Saturday, July 29, 2006

Atwood & Amis on television

Margaret Atwood and Martin Amis recently sat for interviews for a series titled "Bill Moyer's on Faith & Reason."

The interviews were broadcast last night on PBS and may be re-broadcast on your local affiliate. You may also watch them online or read a transcript of the sessions.

Yet, if you're a reader, you may find your time better spent with a book by either author than watching the interviews. Atwood and Amis are both bright and thoughtful people, but the interviews have little to do with their craft or--despite Moyer's establishing that the writers are both agnostic and he is a churchgoer--their particular world- (or cosmological-) views.

If you are interested in knowing just a little bit about Martin Amis, click here for a very brief bio which opens with a quote from him: "I have a god-like relationship with the world I've created. It is exactly analogous. There is creation and resolution, and it's all up to me."

Click here for a similarly brief bio of Margaret Atwood. Her quote: "Some part of me thought that I would always be teaching grammar to Engineering students at 8.30 in the morning. For ever."

Click here for Atwood's page at Random House to find a short bio, an interview, and various other links. For information on and an excerpt from her most recent book, The Penelopiad, click here.

For Martin Amis' official site, click here.

--Marshal Zeringue