Re:sound #21: The Raymond Carver Show
This hour: the difficult, brief, and brilliant life of writer Raymond Carver.
2005 / TCF / WBEZ 91.5, USA
This hour: the difficult, brief, and brilliant life of writer Raymond Carver.
There is in the Soul a Desire for Not Thinking: The Double Life of Raymond Carver
by Alfred Koch and Lea Redfern (ORF, Austria, 2001)
The life of Raymond Carver was right out of one of his own short stories: difficult, brief, and brilliant. He's been called the modern-day Chekov, and his work often draws comparisons with Hemingway.
Carver hadn't been very well known in Austria, where this documentary was originally produced, but after the release of Robert Altman's Short Cuts, Carver's short stories (which were the basis of Altman's film) were finally translated into German, generating something of a Carver explosion. Then, this story aired. Koch was, as he puts it, "heavily Carver addicted" at the time of this production, and the care with which he approached it shows.
This episode of Re:sound was produced by Roman Mars.
produced by
Alfred Koch has been with the ORF (Austrian Radio) since 1976. Since 1995 he has been a producer and author for the Feature Departement of the Austrian Radio.
Lea Redfern has been making radio since the early 1990s when she was seduced by the intimacy, independence, and creative possibilities allowed by the medium.
Roman Mars (@romanmars) is the creator of 99% Invisible , a short radio show about design and architecture.