Robert Nagle is a blogger and editor of Personville Press. Over the years he has interviewed people in creative fields. (At some point these will be collected into ebook form– maybe 2027 or 2028?) Here is a sample.
Abbreviations: W= Wikipedia, I = personal Home Page, FB = Facebook page, BC = Bandcamp, JAM=Jamendo, YT = YouTube, SC = Soundcloud, POP = Popmatters, LIN = Linktree ARCH=Archive.org
Literature
Clay Reynolds. Texas author and critic (W, I)
- Written Interview (10 parts)
- Also: Reader’s Guide to the Fiction of Clay Reynolds: A Literary Appreciation (2022)
Jack Matthews. Ohio author of philosophical fiction (W, I)
- Written Interview
- Audio Interview (2010)
- Audio Interview (2012)
- Also: RIP Ohio Author Jack Matthews: Book Collecting Enthusiast & Author of Philosophical Fiction (2013)
Robert Flynn, Texas author (W, I)
Michael Barrett, Texas film critic (FB, Pop)
- Written Interview (2014)
Harvey Havel, Pakistani-American novelist (FB)
- Written Interview (2020)
- 7 minute Video Interview (2022)
Alberto Balengo, Texas short story writer (I)
Musicians
I did a bunch of interviews with musicians between 2010 and 2013. Most offered their music under Creative Commons licenses. Most were done for an article I wrote publicizing artists who put their stuff on the French music sharing site Jamendo.
Monk Turner, California musician & songwriter (W, I, BC)
Ant on Wax, Hungarian electronica composer. (I, and I)
No Really (Hannah Clemens/Hannah Sheehan), Acoustic Singer-Songwriter & from Tennessee/Missouri ( I, SC, Arch )
Serge Robinson. French jazz piano improvisationalist. (JAM)
Tryad (Vavrek & John Holowach), A remote musical collaboration project (BC1, BC2 )
JCRZ (Jose Cruz), French EDM Musician (I, BC, FB )
Thomas Eccard (of 2 Inventions, Johannes Gilther, Oktafonika). Polish electronica musician(FB, BC)
Lonah (Eric, Raphaelle, ???) Paris-based musical group (JAM, YT)
VAE Väinö Ala-Härkönen (AKA Lumeet), a Finish electronica musican. (SC, ARCH)
2010 Interview with Vae (Intergalactic Tourist)
Robert Recommends: Favorite Interviews
I grew up reading the famous Paris Review interviews (and my favorite compilation so far has been the Playwrights at Work volume). Here are two ebooks of author interviews which are frequently discounted: the BOMB interviews is a great collection of interviews with authors I have never heard of. Shop Talk: A Writer and His Colleagues and Their Work is a collection of interviews Philip Roth did with various authors in the 1970s through the 1990s.
For those who say that my interviews are too long, let me recommend the book length The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film by Michael Ondaatje (W) and Eckermann’s Conversations with Goethe (W, Archive) which I have read only parts of. The Murch-Ondaatje collaboration is an incredible read.
I also enjoy audio/video interviews. Bill Moyers has interviewed a lot of authors, artists and intellectuals and has conversations with them on TV shows (and then compiles them into very wonderful books). I confess that I started Personville Press to champion the works of author Jack Matthews only after listening to his delightful 25 minute interview on Don Swaim’s Wired For Books (I). Michael Silverblatt (I) has done over 1600+ in-depth interviews with authors in his KCRW Bookworm podcast. Silverblatt has collected his interviews into a single volume called Bookworm: Conversations with Michael Silverblatt . Book Talk, a Texas Public Radio podcast hosted by Yvette Benavides, has been interviewing authors (both Texan and non-Texan) for several years. Austin Liti Limits (YT) does video interviews with (mostly) Texas authors and is hosted by Scott Semegran (I, More), Ron Seybold (I)and Larry Brill (I, More) . I am a gigantic fan of the Inner Views PBS series by Houstonian Ernie Manouse (W, I,).
It’s not exactly the same thing, but there is a great collection of author profile pieces by Joyce Kilmer from the 1910s which included a strong component of interviewing. I love this little book.
Miscellaneous Interviews
Interview with Milan Kundera by Philip Roth was an incredible interview I came across during college. It appears at the end of Kundera’s 1978 novel Book of Laughter and Forgetting and also in Roth’s 2001 Shop Talk: A Writer and His Colleagues and their Work .
Interview with David Steinberg (Fine Art Erotic Photographer and Sex Columnist) by Hapax Legomenon. An extended discussion with Steinberg (I, FB, ) about erotic fiction, censorship and author Marco Vassi with the author of Erotic by Nature (1988).