University presses have podcasts

May 4, 2008 4:35 PM

Invisible Handwriting is the blog of Heron & Crane Productions, who do podcasts for the MIT, Harvard, Yale and University of California presses. Heron & Crane link to every episode they produce from their blog. The Rutgers Press and University of Michigan Press do their own podcasts. All podcasts are almost exclusively interviews with authors of books recently published by the presses. Heron & Crane also does a business management podcast called The Invisible Hand.
posted by Kattullus (8 comments total)

So, this is just editors interviewing their own authors? And shills paid to interview authors? How inspiring that if I write a book now, I'm guaranteed an 'on-air' interview with somebody!
posted by parmanparman at 5:21 PM on May 4, 2008

Personally, I dig hearing authors talk about their writing and the work that inspired it.

Episode 9 of the MIT Press podcast (interview with DJ Spooky) is super. Thanks for this.
posted by sneakin at 5:30 PM on May 4, 2008

Oh wow this is fantastic. I don't have time to read 1/10th the books that come out monthly (weekly!) so to get the "big idea" summary through author promotional tours is a commonly good way to stay up to date with current ideas and trends. However most of the University Press books are kinda off-broadway so to speak so this is the first time I've seen a resource devoted to it. Yale UP is my favorite in the US. This is a goldmine of great stuff - I like BookTV on C-Span for the same reason. Thanks!
posted by stbalbach at 5:55 PM on May 4, 2008

Fantastic post, thanks.
posted by LarryC at 6:28 PM on May 4, 2008

Parmanparman, I've done a few interviews like this (as an interviewer), and I think it's entirely possible to do this in a way that's useful. If it's done well, of course.
posted by YoungAmerican at 7:47 PM on May 4, 2008

Fantastic! Thanks for this.
posted by R. Mutt at 6:14 AM on May 5, 2008

So, this is just editors interviewing their own authors? And shills paid to interview authors?

Yes because clearly these huge powerful university press types will stop at NOTHING to crush the poor McStarBooks!
posted by R. Mutt at 6:24 AM on May 5, 2008

R. Mutt: "So, this is just editors interviewing their own authors? And shills paid to interview authors?

Yes because clearly these huge powerful university press types will stop at NOTHING to crush the poor McStarBooks!"

You forgot corrupt.
posted by Toekneesan at 8:00 AM on May 5, 2008