Auster, Paul, 1947-. National Story Project Records
Description:
This collection contains over 5,000 submissions to the National Story Project, a program that aired from 1999 November until 2001 July on National Public Radio's (NPR's) Weekend All Things Considered. The National Story Project was created and supervised by American author, Paul Auster. The collection primarily contains printed e-mail submissions and letters received through the mail. In addition to the stories, some participants sent cassette tapes or "CD"s of themselves reading their stories or performing music to accompany the submission. Also included are books, photographs, newspapers, magazines, pamphlets and other materials either meant to verify their submission as true, add context to their submission, or to show other formats that their submissions had appeared in previously.
Dates:
1998/2002
Repository/Collector:
Rare Book and Manuscript Collections, Butler Library
Repository/Collector Type:
College or university
City:
New York
State:
New York
Country:
United States
Extent:
7.5 linear feet
Formats:
Analog audiocassette and Optical disc (Including CD, CD-R, CD-RW, DVD, DVD-R, DVD-RW, VCD)
Historical relevance:
The National Story project began in 1999 after American author, Paul Auster, read a selection from his novel Timbuktu on NPR's Weekend All Things Considered. Auster was asked to return to the program by its then host, Daniel Zwerdling, to perform another reading at a future date. Auster answered with the conditional response that he would be willing to return, but only if he could read other people's stories and not just his own. The National Story Project began taking submissions from listeners in 1999 October through both e-mail and mail. The guidelines for the stories were that they had to be no more than three pages in length and that the submissions relayed a true event. The selected stories would then be edited or rewritten, if needed, by Auster and his team. The National Story Project aired on Weekend All Things Considered the first Saturday of each month from 1999 November until 2001 July and during that time received over 5,000 submissions from all over the United States on a wide variety of topics and from people of varying ages, gender and backgrounds.
Condition note:
Playable with proper equipment
Notes:
After the National Story Project ended, Auster selected his favorite submissions and compiled them for a book entitled I Thought My Father Was God: And Other True Tales from NPR's National Story Project (Picador, 2002).