Talking to Myself: A Memoir of My Times

Studs Terkel

Pantheon Books, 1977 - Biography & Autobiography - 316 pages

This memoir cuts across worlds, years and the vast spectrum of people that Terkel has known, from workers to famous stars, from Nobel Prize winners to ordinary folk ... Terkel uses some of the methods that have made his radio programs so famous. He cuts from a visit to Chief Luthuli in South Africa to a memoir of the McCarthy period, from growing up among the petty gangsters of Chicago in the thirties to confronting the bigger gangsters of our political life in the sixties, from acting in a radio soap opera to discussing film with Fellini ...

Contents

• The Visit: 3
• Dreamland: 10
• Do You Like Bruegel?: 21

About the author

Studs Terkel was an actor, writer, and radio host. He was born Louis Terkel on May 16, 1912 in New York City. He took his name from the James T. Farrell novel, Studs Lonigan. Terkel attended the University of Chicago and graduated with a law degree in 1934. Terkel acted in local stage productions and on radio dramas until he began one of the first television programs, an unscripted show called Studs Place in the early 1950s. In 1952, Terkel began Studs Terkel's Almanac on radio station WFMT in Chicago. Terkel compiled a series of books based on oral histories that defined America in the 20th Century. Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do received a National Book Award nomination in 1975. The Good War: An Oral History of World War II won the Pulitzer Prize in nonfiction in 1985. Working was turned into a hit musical in 1978. Terkel was named the Communicator of the Year by the University of Chicago in 1969. He also won a Peabody Award for excellence in journalism in 1980 and the National Book Foundation Medal for contributions to American letters in 1997. He died on October 31, 2008 at the age of 96.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Talking to Myself: A Memoir of My Times
• Author: Studs Terkel
• Publisher: Pantheon Books, 1977
• Original from: the University of Michigan
• Digitized: Feb 26, 2008
• Length: 316 pages
• Subjects: Biography & Autobiography / Literary Figures