16 September 2005
Friday 16 September 2005 21:30-22:15 (Radio 3)
Writer John McGahern talks to Paul Allen about Memoir, his moving account of growing up in County Leitrim between the wars - virtually cut off from the rest of the world.
Programme Details:
John McGahern is widely recognised as Ireland 's greatest living writer, with six highly acclaimed novels (including the Booker shortlisted Amongst Women) and numerous collections of short stories to his name. His careful and detailed portrayal of ordinary life and extraordinary characters in the slow moving backwaters of rural Ireland have now led him to write his own Memoir - a beautifully drawn evocation of the countryside of his youth in County Leitrim. At the heart of this Memoir are the loving presence of his mother and the vengeful and aggressive antics of his father, a police sergeant in charge of the local barracks.
In tonight's Night Waves Paul Allen talks to John McGahern - about his family and his upbringing, about the impact of the Church on his youth, his developing love of fiction, about his beloved countryside of peat and bog, and the satisfaction in fitting in with the slow and repetitious patterns of country living.
Also on the programme: Susannah Clapp reviews the first night of Mike Leigh's eagerly awaited new play, Two Thousand Years, which has opened at the National Theatre. Set in Cricklewood, North London , it portrays the explosive tensions lying beneath the veneer of an ordinary secular Jewish family in suburbia.
And Nigel Floyd reviews Wolf Creek , the horrific account - based on a true story - of travellers who go astray in the Australian outback.
Night Waves, live at 9.30pm, presented by Paul Allen here on BBC Radio 3.
Presenter: Paul Allen
Producer: Anthony Denselow
Additional Information:
Memoir by John McGahern is published by Faber £16.99
Two Thousand Years runs at the Cottesloe, National Theatre
Wolf Creek , Cert 18, opens around the country this Friday.
