Live from the University of Evansville campus and the Shanklin Theatre, where Rami Malek once trod the boards…

One True Podcast welcomes Alex Vernon for an interview recorded live in front of a captive audience of students, faculty, and community members in Evansville, Indiana, as he discusses his magnificent new biography of Tim O’Brien, Peace Is a Shy Thing: The Life and Art of Tim O’Brien.

Vernon explains his process of how to write a true biography, O’Brien’s life and relationship to the Vietnam War, what distinguishes O’Brien’s style as a writer, the enduring power of some of his greatest work, and much more. It is a generous, penetrating Q&A session with the world’s preeminent O’Brien scholar.

Vernon – who has previously joined One True Podcast for a discussion of Hemingway and War, as well as an episode devoted to “Soldier’s Home” – lends his essential perspective to this essential contemporary writer.

** Special thanks to the UE students for their insightful questions at the end, and to the wizardry of sound designer Jon Robertson for his assistance. **

Episode Bibliography

Tim O’Brien works mentioned:

• Going After Cacciato
• If I Die in a Combat Zone
• In the Lake of the Woods
• The Things They Carried

Other works mentioned:

• Five-volume biography of Hemingway by Michael Reynolds (The Young Hemingway, Hemingway: The Paris Years, Hemingway: The Homecoming, Hemingway: The 1930s, Hemingway: The Final Years)

In our fourth episode celebrating the centenary of The Sun Also Rises, we examine the theme of religion and its role in the novel.

From the title, the epigraphs, the pilgrims on the train, Jake’s self-conscious prayer, the festival of San Fermín, and the idea of fishing as a religious experience, Larry Grimes guides us through this vast topic and shows Hemingway’s religious design in The Sun Also Rises. Grimes also discusses the minor roles of Harris and Montoya and explains why Jake is such a rotten Catholic.

Listening to Larry Grimes talk about such a crucial topic in this great novel is our idea of a divine pleasure. We hope you’ll enjoy it, too!

Also, in these Sun Also Rises episodes, we enjoy the legendary actor William Hurt reading from Jake’s fascinating prayer in chapter 10, courtesy of our friends at Simon & Schuster Audio.

Audio excerpt courtesy of Simon & Schuster Audio from The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway, read by William Hurt. Copyright © 1926 by Charles Scribner’s Sons. Used with permission of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Thank you for supporting One True Podcast, from Mark and Michael (each with a hell of a Biblical name!)

Legendary scholar Jackson Bryer joins us once again, this time to discuss one controversial moment in Hemingway’s career, his vicious “poor Scott Fitzgerald” swipe in the original publication of “The Snows of Kilimanjaro.”

We discuss the publication history of this graceless insult, what it says about Hemingway and what it says about Fitzgerald. We go on to discuss “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” as a story and the ways that wealth emerges as one of Fitzgerald’s central themes. We explore the nature of the Hemingway-Fitzgerald relationship in the 1930s, Fitzgerald’s “The Rich Boy,” and other works where the very rich emerge as important characters.

Join us in our romantic awe of Jackson Bryer as he guides us through this notorious moment in Hemingway’s career!