Sunday

May 28, 2000

Weather

by May Swenson

Broadcast Date: SUNDAY: May 28, 2000

Poem: "Weather," by May Swenson, from Nature (Houghton Mifflin).

On this day in 1951, the BBC broadcast the first Goon Show, a madcap sketch comedy program that featured Peter Sellers, Harry Secombe, Michael Bentine and Spike Milligan. The rather conservative BBC didn't know what to make of the show, which pushed silliness about as far as it could be pushed, but it ran for 9 years.

It's the birthday of American writer Stephen Birmingham, born in Hartford, Connecticut (1932), author of books about rich people: Our Crowd: The Great Jewish Families of New York (1967), Real Lace: America's Irish Rich (1973), California Rich (1980), and Certain People: America's Black Elite (1977).

It's the birthday of poet May Swenson, born in Logan, Utah (1919), author of nine collections of poetry, including Selected Things Taking Place (1979).

"Analysis of Baseball"

"Analysis of Baseball"

It's done
on a diamond,
and for fun.
It's about
home, and it's
about run.


It's the birthday of Southern novelist Walker Percy, born in Birmingham, Alabama (1916). When Percy was thirteen, his father committed suicide; his mother died two years later in a car crash. Percy and his two brothers were adopted by their father's cousin, a wealthy and educated man who lived in Greenville, Mississippi, in a home visited by historians, novelists, psychologists and poets. Percy left for college intending to pursue a career in medicine. He got his M.D. from Columbia College, and began his residency at Bellevue Hospital in New York City at age 25. As a working pathologist, he was called upon to perform autopsies on indigent alcoholics, many of whom had died of tuberculosis. Within a year, Percy contracted the disease himself and spent the next three years in a sanatorium, where he immersed himself in French and Russian literature, philosophy, and psychology. He wrote two unpublished novels before The Moviegoer (1961) came out: it won the National Book Award for fiction in 1962. His other books include Love in the Ruins (1971), and The Second Coming (1980).

It's the birthday of mystery and children's fiction writer Ian Fleming, born in London (1908). He started writing at the age of 44: his only purpose was to make money and provide entertainment. He found astounding success with his series of espionage novels featuring the dashing hero, James Bond: Casino Royale (1953), Live and Let Die (1954), From Russia, with Love (1957), Doctor No (1958), Goldfinger (1959). Like Bond, Fleming had a taste for cigarettes and gin, luxury, gambling, and beautiful women.

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.®

 

«

»

  • “Writers end up writing stories—or rather, stories' shadows—and they're grateful if they can, but it is not enough. Nothing the writer can do is ever enough” —Joy Williams
  • “I want to live other lives. I've never quite believed that one chance is all I get. Writing is my way of making other chances.” —Anne Tyler
  • “Writing is a performance, like singing an aria or dancing a jig” —Stephen Greenblatt
  • “All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath.” —F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • “Good writing is always about things that are important to you, things that are scary to you, things that eat you up.” —John Edgar Wideman
  • “In certain ways writing is a form of prayer.” —Denise Levertov
  • “Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.” —E.L. Doctorow
  • “Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” —E.L. Doctorow
  • “Let's face it, writing is hell.” —William Styron
  • “A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.” —Thomas Mann
  • “Writing is 90 percent procrastination: reading magazines, eating cereal out of the box, watching infomercials.” —Paul Rudnick
  • “Writing is a failure. Writing is not only useless, it's spoiled paper.” —Padget Powell
  • “Writing is very hard work and knowing what you're doing the whole time.” —Shelby Foote
  • “I think all writing is a disease. You can't stop it.” —William Carlos Williams
  • “Writing is like getting married. One should never commit oneself until one is amazed at one's luck.” —Iris Murdoch
  • “The less conscious one is of being ‘a writer,’ the better the writing.” —Pico Iyer
  • “Writing is…that oddest of anomalies: an intimate letter to a stranger.” —Pico Iyer
  • “Writing is my dharma.” —Raja Rao
  • “Writing is a combination of intangible creative fantasy and appallingly hard work.” —Anthony Powell
  • “I think writing is, by definition, an optimistic act.” —Michael Cunningham
Current Faves - Learn more about poets featured frequently on the show