Listening Is an Act of Love: A Celebration of American Life from the StoryCorps Project (Penguin Books for English: Developmental)

Listeners to National Public Radio's "Morning Edition" on Fridays are familiar with interviews from Dave Isay's StoryCorps project. Here in written form is a collection of some of those essays, along with a photograph of the person being interviewed and usually the interviewer as well. The essays are grouped in "Home and Family," "Work and Dedication," "Journeys," "History and Struggle" and finally "Fire and Water," recollections of survivors of 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, certainly some of the most moving interviews in the entire book.How refreshing in a world gone mad with non-news of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton-- I do not believe I have ever heard either of these women's names mentioned or either public radio or public television-- to listen to and read of ordinary people whose lives are interesting, who have done often noble, unselfish deeds with no pomp and circumstance.While some of these stories are more engaging than others, to a person each one interviewed here has something to say that touches the reader. There is an interview of a woman reunited with her son whom she gave up for adoption: "Knowing what I know now, I wouldn't do it again" [let her son be adopted]. An eighty-seven-year-old World War II veteran still sees in his dreams the blond, blue-eyed teenaged member of the Hitler Youth he had to kill to save his own life. A forty-nine-year-old prisoner in the Oregon State Penitentiary hopeful of his eventual freedom died from a drug overdose shortly after his interview. A Memphis sanitation worker recalls the death of Martin Luther King. A World War 11 veteran, when asked by the interviewer, his twelve-year-old grandson, one of the standard StoryCorps questions, what was the saddest moment of his life, remembers that while stationed in the Navy in Norfolk, he was refused admission to a movie in D. C. because he was black: "I just walked the streets crying all night, betrayed that my country could force me to fight a war but say, 'You're not a good enough citizen to come to a movie.'" Finally, one of the saddest interviews for me is that of the man who was so lonely that he got a haircut once a week just to have someone touch him.These are Ken Burns, Charles Bukowski and Studs Terkel (who wrote a blurb for the book) people. Many of these stories rise to the level of poetry. Reading these interviews, at least some of them, reminded me of the time I saw the AIDS Memorial Quilt, another tribute to ordinary Americans, unfurled for the first time in Washington in 1987, the raw emotion, the great pain of loss but also the overwhelming sense of love and connectedness that we all felt on that cold October morning.These unsentimental stories will warm the cockles of your heart.

The StoryCorps Project is dedicated to collecting and preserving the stories of ordinary Americans for future generations. People participate by being interviewed at the Storycorps booth in New York City or at one of the mobile recording booths traveling the country - they can choose to be interviewed by a relative or friend, or by a Storycorps facilitator. Selected stories are read on NPR every Friday morning and all are stored in the Library of Congress (subject to the participant's signing a release; thus far about 95% of participants have done so).This book represents a selection of the submissions so far, and the majority of the stories are truly moving. It's divided into five broad sections:Home and FamilyWork and DedicationJourneysHistory and StruggleFire and Water (stories related to the attacks of September 11th and to Hurricane Katrina)With the exception of those in the first section, the stories are universally powerful and moving, with over 10,000 to choose from, the editor has done a fine job in selecting the best. For me, the 'home and family' stories fell oddly flat, though this just may be an inability to match the power of some of the later contributions.One could think of this as an oral version of the other NPR Story Project, stories from which are collected in the (awesome) book "I Thought My Father was God", which also deserves a 5-star rating. The stories in "Listening is an Act of Love" match those in that book in their capacity to move the reader. Although I did find the first section of this book to be somewhat weaker than the remaining four sections, it still deserves a 5-star rating.The success of this venture is an interesting contrast with what I (in a clear minority) considered to be the weakness of the 'This I Believe' collection, which I also reviewed recently. It's interesting to me that two undertakings, which are fairly similar on the surface, should give such disparate results. What psychologists and social science researchers tell us does appear to be true - it really matters how you ask the questions...

These stories will bring out every emotion in you. They may remind you of your parents or your grandparents, or others, friends, or you may learn things about different places, different life views. Some are heartbreaking. All are worth reading. They all will tug at your heartstrings.“In some houses maybe there’s music playing in the background. I don’t remember any music ever playing in the background because the music of our lives was the voices.”“They were able to turn the ordinary into something absolutely splendid. And I think in the end if we asked them ‘Did you have a successful life?’ all of them would shave said ‘Yes.’ They loved. They had friends. They were alive. They didn’t see the world, but they saw their world – which maybe is better than seeing the world.’”There’s one story of a young man interviewing his birth mother. Another: the NYC Bus driver, performing a most touching act of kindness. A husband and wife share their story of how they first met. The hospital chaplain who shares his “holiest moments.”Have Kleenex handy before you reach page 145. These stories are too touching and beautiful to not read them.

I found this is an easy CD to play when driving to work. Each story was different and subtle. Whilst the stories were short they had a way of making me think about the one I heard for the rest of the day. Overall the CD left with a sense that asking someone to tell you a story from thier life and listening well to that story allows a new bond to unfold.

Very moving collection of stories. Oral history is an excellent way of sharing diverse experiences