpe. This joins readings, craft talks, writing prompts and more from everyone from Danez Smith to Marlon James to Nikky Finney. You can find out how to subscribe to the bonus audio and about all the other potential benefits and rewards of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-support at the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-dionne-brand-s-salvage-conversation?new-list-page=true">BookShop</a> for today.
The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/dionne-brand-salvage-readings-from-the-wreck/">Dionne Brand : Salvage : Readings from the Wreck</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Dionne Brand : Salvage : Readings from the Wreck

Danez Smith&#8217;s poetry is so many things, a poetry of resistance, of elegy, of joy, of care, of repair. Their poetry is Afrofuturist and Afropessimist. It&#8217;s nature poetry, decolonial poetry, queer poetry, a poetry that is archival and documentary. And it is also a poetry that questions poetry itself and even more so, questions the poet, a poetry that is continually in the process of self-remaking and unmaking, of forging and severing allegiances, a shapeshifting poetry, a poetry of mutual aid, a poetry reaching toward, and already singing from, an elsewhere and an otherwise. Nam Le for the New Your Times, speaking of Smith&#8217;s new book Bluff, doesn&#8217;t just suggest that this book is a major turning point for the poet, a volta within this poet&#8217;s evolution, but also suggests that Danez&#8217;s volta might also represent a turning point for American poetry at large. This twinning, of the self that is Danez to the poetry collective, feels prescient, as their poetry contains so much, and so much powerful self-examination, that it becomes an examination of all of us, for all of us, of what it means to be an &#8220;I&#8221; and what it means to be a &#8220;we.&#8221; Who better to lead us through than a poet like this?
For the bonus audio archive, Danez contributes something really special for us. As one of the six members of the Dark Noise Collective (along with Fatimah Asghar, Aaron Samuels, Franny Choi, Nate Marshall, and Jamila Woods), Danez reads a favorite poem from each of their five peers and follows each reading with a writing prompt designed for us and related to the poem just read. After five poems and five writing prompts, Danez reads a poem of their own too. This joins an ever-growing archive of supplemental material from Ross Gay reading Jean Valentine to Dionne Brand reading Christina Sharpe to Nikky Finney reading from the diaries of Lorraine Hansberry. To learn how to subscribe to the bonus audio and about all the other possible benefits of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter head over to the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-from-danez-smith-conversation?new-list-page=true">BookShop</a> for today.
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/danez-smith-bluff/">Danez Smith : Bluff</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Danez Smith : Bluff

Today&#8217;s conversation with Kenzie Allen, about her debut poetry collection Cloud Missives, is unusually wide-ranging. We look at the influence of archaeology, anthropology and cartography on her poetry, and on her notion of gaze within her work. We explore the fraught colonial history of these fields, and how, as an indigenous poet, she orients herself to her own work in this regard. We look at questions of identity, representation and stereotype both in the realm of language and art-making, and also in the realm of tribal sovereignty, looking at the colonial history of  blood quantum and its repercussions today. We also look at questions of form, both inherited forms and the creation of new ones, of both poetry on the page, and multimodal works that live off of it, from visual poetry to literary cartography to the wampum belt as an ancient form of hyper-text.
For the bonus audio archive, Kenzie contributes an extended reading of a sequence poem that she calls Love Songs to Banish Another Love Song. By reading this, she gives us a peek behind the curtain of the process of revision, because this sequence is an earlier, very different version of a much shorter poem in Cloud Missives. This joins many other supplemental readings in the archive from everyone from Jake Skeets to Layli Long Soldier, Elissa Washuta to Natalie Diaz, Brandon Hobson to Tommy Pico to Terese Marie Mailhot. You can find out how to subscribe and check out the many other possible benefits and rewards of joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter at the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a>.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-for-kenzie-allen-conversation">BookShop</a> for today.
The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/kenzie-allen-cloud-missives/">Kenzie Allen : Cloud Missives</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

Kenzie Allen : Cloud Missives

Today&#8217;s craft talk—by Torrey Peters on &#8220;Strategic Opacity&#8221;— was recorded at the 2024 Tin House summer writers workshop. Peters explores the elements in works of fiction that actually don&#8217;t make sense—from William Shakespeare to Elena Ferrante —and how, paradoxically, it is these very elements, the unexplainable ones, that can make a work of art great. Given that most actual humans make nonsensical choices and can&#8217;t be fully known as people, Peters discusses how we might write lifelike characters who don&#8217;t make sense either—but in a strategic way—writing them so that they begin to feel like the real people all around us: &#8220;the friends who make strange and frustrating decisions in their worst interests, the parents who act with sudden arbitrariness, the lovers who just won&#8217;t accept the care they need and want.&#8221; Peters then looks at the ways this revelation has deeply changed her own work.
If you enjoy today&#8217;s conversation consider joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter. Head over to the show&#8217;s <a href="http://patreon.com/betweenthecovers">Patreon page</a> to learn more.
Finally, here is the <a href="https://bookshop.org/lists/books-for-torrey-peters-craft-talk?new-list-page=true">BookShop</a> for today&#8217;s talk, which includes many of the books mentioned.
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The post <a href="https://tinhouse.com/podcast/tin-house-live-torrey-peters-on-strategic-opacity/">Tin House Live : Torrey Peters on Strategic Opacity</a> appeared first on <a href="https://tinhouse.com">Tin House</a>.

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Between The Covers : Conversations with Writers in Fiction, Nonfiction & Poetry

…

David Naimon, Tin House Books

#292

Torrey Peters : Stag Dance

#291

Michelle de Kretser : Theory & Practice

#290

Omar El Akkad : One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This

#289

Hélène Cixous : Rêvoir

#288

Aria Aber : Good Girl

#287

Zahid Rafiq : The World With Its Mouth Open

#286

Tin House Live : Denis Johnson : 2004

#285

Rodrigo Fresán : Melvill

#284

Dionne Brand : Salvage : Readings from the Wreck

#283

Danez Smith : Bluff

#282

Kenzie Allen : Cloud Missives

#281

Tin House Live : Torrey Peters on Strategic Opacity