Anna Deveare Smith's award-winning one-woman shows were borne
of her uniquely brilliant ability to listen. In Talk to Me she
applies her rare talent to the language of political power in
America.
Believing that character and language are inextricably bound,
Smith sets out to discern the essence of America by listening to
its people and trying to capture its politics. To that end she
travels to some of America's most conspicuous places, like the
presidential conventions of 1996, and some of its darkest corners,
like a women's prison in Maryland. And along the way she interviews
everyone from janitors to murderers to Bill Clinton himself.
Memoir, social commentary, meditation on language, this book is as
vastly ambitious as it is compellingly unique