This Weekend

Bob Edwards Weekend Highlights – May 1-2, 2010

 

HOUR ONE

 

Alex de Campi is the author of a 24-epsiode graphic novel titled Valentine.  It’s published every month in 14 languages to ereaders, smartphones, and shortly the web. Valentine is a creative commons work that allows its readers to pay what they can, which has helped build a global fanbase over the comic’s first four episodes. As part of our series on the publishing industry Bob talks with de Campi about her work, her approach to digital platforms, and how she plans to make enough money to quit her day job some day.

 

Richard Russo is a Pulitzer-prize winning novelist and screenwriter. His career has stretched over twenty-five years, and as part of our series on the publishing industry, Bob talks with Russo about changes he’s encountered in the past quarter Century and expectations on authors for the future. Russo’s latest novel, That Old Cape Magic, is available in paperback in June.

 

In this week’s installment of our ongoing series This I Believe, Bob talks with curator Dan Gediman about the essay of Walter Lanier “Red” Barber.   Red Barber was a play-by-play announcer from 1933 – 1966, working for the Cincinnati Reds, the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Yankees. In retirement, he wrote seven books and appeared in weekly conversations with Bob Edwards on NPR. Barber was among the first broadcasters honored by the Baseball Hall of Fame.

 

HOUR TWO

 

Director Anne Henderson’s documentary Battle of Wills is a historical mystery about the legitimacy of a portrait that its owners claim to be the only picture of William Shakespeare painted during his lifetime.

 

Master novelist Ian McEwan’s new book Solar tells the story of a Nobel Prize-winning physicist who, at this mid-point in his career, is happy to coast along on his famous name, even while his personal life falls apart around him.  McEwan is the Booker Prize winning author of the novels Atonement, Saturday, and Amsterdam.