T.C. Boyle: Is There Still Hope?

Thomas Coraghessan Boyle has written widely read books such as
World’s End, The Tortilla Curtain, Dr. Sex, Water Music, The Road
to Wellville and—so far published only in Germany—No Way Home. His
works have been translated into two dozen languages, and some have
been adapted for film. This is the the freely accessible original
English version of the podcast. An AI-translated version is
available exclusively to ZEIT podcast subscribers. A free trial
subscription is available at https://www.zeit.de/podcastabo. T.C.
Boyle was born in New York and grew up in precarious circumstances:
both of his parents, immigrants from Ireland, were alcoholics; as a
young man he struggled with drug problems himself and barely
managed to finish school. During his studies, he discovered his
love of writing. Boyle initially worked as a teacher at his former
problem school in order to avoid being drafted into the Vietnam
War. His first published short story, about his experiences with
heroin use, secured him a place in the prestigious Writers’
Workshop at the University of Iowa. Among his teachers there were
John Irving and John Cheever. Boyle earned a doctorate in
nineteenth-century English literature, although his dissertation
was a collection of short stories, Descent of Man. Shortly
thereafter he received a position at the University of Southern
California in Los Angeles, where he founded the creative writing
program. He taught there until his retirement. Since his debut
novel Water Music, T.C. Boyle has published almost every
year—either a novel or a collection of short stories. He lives with
his wife Karen Kvashay in Montecito, near Santa Barbara, and has
three children. Fragen, Kritik, Anregungen? Schreiben Sie eine Mail
an allesgesagt@zeit.de. Seit dem 15.01.2025 sind Teile des
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