First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing

This episode on literary friendship with Claire Messud and Amitava Kumar was recorded live at Lighthouse Writers Workshop in Denver, Colorado at the June 2024 Lit Fest. Learn more about Lighthouse. Claire Messud is the author of six works of fiction. She is a recipient of a Guggenheim and Radcliffe Fellowships and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Her essay collection is called Kant’s Little Prussian Head and Other Reasons Why I Write. Her recent novel is called This Strange Eventful History. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with her family. Amitava Kumar is a writer and journalist. He was born in Ara, and grew up in the nearby town of Patna, famous for its corruption, crushing poverty and delicious mangoes. Kumar is the author of several books of non-fiction and four novels. His new novel is My Beloved Life. Kumar lives in Poughkeepsie, in upstate New York, where he is the Helen D. Lockwood Professor of English at Vassar College. He serves on the board of the Corporation of Yaddo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Boyce Upholt is a journalist and essayist whose writing has appeared in the Atlantic, National Geographic, the Oxford American, and Virginia Quarterly Review, among other publications. He is the winner of a James Beard Award for investigative journalism, and he lives in New Orleans, Louisiana.  His book is called The Great River: The Making & Unmaking of the Mississippi. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kevin Barry is the author of the novels Night Boat to Tangier, which was longlisted for the Booker Prize, Beatlebone, and City of Bohane as well as three story collections including Dark Lies the Island. His stories and essays have appeared in the New Yorker, Granta and elsewhere. He also works as a playwright and screenwriter lives in County Sligo, Ireland.  His new novel is The Heart in Winter. We talked about the Irish in Butte, Montana, watching and writing westerns, Wuthering Heights, voice and character, Kevin’s writing process, comedy, and Annie Proulx. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amina Gautier is the author of four short story collections: At-Risk, Now We Will Be Happy, The Loss of All Lost Things, and The Best that You Can Do. Gautier is the recipient of the Blackwell Prize, the Chicago Public Library Foundation’s 21st Century Award, the International Latino Book Award, the Flannery O’Connor Award, and the Phillis Wheatley Book Award in Fiction. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices