Studs Terkel — Chicago journalist, radio raconteur, spellbinding storyteller and popular historian — marks his 95th birthday tomorrow. We are fortunate to have had Studs around for the better part of the 20th century; in fact, Studs and his work are one of the better parts of the 20th century.
The term “oral history” may not have originated with Studs but it certainly reached its greatest and most accessible form in his sympathetic, endlessly observant interviews, which are the foundation for his impressive bookshelf — Division Street: America, Hard Times, Working and many others. As he explained at the beginning of Hard Times, his oral history of the Depression:
This is a memory book, rather than one of hard fact and precise statistic. In recalling an epoch, some thirty, forty years ago, my colleagues experienced pain, in some instances; exhilaration, in others. Often it was a fusing of both. A hesitancy, at first, was followed by a flow of memories: long-ago hurts and small triumphs. Honors and humiliations. There was laughter, too.
Notice his word for the people he interviewed: colleagues. Not subjects, not witnesses, not informants — colleagues. The lesson to take away from Studs Terkel is that great interviews are great conversations. His interviews are collaborations in which he and his companions work together to bring out essential, emotional truths.
That Studs Terkel approach — sympathetic but not uncritical, companionable but closely observant — combined with his omnivorous taste for great music and writing, also made him an exceptional radio and television host. The Chicago Historical Society’s Web site offers a list of Terkel’s own favorite programs, and while I haven’t heard all of them, the many I have listened to are (or ought to be) models for anyone who wants to learn how great talk radio should be done.
Any artist or writer who went on Terkel’s program knew he was facing one of the few radio personalities who actually read, listened to and thought about the work of his guests. For that reason, the young Bob Dylan’s appearance on the Terkel show in 1963 has long been one of the most valued recordings in the Dylan bootleg canon. It’s testy, sometimes defensive and occasionally inspired, but throughout you can sense Dylan’s wary respect for Terkel. Dylan was already honing his legend as a trickster who ate interviewers for breakfast, but when he met Studs Terkel he knew he was face to face with the real thing, and it showed.
If I lived in or near Chicago, I’d make it my business to drop by the Chicago History Museum for its early afternoon birthday celebration tomorrow. Instead, I’ll send him my best wishes and spend my quality time with his quality books.
