915. Alejandro Zambra and Megan McDowell

Otherppl with Brad Listi

Brad Listi

Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.8 • 554 Ratings

🗓️ 28 April 2024

⏱️ 82 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Alejandro Zambra is the author of the story collection My Documents, available from Penguin Books. Official April pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Megan McDowell is the book's translator. Zambra is the author of ten books, most recently Chilean Poet and Multiple Choice. The recipient of numerous literary prizes, as well as a New York Public Library Cullman Center fellowship, he has published fiction and essays in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The Paris Review, and Harper's Magazine, among other publications. He lives in Mexico City. McDowell is the winner of the 2022 National Book Award for Translation and the recipient of a 2020 Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, among other awards. She has been nominated four times for the International Booker Prize. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, everybody, welcome to the program. This is The Other People Show, a weekly podcast featuring
0:11.6	in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. I am Brad Listy, and I'm in Los Angeles. It's good to be
0:17.9	with you. Appreciate you tuning in. Hope you're doing all right.
0:21.1	Don't forget to subscribe to this show wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also
0:27.0	subscribe on YouTube, follow the show on social media, TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, and
0:33.8	Blue Sky. So today I have a bit of a special episode. and blue sky.
0:41.8	So today I have a bit of a special episode.
0:44.4	I have two guests for the price of one.
0:49.8	First of all, I will be in conversation with Alejandro Sambra,
0:53.9	author of the story collection, My Documents.
1:03.4	Maybe when we talk about our work publicly, we are not that honest,
1:09.8	because we are always talking about subjects, about purposes.
1:16.4	But what you really enjoy is that you have a plan and you sit in front of the computer and you get to the point where you don't know what you're doing.
1:23.6	And it's like, okay, like you're playing the instrument, you're playing the guitar.
1:30.3	So you are able to improvise.
1:33.7	But there is a moment where you are really part of the instrument.
1:39.8	And that is writing for me.
1:42.6	All right, that was Alejandro Sambra, author of the story collection My Documents.
1:50.2	Alejandro and I were joined in conversation by Megan McDowell, his longtime translator
1:56.8	and a winner of the National Book Award for Translation.
2:03.1	You know, I think when I first read Alejandro's work, I felt a connection to it.
2:09.9	I felt like if I were a writer, this is the kind of thing I would want to write.
	...

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