'Selected Shorts: Figuring it Out'

Actor B.D. Wong

James Naughton reads 'The Towel Season' by Ron Carlson and B.D. Wong reads 'A Bad Joke' by Ha Jin.

Ron Carlson's stories are often of ordinary lives struggling for hope and happiness, and the first story on this program, "Towel Season" is marvelous in its close-up depiction of a brilliant man struggling to keep his balance in life and marriage. The always meticulous reader is Tony Award-winning actor and director James Naughton. An interview with Carlson follows the reading.

The second part of the program features a "short short" by author Ha Jin, who served in the army of the People's Republic of China for six years before coming to America in 1985. It's easy to see his tragic-comic story, "A Bad Joke," as a comment on that period of his life. The reader is the Broadway and television star B.D. Wong.

"Selected Shorts: A Celebration of the Short Story" presents some of the finest artists of the American theater and screen reading short fiction by classic, contemporary and bold new writers. Performances have featured distinguished works by classic masters such as Chekhov, Edith Wharton, de Maupassant, Ernest Hemingway and Isaac Bashevis Singer; stories by contemporary greats such as Alice Munro, John Updike, John Edgar Wideman, Grace Paley, William Trevor and Alice Walker; as well as the fresh, vivid and diverse works of a new generation of remarkable literary talents, from Pulitzer Prize-winning Jhumpa Lahiri, Academy of Rome Prize-winner Tom Bissell and celebrated Haitian-American writer Edwidge Danticat to promising newcomers like Rattawut Lapchararoensap, Yiyun Li and Etgar Keret.

There are currently a dozen "Selected Shorts" thematic CDs, which feature listeners' best-loved stories, including "Baseball!," "Timeless Classics," "Food Fictions," "Travel Tales," "Falling in Love," "Edith Wharton," and most recently, "Pets!," "Tales of Betrayal," "Family Matters" and "Wartime Lives." Visit the PRI Store to purchase CDs.

More "Selected Shorts"