Alison Lurie
Desert Island Discs
BBC
4.3 • 14.3K Ratings
🗓️ 9 March 1985
⏱️ 31 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Alison Lurie is not only a part-time professor of English at Cornell University where she teaches creative writing and children's literature, but she is also a very successful novelist. "Her seven novels", writes Malcolm Bradbury, "collectively form a biting record of American social, moral and sexual mores from the early 1960s to the present." In conversation with Roy Plomley, she talks about her work and she chooses the eight records she would take to the mythical island.
[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]
Favourite track: The Marriage Of Figaro - Overture by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Book: The Oxford Book of English Verse Luxury: Telephone
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, I'm Christy Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. |
| 0:05.6 | For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music. |
| 0:08.7 | The program was originally broadcast in 1985, and the presenter was Roy Plumley. |
| 0:30.5 | On our Desert Island this week is the American novelist, Alison Laurie. |
| 0:34.8 | You're no stranger to England, of course. You're over here quite a lot. |
| 0:38.4 | Well, I try to come every year for a month or so, yes. |
| 0:41.6 | How important is music in your life? |
| 0:43.8 | I like music, but I couldn't call myself a musical person. |
| 0:48.1 | I don't know as much about it as many of my friends. |
| 0:52.0 | Did you ever learn an instrument? I mean, did you start the piano? |
| 0:55.8 | Of course, like all children, I had piano lessons, and at one point, |
| 0:59.5 | I played the recorder, but that was a long time ago. |
| 1:02.9 | Are you a concert guy? |
| 1:04.1 | Yes, but not a great deal. |
| 1:07.2 | Now, you have eight discs to take to your Desert Island. |
| 1:09.9 | You don't know how long they again have to last. |
| 1:12.6 | Did you find it very difficult to choose this little short list? |
| 1:16.1 | I did, and I did choose three operas because I, |
| 1:20.8 | that way I can have a story as well as the music. |
| 1:24.4 | What's the first record you've chosen? |
| 1:26.8 | It's a selection from the Marriage of Figaro, |
| 1:29.8 | sung by Federica von Stade. |
... |
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