KPFA - Radio Wolinsky

Anthony Lewis (1927-2013) discussing “Freedom for the Thought that We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment,” with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded February 4, 2008 in the KPFA studios.

In his long career, Anthony Lewis spent time as the Washington Bureau chief of the New York Times, was the author of “Gideon’s Trumpet,” about a Supreme Court case that led to free legal counsel for indigent defendants, and spent several years as an op-ed writer for the Times. He won two Pulitzer Prizes for reportage, and wrote five books alone and two books with a co-author.

In the first half of the interview, he delves into how the First Amendment came into existence, and what it really means. In the second half, he discusses the Bush Administration during the early days of the 2008 campaign. It’s clear in the interview that Bush and Cheney were the precursors for today’s current constitutional crisis.

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Chimananda Ngozi Adichie, Nigerian author of “Americanah” and four other novels, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studios, June 5, 2013.

She has written five novels, two collections of short stories, one memoir, and many articles and short stories for many newspapers, magazines, and periodicals. She is widely regarded as a central figure in postcolonial feminist literature.

Her latest novel, “Dream Count” has just been published. This interview aired in July 2013 but has never been heard in its entirety.

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Todd Haynes, independent filmmaker, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky. Recorded February 27, 2025.

The director of ten feature length films, Todd Haynes is an independent film-maker with his roots in New Queer Cinema. After coming to the attention of the film community with his short film, Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, in which the “actors” were Barbie Dolls, he achieved fame with his first feature, Poison, which told three stories in different ways, all of which commented on the AIDS epidemic. He followed that with the much-lauded Safe, and then moved on to mainstream success with the lush melodrama, Far from Heaven.

His later films include Velvet Goldmine, focusing on the glam rock era, I’m Not There, in which several actors portrayed Bob Dylan, Carol, Dark Waters, Wonderstruck, and his latest film, May December (Netflix). His documentary, Velvet Underground, is available on Apple Plus. Along the way there was a miniseries, Mildred Pierce, starring Kate Winslet, on HBO (streaming on MAX). All his films are available streaming.

The films of Todd Haynes will be shown in a retrospective, “Todd Haynes: Far From Safe,” beginning March 8th and continuing through April 12th at BAMPFA, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. Todd Haynes will be introducing some of his films (sold out). Special thanks to AJ Fox and the staff at Pacific Film Archive.

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Margaret Atwood, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studios in October 2009 while on tour for the novel “The Year of the Flood.”

One of the most distinguished authors writing today, Margaret Atwood is best known for her novel “The Handmaid’s Tale,” and well as several other novels, short stories, poems, essays and political commentary.

In this interview which originally aired October 15, 2009 but never heard in its entirety, she discusses her science fiction novel “The Year of the Flood,” second of what later became a trilogy including ‘Oryx and Crake” and “Maddadam,” along with her short novel, The “Penelopiad.” Along the way, she talks about her website for the book, her view on the names of tech companies, the nature of science fiction as prediction, and other topics. This is the seventh of eight interviews with Margaret Atwood conducted between the years 1989 and 2013.

Margaret Atwood I, 1989: Cat’s Eye, The Handmaid’s Tale

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Tom Robbins (1932-2025, author of the classic novels “Another Roadside Attraction” and “Even Cowgirls Get the Blues”, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff in the KPFA studios on May 15, 2000 while on tour for the novel “Fierce Invalids, Home from Hot Climates.”

Tom Robbins, who died on February 9, 2025 at the age of 92,  was the considered the leading chronicler of the sixties vibe. Over the course of his long life, he only wrote eight novels, one collection of short stories and a memoir over the course of his long life, but he is recognized as one of the most important voices of mid to late twentieth century America. Among his novels are Another Roadside Attraction, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, which became a film by Gus Van Sant, Still Life with Woodpecker and Jitterbug Perfume.

Tom Robbins would only write one more novel after Fierce Invalids, Titled Villa Incognito, it was published in 2003. A collection of his short writings, Wild Ducks Flying Backwards, was published in 2003, and a memoir, Tibetan Peach Pie: A true Account of an Imaginative Life, was published in 2014. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues is the only one of his books to be adapted for film. This interview has never been heard in its entirety, until now.

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Mickey Spillane (1918-2006), author of the classic crime novels, “I, The Jury” and “Kiss Me Deadly,” in conversation in 2003 with Richard A. Lupoff, introduced by Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff.

In this recently discovered recording, best-selling crime/noir novelist Mickey Spillane discusses his career as a professional writer and gives advice to writers. In the introduction, Richard A. Lupoff, the late co-host of KPFA’s Probabilities, details how the interview came to be. This was the last interview conducted by Richard A. Lupoff for KPFA.

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Lance Gardner,  Artistic Director of Marin Theatre since October, 2023, in conversation with host Richard Wolinsky.

A long-tme Bay Area actor, Lance Gardner came to Marin Theatre after a stint as a live event producer at KQED, and as Chair of the Board of Aurora Theatre. In this interview, he discusses the theatre’s fiscal health, how he hopes to increase the audience, along with details of the various upcoming shows.

Lance Gardner has earned dozens of theatre credits over the last 20 years, including six mainstage shows and a school tour at Marin Theatre Company. He has also performed in multiple shows at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, California Shakespeare Theater, Magic Theatre, TheatreWorks, and more.

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China Mieville, author of the Hugo Award winning novel, “The City and the City,” and the classic “Perdido Street Station,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky in this archive interview recorded September 1, 2002.

China Mieville is a British author of weird fantasy and science fiction, and a leftist political activist in Britain. Born in 1972, he began his literary career with an urban fantasy novel, King Rat, and followed it up with a novel considered now one of best fantasy works of the 20th Century, Perdido Street Station in 2000. This interview with China Mieville at the 60th World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose on September 1, 2002, shortly after the publication of his follow-up to Perdido Street Station, The Scar.

Since then, China Mieville wrote a third novel set in that same Bas Lag universe as Perdido Street Station, Iron Council, published in 2004, and then moved on to other worlds with six stand alone novels, the most recent being a collaboration with Keanu Reaves titled The Book of Elsewhere, set in the BRZRKR comic book universe, published in 2024. A new novel is expected some time in 2025. his novel, The City and the City, which tied for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2010, was adapted for television by the BBC in 2018 and is now available streaming on Amazon Prime.

This interview has previously never been heard in its entirety. Remastered and edited in January 2025 by Richard Wolinsky.

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Susanna Clarke, author of the classic fantasy novel, Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, interviewed September 12, 2005 in the KPFA studios.

​​​​​Back in the fall of 2004, a new fantasy novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by a newcomer, Susannah Clarke, hit the stands and became an instant classic, finding its way to best-seller lists in England and the United States, and winning the Hugo Award for 2004’s best novel at the World Science Fiction convention in 2005.

This interview with Susannah Clarke was recorded while on tour for the paperback edition of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. The interview was originally edited down to fit a half-hour KPFA slot, and no edit of the complete interview was ever made, until now.

Both Christopher Hampton and Julian Fellowes took stabs at writing a film adaptation of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, but both were unable to translate the very long novel into a screenplay, and then New Line cancelled the project. It was eventually developed into a seven -part miniseries for the BBC, and aired in both the United States and Britain in 2015. It is now streaming on Amazon Prime.

After the publication of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, and the awards, Susannah Clarke continued to work on the sequel, set in the same universe a few years later, but became bogged down, almost sentence by sentence, as chronic fatigue syndrome took its toll. By 2015, after visiting the set of the BBC production, she decided to go another route, and went back to another manuscript that likely pre-dated her best-seller. That novel, Piranesi, was published to mostly favorable reviews in 2020. She is now working on a third novel.

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