Sad Me of the Past

Sad Me of the Past
  • 4.4 (9)
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Welcome to Sad Me of the Past, where we invite an established writer to revisit a piece they wrote in their tender years that fills them with affection, regret, nostalgia, embarrassment, relief, delight, anguish, all of the above, or something else entirely. Just as an infant must take those early, brave, awkward steps when learning to walk, we writers must make our own early, brave, awkward efforts as we set out on the journey of mastering our craft. So let's travel back to that ancient time when we were bursting with hubris or scared to death; drunk with language or paralyzed by it; determined to become a writer or terrified that we didn't have the stuff. I'll show them! we thought. But what did we show, really, and to whom?

  1. FEB 3

    Episode 18: Naomi Wood

    Hello listeners! And welcome to Sad Me of the Past, SEASON 3! We've been in the midst of office-space moves and position reconfiguration, but we are finally back! Today we have Noami Wood for our first episode of the new season! We talk about her upbringing in the UK, a novel about a family of eggs, the “cocoa ending,” the inspiring power of confusion, another transformative English teacher, the sexy moms at the gate, the epiphanic Jenny Zhang, nannying in Paris, launching stories with an essential question, and a form that’s obsessed with its ending. Naomi Wood is the bestselling author of The Godless Boys, Mrs. Hemingway and The Hiding Game. As a novelist, her books have won a Jerwood Award, the British Library Hay Festival Prize, and been shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize, the Dylan Thomas Prize, and the Historical Writers Golden Crown. Mrs. Hemingway was a Richard and Judy Bookclub pick in 2014 and a Chanel Bookclub pick in 2023. Her début story collection This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things was published in 2024 by Phoenix (Orion), Nagel und Kimche (Germany) and Morrow (US). In 2023 she won the BBC National Short Story Prize with ‘Comorbidities’. Her short stories have also won the Desperate Literature Tbilisi Prize, and been shortlisted for the Manchester Fiction Prize, the Galley Beggar Press Prize, and a Society of Authors Prize. Her interests are complicated femininity and transgressive motherhood, and how these fit in the modern workplace. She is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia.

    1h 2m

  2. 07/31/2025

    Episode 17: Donika Kelly

    Welcome to SAD ME OF THE PAST, the podcast where we officially start celebrating Spooky Season on August 1st. Today we have poet Donika Kelly in the studio! We discuss drawing curtains and dressing chickens, growing up in Compton, the English teachers of Arkansas, illustrating Ogden Nash with Clip Art, self-insert fan fiction, and poetry: where the sadness goes, imagining into another way of being, leaving out the story, and the idea that “poetry is my securest attachment.” Donika Kelly is the author of The Natural Order of Things, The Renunciations, winner of the Anisfield-Wolf book award in poetry, and Bestiary, the winner of the 2015 Cave Canem Poetry Prize, a Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and a Kate Tufts Discovery Award. Kelly’s poetry has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Publishing Triangle Awards, the Lambda Literary Awards, and longlisted for the National Book Award. A Cave Canem graduate fellow, National Endowment for the Arts fellow, and Pushcart Prize winner, she has also received a Lannan Residency Fellowship, and a summer workshop fellowship from the Fine Arts Work Center. She earned an MFA from the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas at Austin and a PhD in English from Vanderbilt University. Her poems have been published in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Paris Review, and elsewhere. Donika lives in Iowa City with her wife, the nonfiction writer Melissa Febos, and is an associate professor in the English Department at the University of Iowa.

    1h 2m

  3. 06/16/2025

    Episode 16: Srikanth Reddy

    Welcome to SAD ME OF THE PAST, the podcast where we are actively trying to make the words "touch" and "brill" the new slang for cool. Today we have poet Srikanth Reddy in the studio to share some of his earliest writing and his literary journey! We discuss his formative 3rd grade acrostic poem ABRAHAM LINCOLN, skipping school to review movies for the Chicago Tribune, deliberately throwing a Spelling Bee, and the inevitable Workshop curse of writing in everyone else's style except your own. Srikanth Reddy grew up in Chicago. He earned a BA from Harvard College, an MFA in creative writing from the University of Iowa, and a PhD in English literature from Harvard University. He is the author of the poetry collections Underworld Lit (Wave Books, 2020), Voyager (University of California Press, 2011), and Facts for Visitors (University of California Press, 2004) and a book of literary criticism, Changing Subjects: Digressions in Modern American Poetry (Oxford University Press, 2012).

    1h 10m

  4. 05/28/2025

    Episode 15: SPECIAL EDITION Sad Me of the Past Presents Ghosts on the Radio

    Welcome to SAD ME OF THE PAST Presents: Ghosts on the Radio! This is a SPECIAL EPISODE of Sad Me of the Past, where we invite young writers from the Iowa Youth Writing Project (IYWP) to talk about a ghost story they created for the Ghosts on the Radio haunted audio anthology. We have compiled four interviews with IYWP writers into this one episode. The writers, ranging in age from 9 to 14, were among the winner of the Ghosts on the Radio writing contest this past fall. You will hear each of their interviews first, followed by a dramatic reading of their winning story. You can hear all of the stories on the Ghosts on the Radio podcast on the Writing University Podcast Network. Chapters 01:25 - The Circus is Coming by Imogen Olszewski When a family of clowns moves in, the protagonist knows something is wrong. But do her parents agree? Read by Alic Eberhart. 29:54 - The Forest’s Shadow by Olivia Groff Everyone knows that the Forest is dangerous. But Macy doesn’t believe it. To prove her point, she sets foot where even the bravest huntsmen refuse to go. Read by Skyler Tarnas. 54:09 - How the Blood Dragon was Born by Aniya Maharjan Tillie gets lost in the woods and undergoes a mysterious transformation. Read by Olivia Morrow. 01:05:05 - Under the Gaze of Two Pink Eyes by Lucy Liao and Natalie Witt What happens to Iris moves into a strange house and is confronted by a creature that refuses to pass on. Can she survive? Read by Anne Marie Berry. Explicit.

    1h 8m

  5. 04/21/2025

    Episode 14: Madeline McDonnell

    Welcome to SAD ME OF THE PAST, the podcast that asks: are there any new babies being named Brian? On this episode, Madeline McDonnell joins us via Zoom. It's our first remotely-recorded episode! Madeline shares all sorts of secrets with us from being admonished in Middle English, reading in trees, dramatic countdowns to playing an evil Jack-o-lantern in a 3rd grade play with Mindy Kaling, starting three books at the same time, and the importance of friends. Madeline McDonnell is the author of three books of fiction: Lonesome Ballroom, Penny, n., and There Is Something Inside, It Wants To Get Out. She has an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where she was an Iowa Arts Fellow, and has taught creative writing, literature, and composition courses at many places, most recently the MFA program at Portland State University. She lives in Oregon with her family.

    1h 10m

  6. 03/24/2025

    Episode 13: Curtis Sittenfeld

    On this episode, we have bestselling author Curtis Sittenfeld in the studio! We can't believe it! Lauren was very nervous! Curtis talks with us about the perils of boarding school, getting good luck from a used car, how her family really feels about her writing, and her new short story collection Show Don’t Tell. For her piece from the past, Curtis shares a short story she wrote in high school that has a surprising twist (and continues to hold a special place in the “Best of Curtis Sittenfeld” as selected by her mother). ____ Curtis Sittenfeld is the bestselling author of seven novels: Prep, The Man of My Dreams, American Wife, Sisterland, Eligible, Rodham, and Romantic Comedy, which was picked for Reese Witherspoon’s Book Club. Her first story collection, You Think It, I’ll Say It, was published in 2018 and also picked for Reese Witherspoon’s Book Club. Show Don’t Tell is her second story collection. Her books have been selected by The New York Times, Time, Entertainment Weekly, and People for their “Ten Best Books of the Year” lists, optioned for television and film, and translated into thirty languages. Her short stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Washington Post, and Esquire, and in the Best American Short Stories anthology, of which she was the 2020 guest editor. Her non-fiction has appeared in The New York Times, Time, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, Slate, and on “This American Life.” A graduate of Stanford University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Curtis has appeared as a guest on NPR’s “Fresh Air,” CBS’s “Early Show,” and PBS’s Newshour; five times been a Jeopardy! answer, and once been a Word Search puzzle.

    1h 2m

  7. 02/14/2025

    Episode 12: Josh Parkinson

    On this episode, we have prose, screen, and television writer Josh Parkinson stop by the studio to share a story he wrote in high school called "The Man and the Fly." This absolute banger involves a fly, a car crash, and a response from the local authorities that you won't see coming. Is it worth an hour of your time? We think so. It did win 3rd place in 1991. We also talk about his journey from QB1 of the Needville Texas Fighting Bluejays to his work writing scripts in the big city of Los Angeles, and how Iowa City has impacted his current and future work. We discuss the books that got Josh interested in writing, whether or not he actually likes Billy Joel, and if (as Stephen suggests) his writing is in fact Stienbeckian. ____ Josh Parkinson is a writer from Texas who received an MA in Fiction from Johns Hopkins University. Over the last dozen years he has written feature originals or rewrites for Warner Bros., Sony, Universal, Paramount, and Media Rights Capital, as well as held TV staff-writing positions on the HBO comedy Eastbound and Down and the AMC horror series The Terror. He has also during that time sold both hour-long drama and half-hour comedy pilots to NBC, CBS, AMC, USA, Showtime, and most recently, Peacock. He lives in Iowa City and teaches screenwriting at the University of Iowa for the Magid Center for Writing.

    1h 9m

  8. 01/15/2025

    Episode 11: Gina Welch

    On this episode, we are joined by Gina Welch, award-winning 'Castle Rock' screenwriter. We explore Gina's decision to ditch the mullet and reinvent herself in 8th grade, her obsession over Twin Peaks and impressing her English teacher Mr. Gould and the joy of entertaining people with story. She tells us about studying with Robert Stone, going undercover in Jerry Falwell’s church, solitude, misery, and traveling deep into a character’s psyche—like, perhaps, that of a wholesome personal injury lawyer, or a madame who goes into witness protection. ____ Gina Welch received an AFI Award for FX’s FEUD: Bette and Joan and a WGA Award for her work on Castle Rock. She has also worked on FX’s Under the Banner of Heaven, Station Eleven, The Terror, Ray Donovan and is the author of the non-fiction book In the Land of Believers. She visited the University of Iowa in the fall of 2024 to teach in the "Big Binge," a screenwriting course offered by the Magid Center for Writing.

    1h 6m
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Ratings & Reviews

4.4
out of 5
9 Ratings

About

Welcome to Sad Me of the Past, where we invite an established writer to revisit a piece they wrote in their tender years that fills them with affection, regret, nostalgia, embarrassment, relief, delight, anguish, all of the above, or something else entirely. Just as an infant must take those early, brave, awkward steps when learning to walk, we writers must make our own early, brave, awkward efforts as we set out on the journey of mastering our craft. So let's travel back to that ancient time when we were bursting with hubris or scared to death; drunk with language or paralyzed by it; determined to become a writer or terrified that we didn't have the stuff. I'll show them! we thought. But what did we show, really, and to whom?

Information

  • Creator
    Sad Me of the Past
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    19
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © All rights reserved
  • Show Website
    Sad Me of the Past