History

Joel Rosenman and John Roberts. Twenty years ago Rosenman and Roberts were in their 20s when they came into a large inheritance. They decided to take the money and promote a rock concert in upstate New York. What they ended up organizing was Woodstock, possibly the one event that best sums up an entire era of American history.

Commentator Maureen Corrigan looks back at Ex-Wife a 1929 novel by Ursula Parrott that has recently been re-printed. Corrigan finds many of the issues of contemporary feminism wrapped up in this story of a flapper who tries an "open" marriage.

On the eve of the 20th anniversary of man's first walk on the moon, commentator Stewart Brand shares his thoughts on space exploration and how it has changed us. Brand is founder of The Whole Earth Catalog.

Book Critic John Leonard reviews the novel Polar Star by Martin Cruz Smith, his sequel to his 1981 best-seller Gorky Park. Reappearing in Polar Star is Arkady Renko, the intrepid police investigator hero of Gorky Park.

Novelist Cynthia Kadohata. Her first novel, The Floating World, is a `road novel' about a second generation Asian American teenager who leads a nomadic life with her parents as her father travels the country from one job to the next. As her journey unfolds, the protagonist struggles to find her place in her family and in America. Kadohata's short stories have appeared in The New Yorker and the quarterly The Pennsylvania Review. (Interview by Marty Moss-Coane)

Writer Allan Gurganus. His novel, Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All, which is scheduled for publication later this fall, is the story of a blind 99-year-old widow, now confined to a nursing home, whose stories about her life and her husband's take in almost 150 years of American history. Mostly her stories focus on her husband and how his experiences in the Civil War, when he was only 13, haunted him, and her, until he died. Gurganus, a professor of writing at New York's Sarah Lawrence University, has written for The New Yorker, Harpers and The Atlantic Monthly.

Book Critic John Leonard reviews From Beirut to Jerusalem, Thomas Friedman's account of his ten years covering the Middle East for The New York Times.

Pennebaker, who died Aug. 1, pioneered a cinéma vérité style of filmmaking in documentaries like Bob Dylan: Don't Look Back and The War Room. Originally broadcast in 1989.

Filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker. One of America's foremost documentary producers, Pennebaker has brought his cinéma verité approach to subjects ranging from Castro's Cuba, to Jimmy Carter's energy policy, to Bob Dylan's first tour of Britain. Music has been the source of much of Pennebaker's work. His films have featured the likes of Pablo Cassals, Van Cliburn, jazz singer Dave Lambert, rocker David Bowie, John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

The New York Times correspondent's new book is called From Beirut to Jerusalem, about Arab-Israeli conflicts in the Middle East. He joins Fresh Air to discuss how cultivating a network of contacts, coming to terms with the frequent violence he witnessed in Lebanon, and how those experience affected his reporting in Israel.

An's White Badge is the first Korean novel to be published by an American house. The story is based on his experience as a soldier in the Vietnam War. An also works as a translator, and has translated several American books into Korean.

Author Philip Roth was in part responsible for getting the Czech novelists Life with a Star translated into English and published stateside. Book critic John Leonard says it stands out among the myriad, Kafka-esque books about the Holocaust.

The German-born writer's memoir documents her parents' involvement in World War II. Reichel grew up in Hamburg after the end of the war, as the country dealt with the guilt of its Nazi past. She says the pain of that history was felt by all citizens, even if it was deeply repressed.

Rock historian Ed Ward says that bands like the Rolling Stones helped popularize the distinctly African American genre. Interest in blues led more musicians to picking up the electric guitar, including Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton, who would take rock music in a new direction.

Spiegelman edits the underground comics magazine Raw. He is best known for graphic novel Maus, about his father's experiences in Nazi concentration camps, which was widely celebrated. Raw recently featured a new chapters in that story.

Apelfeld is a Holocaust survivor; his family was sent to a concentration camp, despite their being non-practicing Jews. This history informs much of Apelfeld's work, including his new novel, For Every Sin.

Le Carre is the pseudonym of writer David Cromwell, who used to be a spy himself. His newest novel, The Russia House, considers the glasnost reforms of the Soviet Union's Gorbachev administration. Some of Le Carre's past novels include The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, The Little Drummer Girl, and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Halberstam usually covers international affairs. Book critic John Leonard says the writer's new book reveals a boyish fandom for a bygone era of baseball.

Mason completed over a thousand combat missions in Vietnam and later served time for a drug smuggling. His debut memoir, Chickenhawk, found success while he was in prison. Mason's new, science-fiction inspired novel is called Weapon.

Gordimer returns to Fresh Air to discuss her new collection of essays called The Essential Gesture, about her role as a white woman in South Africa fighting against Apartheid.