Book Series Review: The Last Interview and Other Conversations

The Last Interview and Other Conversations

by and about various individuals (Biography _____ )

 

I first stumbled across early entries in this The Last Interview and Other Conversations series a few years ago, and enjoyed reading the Ray Bradbury and Kurt Vonnegut entries when they came out. Subsequently, I’d lost touch with the series, until stumbling across several newer volumes (Fred Rogers, Marilyn Monroe, Ruth Bader Ginsburg), and I recommended that the libraries purchase additional entries. As of late 2021, the Lincoln City Libraries now own 8 of the 35+ volumes that have been published by Penguin Random House to date.

 

Each volume, which is focused on someone significant who has passed away, opens with an essay by that volume’s editor. This is then followed by reprints of anywhere from 4 to 5, all the way up to 9 or 10, interviews conducted with the individual in question over the course of their career. The final reprinted interview in each book is also literally the final interview that the focus individual was ever a part of in their lifetime.

 

Unlike the experience of reading a full-fledged biography of each individual, which can give you in-depth understanding of their lives, this reading experience is more of a detailed snapshot of the subjects, at varying times in their lives — summing up their thoughts and experiences in their own words.

 

Of the first 35 volumes in this series, there are a lot of writers, musicians, politicians, artists and performers represented. Some I’ve known a lot about, while others I’ve known almost nothing about. But these Last Interview books have really broadened my knowledge about each person who has been featured, without committing to full biographies.

 

Highly recommended. The libraries currently have volumes on: Fred Rogers, John Lewis, Shirley Chisholm, Frida Kahlo, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Ray Bradbury, James Baldwin and Kurt Vonnegut. Additional volumes exists for the following — consider getting them through InterLibrary Loan, or suggesting them as purchases for the library: Prince, Diego Maradona, Janet Malcolm, Johnny Cash, Marilyn Monroe, Toni Morrison, Graham Greene, Anthony Bourdain, Billie Holiday, Julia Child, Kathy Acker, Christopher Hitchens, David Bowie, Jane Jacobs, Nora Ephron, Ernest Hemingway, Lou Reed, Hannah Arendt, Robert Bolano, Ursula K. LeGuin, Hunter S. Thompson, Martin Luther King, J.D. Salinger, Philip K. Dick, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Jorge Luis Borges, David Foster Wallace and Oliver Sacks. I’ve enjoyed this series enough that I’ve purchased the Bradbury, LeGuin, Rogers, and Monroe volumes for my personal collection.

 

( publisher’s official The Last Interview web page)

 

See Scott C.’s review of the Ray Bradbury entry in this series, in the February 2015 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

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