The craft of interviewing has always fascinated me and kept me on edge. Will we get on? What if they don’t care for my earnest questions? How can I put that person at ease and have them trust me enough to share what’s real and true?
It’s a lifelong pursuit and there are few more accomplished in the field than NPR Fresh Air host Terry Gross, who has been talking to distinguished names on air five days a week for more than three decades. The likes of Ray Charles, Stephen Colbert, Zadie Smith... Gross is so good, in fact, you wonder if she ever stops interviewing.
As Nicholas Quah wrote in Vulture, Gross is “empathetic yet incisive, patient yet methodical, deeply personal yet wholly universal”. One of her frequent guests was the children’s author and illustrator Maurice Sendak, who imagined much-loved works including Where the Wild Things Are and In the Night Kitchen among others.
I came across the highlights show they broadcast after he passed in 2012 among a list of Gross’ finest moments and it reminded me just how special the connection between interviewer and interviewee can be.
Although sad to hear Sendak becoming progressively weaker through the years, Gross’ tactile manner made him comfortable enough to share the deepest of thoughts in their final conversation: the pain of outliving those he loves (especially Eugene, partner of 50 years) and how he then misses them more (38m 40s, 42m 30s); contemplating mortality and the fragility of life as a Jewish yet secular man with no faith to fall back on (40m 30s); “fantasising” about having a grown-up daughter to care for him yet relieved he never had to raise a child (33m); being thankful for the time to come into himself through books, music, nature (40m 30s). “Live your life, live your life, live your life,” he implores. An old man in touch with the joy, pain and wonder of this world.
In the final part (43m 30s), Gross is almost left speechless by Sendak’s candour and the affection he holds her in. A Gross interview is more like a chat between two human beings. “It’s what we do,” Sendak mused. “It’s what we’ve always done.”
Radio and podcasts like this bring a listener into the conversation and make us reflect on our own life in a profound way. Go check out Fresh Air on NPR’s site or wherever you get your podcasts.
PS Check out this delightful animation which shows how moved illustrator Christoph Niemann was by their final conversation.