Radio: An Illustrated Guide

Radio: An Illustrated Guide was chock full of many gems and shed interesting light on both editing for radio and the interviewing process. One such gem that I found rather interesting was the idea of anecdote-reflection. Although it may seem somewhat expected, the formula really holds up over the airwaves. It allows people to hear part of a story and how ‘such-and-such’ transpired and follows that with a reflection on why the interviewee believes it happened. Ira also mentions deploying the interviewee’s responses against them, as in quoting things they previously said and using that to drive the interview further. I feel that this can be a great device in the interviewing toolbox as it both shows the interviewee you’re paying attention to their stories and coaxes them to expound upon their previous statements or ideas. Finally, it is mentioned that if you run out of questions or go into an interview underprepared, you can always fall back on Noah Adams question: “What did you think this was going to be like before you started, and then what was it really like?” This can help prompt stories and has the added bonus of an embedded lesson. Radio: An Illustrated Guide was a fantastic insight into the radio world and the inner working of This American Life, especially the vast time spent on each show. Even with all this time spent though they sure do like to bring things down to the wire.