Colson Whitehead

Available for over a year

Elizabeth Day talks to Colson Whitehead in a special feature length interview. Twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his novels The Underground Railway and The Nickel Boys, the writer has changed direction with his latest, Harlem Shuffle. Part heist novel, part richly woven tapestry of New York social history, the novel begins in 1959 and runs to the Harlem riots of 1964. Recurring themes emerge racial injustice, corruption of power but this time his protagonist is an active agent. It follows the travails of Ray Carney, a furniture salesman with one foot in respectability and one in the city's underworld, as Whitehead writes "Carney was only slightly bent when it came to being crooked". In the interview Colson Whitehead talks about his creative writing process, his reluctance to be a spokesman for black America and why he's stashed an unpublished novel in his bottom drawer for his children's inheritance. Presenter: Elizabeth Day Producer: Kirsten Locke Image copyright: Michael Lionstar Book List Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead The Intuitionist by Colson Whitehead Sag Harbour by Colson Whitehead Ulysses by James Joyce