Tomorrow: Flanagan and Loh, with Ben Schwartz

by | May 14, 2012

Tomorrow we’re lucky to have Caitlin Flanagan and Sandra Tsing Loh visit the Literary Journalism program, along with their editor at The Atlantic, Ben Schwartz. Humanities Gateway, Room 1030, at 12 PM.
Ehrenreich

Ehrenreich

by | Apr 23, 2012

Great conversation with Ben Ehrenreich, the novelist and journalist, in the Humanities Gateway at lunchtime. Ehrenreich talked about how he writes fiction (he needs at least three hours alone and unbothered to do any valuable work) vs how he writes nonfiction (give him a deadline!). He talked about the difficulties of reporting when you don’t speak the local language, as when he visited Afghanistan in 2003. Just having the extra layer of the interpreter in the conversation changes the interview, he said. And then, when no one knows exactly who that interpreter is, subjects can tend to clam up, especially in countries where the government is oppressive and dangerous.

Literary Journalism visit

by | Apr 22, 2012

Novelist Ben Ehrenreich will be visiting UCI and participating in a LitJ Extra! tomorrow. See below for the moving yet clinical nonfiction piece he wrote for LA Magazine that won the National Magazine Award in 2011.