Moth
Emperor Gum Moth, Opodiphthera eucalypti
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
(unranked):	Heterocera

A moth is an insect related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Most of this order are moths; there are thought to be about 160,000 species of moth (nearly ten times the number of species of butterfly),^[1] with thousands of species yet to be described. Most species of moth are nocturnal, but there are crepuscular and diurnal species.

Differences between butterflies and moths[link]

Leaf shaped moth

Moths are not easily differentiated from butterflies. Sometimes the name "Heterocera" is used for moths while the term "Rhopalocera" is used for butterflies to formalize the popular distinction; these, however, have no taxonomic validity. Many attempts have been made to subdivide the Lepidoptera into groups such as the Microlepidoptera and Macrolepidoptera, Frenatae and Jugatae, or Monotrysia and Ditrysia. Failure of these names to persist in modern classifications is because none of them represents a pair of monophyletic groups. The reality is that butterflies are a small group that arose from within the "moths" (being considered as part of Ditrysia of the Neolepidoptera).^[2] There is thus no way to group all of the remaining taxa in a monophyletic group, as it will always exclude that one descendant lineage. Also, both their larvae are similar to coleoptera larvae (beetle).

Etymology[link]

Mating pair of Laothoe populi, or Poplar Hawk-moths, showing two different color variants

The Modern English word "moth" comes from Old English "moððe" (cf. Northumbrian "mohðe") from Common Germanic (compare Old Norse "motti", Dutch "mot" and German "Motte" all meaning "moth"). Perhaps its origins are related to the Old English "maða" meaning "maggot" or from the root of "midge" which until the 16th century was used mostly to indicate the larva, usually in reference to devouring clothes.

The study of butterflies and moths is known as lepidoptery, and biologists that specialize in either are called lepidopterists. As a pastime, watching butterflies and moths is known as butterflying and mothing. The latter has given rise to the term "mother" for someone who engages in this activity - sometimes written with a hyphen (moth-er) to distinguish it from the more common word of the same spelling.^{[citation needed]} This confusion does not arise in speech as it is pronounced differently (/ˈmɒθər/, not */ˈmʌðər/).

Caterpillar[link]

A Caterpillar of Deaths-head Hawk-moth

A Caterpillar of Deaths-head Hawk-moth

Moth larvae, or caterpillars, make cocoons. When it comes out of the cocoon, it is a fully grown moth with wings. Some moth caterpillars dig holes in the ground, and they will live in the hole until they are ready to turn into a fully grown moth.^[3]

Economic significance of moths[link]

An adult male Pine Processionary Moth (Thaumetopoea pityocampa). This species is a serious forest pest when in larval state. Notice the bristle springing from the underside of the hindwing (frenulum) and running forward to be held in a small catch of the forewing, whose function is to link the wings together.

Poplar hawk-moth caterpillar
Laothoe populi

Moths, and particularly their caterpillars, are a major agricultural pest in many parts of the world. Examples include corn borers and bollworms.^[4] The caterpillar of the gypsy moth (Lymantria dispar) causes severe damage to forests in the northeast United States, where it is an invasive species. In temperate climates, the codling moth causes extensive damage, especially to fruit farms. In tropical and subtropical climates, the diamondback moth (Plutella xylostella) is perhaps the most serious pest of brassicaceous crops.

Several moths in the family Tineidae are commonly regarded as pests because their larvae eat fabric such as clothes and blankets made from natural proteinaceous fibers such as wool or silk.^[5] They are less likely to eat mixed materials containing artificial fibers. There are some reports that they can be repelled by the scent of wood from juniper and cedar, by lavender, or by other natural oils. However, many consider this unlikely to prevent infestation. Naphthalene (the chemical used in mothballs) is considered more effective, but there are concerns over its effects on human health. Moth larvae may be killed by freezing the items which they infest for several days at a temperature below −8 °C (18 °F).^[6]

Protective silk (or similar material) case (cocoon)

Some moths are farmed. The most notable of these is the silkworm, the larva of the domesticated moth Bombyx mori. It is farmed for the silk with which it builds its cocoon. As of 2002^[update], the silk industry produces over 130 million kilograms of raw silk, worth about 250 million U.S. dollars, each year.^[7][8][9] Not all silk is produced by Bombyx mori. There are several species of Saturniidae that are also farmed for their silk, such as the Ailanthus moth (Samia cynthia group of species), the Chinese Oak Silkmoth (Antheraea pernyi), the Assam Silkmoth (Antheraea assamensis), and the Japanese Silk Moth (Antheraea yamamai).

The mopane worm, the caterpillar of Gonimbrasia belina, from the family Saturniidae, is a significant food resource in southern Africa.

Despite being notorious for eating clothing, most moth adults do not eat at all. Most like the Luna, Polyphemus, Atlas, Prometheus, Cercropia, and other large moths do not have mouths. When they do eat, moths will drink nectar.^[5]

Attraction to light[link]

Moths frequently appear to circle artificial lights, although the reason for this behavior remains unknown. One hypothesis advanced to explain this behavior is that moths use a technique of celestial navigation called transverse orientation. By maintaining a constant angular relationship to a bright celestial light, such as the Moon, they can fly in a straight line. Celestial objects are so far away, that even after travelling great distances, the change in angle between the moth and the light source is negligible; further, the moon will always be in the upper part of the visual field or on the horizon. When a moth encounters a much closer artificial light and uses it for navigation, the angle changes noticeably after only a short distance, in addition to being often below the horizon. The moth instinctively attempts to correct by turning toward the light, causing airborne moths to come plummeting downwards, and resulting in a spiral flight path that gets closer and closer to the light source.^[10]

Predators and parasites of moths[link]

Tomato Hornworm parasitized by braconid wasps.

Nocturnal insectivores often feed on moths; these include some bats, some species of owls and other species of birds. Moths are also eaten by some species of lizards, cats, dogs, rodents, and some bears. Moth larvae are vulnerable to being parasitized by Ichneumonidae.

Six-Spot Burnet Moth (Zygaena filipendulae) extracting nectar from a thistle (and thus pollinating it) on the island of Hiiumaa, Estonia.

Baculoviruses are parasite double-stranded DNA insect viruses that are used mostly as biological control agents. They are members of the Baculoviridae, a family that is restricted to insects. Most baculovirus isolates have been obtained from insects, in particular from Lepidoptera.

There is evidence that ultrasound in the range emitted by bats causes flying moths to make evasive maneuvers because bats eat moths. Ultrasonic frequencies trigger a reflex action in the noctuid moth that cause it to drop a few inches in its flight to evade attack.^[11] Tiger moths also emit clicks which foil bats' echolocation.^[12][13]

Mottephobia[link]

Mottephobia is the fear of moths. The origin of the word motte is German (meaning moth) and phobia is Greek (meaning fear).

Notable moths[link]

• Atlas moth Attacus atlas – The largest moth in the world
• White Witch moth (Thysania agrippina), the Lepidopteran with the biggest wingspan
• Madagascan Sunset moth (Chrysiridia rhipheus), considered to be one of the most impressive and beautiful Lepidoptera^[14]
• Death's-head hawkmoth (Acherontia spp.), is associated with the supernatural and evil and has been featured in art and movies
• Peppered moth (Biston betularia), the subject of a well-known study in natural selection.
• Luna moth (Actias luna)
• Grease Moth (Aglossa cuprina), known to have fed on the rendered fat of humans^[15]
• Emperor Gum moth (Opodiphthera eucalypti)
• Polyphemus moth (Antheraea polyphemus)
• Bogong moth (Agrotis infusa), known to have been a food source for Southeastern indigenous Australians

Moths of economic significance:

• Gypsy moth (Lymantria dispar), a pest of hardwood trees in North America
• Corn earworm or cotton bollworm (Helicoverpa zea), a major agricultural pest
• Indianmeal Moth (Plodia interpunctella), a major pest of grain and flour
• Codling moth (Cydia pomonella), a pest mostly of apple, pear and walnut trees
• Light brown apple moth (Epiphyas postvittana), a highly polyphagous pest
• Silkworm (Bombyx mori), for its silk
• Wax moths (Galleria mellonella, Achroia grisella), pests of bee hives
• Duponchelia fovealis, a new invasive pest of vegetable in the United States

Moth from the Island of Hawaii

See also[link]

• Baculovirus
• Butterfly
• Clothing Moth
• Difference between a butterfly and a moth
• Lepidoptera
• List of moths
• Moth dermatitis
• Pollination

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Lepidoptera

• European Butterflies and Moths by Christopher Jonko
• Museum Witt The World`s Leading Collection of Moths (English)
• Moths of North America Diagnostic large format photographs, taxonomy, descriptions
• Butterflies and Moths at Lepidoptera.pro: Thousands of species and photos
• North American Moth Photographers Group Diagnostic photographs for thousands of species
• Bugguide - Moths
• Back Garden Moths
• UK Lepidoptera
• Helicoverpa Diapause Induction and Moth Emergence Tool
• Pterophoridae of North America
• Moths on the UF / IFAS Featured Creatures Website

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (March 2007)

Kieran Hebden
Hebden performs at the Grog Shop in Cleveland, Ohio
Background information
Also known as	Four Tet
Origin	United Kingdom
Genres	Electronic Folktronica IDM Jazz Post-dubstep Post-rock
Instruments	Piano, drums, guitar, harpsichord, horn, synthesizer
Years active	1998–present
Labels	Output Recordings Domino Records
Associated acts	Fridge, Steve Reid, Burial, Thom Yorke
Website	http://www.fourtet.net/

Kieran Hebden (born 1978, Putney, London) is a post-rock and electronic musician. Hebden first came to prominence as a member of the band Fridge before establishing himself as a solo artist under the moniker of Four Tet.

Hebden's music typically eschews the traditional pop song format in favour of a more abstract approach—his sound and melodies incorporate elements of hip hop, electronica, techno, jazz, and folk music with live instrumentation.

Alongside recording his own material, Hebden has also performed remixes for a number of artists including Aphex Twin, Anti-Pop Consortium, Bonobo, Beth Orton, Born Ruffians, Explosions in the Sky, Super Furry Animals, Radiohead, Manic Street Preachers, Matthew Dear, Sia, Nathan Fake, Bloc Party, Andrew Bird, Kings of Convenience, Battles, Juana Molina, Madvillain, The xx, Foals, and Black Sabbath, as well as producing two albums by psychedelic improvisational group Sunburned Hand of the Man. Hebden's recent output includes a number of improvisational works with the late jazz drummer Steve Reid and collaborations with both Burial and Thom Yorke.

History[link]

Kieran Hebden was born in London to a South African-born Indian mother and a sociology lecturer father.^[1] He attended Elliott School in Putney,^[1] where he formed the band Fridge with classmates Adem Ilhan and Sam Jeffers. The band signed a recording contract when Hebden was 15,^[1] and released their first album in March 1997.

Hebden began releasing material as Four Tet in 1998 with the 36 minute, 25 second single Thirtysixtwentyfive on Trevor Jackson's Output Recordings label. Later that year, he released a second single, the jazz-influenced "Misnomer". 1999's Dialogue, again on Output, was Four Tet's first full-length album release and fused hip hop drum lines with dissonant jazz samples. This was followed by the double A-side single "Glasshead"/"Calamine", which was to be Four Tet's last release on Output.

In late 1999, Warp Records released Warp 10 + 3: Remixes, a tenth-anniversary compilation of remixes of Warp tracks; Hebden contributed a remix of the opening track of Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works Volume II. This relatively high-profile exposure attracted new interest in Four Tet from fans of electronica and intelligent dance music, genres in which the Warp brand has a preeminent status.^{[citation needed]}

In 2001, Four Tet's second album Pause was released on Domino Records and found Hebden using more folk and electronic samples, which was quickly dubbed "folktronica" by the media and press^{[citation needed]} in an attempt to label the style (often also applied to artists such as Isan and Gravenhurst). Rounds was released in May 2003. Three singles were released from the album: "She Moves She", "As Serious as Your Life", and "My Angel Rocks Back and Forth". This last single was released as an EP featuring remixes by electronica duo Icarus and Isambard Khroustaliov along with additional Four Tet tracks "I've Got Viking in Me" and "All the Chimers". An accompanying DVD featured all of Four Tet's videos to date. In addition, the closing track "Slow Jam" was featured in a U.S. Nike commercial in 2001 and 2002; Hebden edited the track on the back of the bus with his laptop while on a tour with Fridge.^{[citation needed]}

At the beginning of 2003, Four Tet opened for Radiohead on their European tour. A remix of the song "Scatterbrain" from Radiohead's sixth studio album Hail to the Thief was released in November 2003 as a B-side to the single "2 + 2 = 5" and later included on their 2004 EP COM LAG (2plus2isfive). Furthermore, Hebden was among the people thanked by Radiohead in the booklet accompanying their 2007 In Rainbows "discbox" release.

A live album named Live in Copenhagen 30th March 2004 was released in April 2004 as a limited edition, available exclusively from the Domino Records website.

In March and April 2005, Four Tet performed two shows of improvisational music, in collaboration with jazz drummer Steve Reid, in Paris and London. He also appears on Steve Reid Ensemble 2005 album Spirit Walk. This collaboration was extended into a series of international tours, and the release of two albums, The Exchange Session Vol. 1 and The Exchange Session Vol. 2 over the course of 2005 and 2006.

His fourth studio album Everything Ecstatic was released on Domino on 23 May 2005. The video for the lead single, "Smile Around the Face", features actor Mark Heap. On 7 November 2005, Domino released a DVD version of Everything Ecstatic featuring video clips for each track of the album plus a CD with new material, titled Everything Ecstatic Part 2, which was later made available as an individual EP.

Hebden has also remixed, under the Four Tet name, tracks by a wide range of artists including Tegan And Sara, Madvillain, Andrew Bird, Bloc Party, Super Furry Animals, Beth Orton, Badly Drawn Boy, CYNE, The Notwist, Boom Bip, Battles, Kings of Convenience, Lars Horntveth, Bonobo, Rothko, The xx, Thom Yorke and Radiohead. On 25 September 2006, Domino Records released Remixes, a two-disc compilation of Four Tet remixes. The first disc contains twelve Four Tet remixes selected by Hebden, with the second disc comprising every official remix to date (both by Hebden himself and by other artists) of Four Tet tracks, many of which had previously been available on vinyl only.^[2] A new EP, Ringer, was released on 21 April 2008.

In 2008, Hebden collaborated with composer David Arnold to write "Crawl, End Crawl", the song used for the end credits of the film Quantum of Solace.^[3]

In 2009, Hebden worked on a secret collaboration with Burial. The two track 12" was released with a plain black cover with no liner notes or details contained on the vinyl, other than the artists' names and the track titles: "Moth" and "Wolf Cub".

In November 2009, details of the fifth full-length Four Tet album were released. Heavily influenced by a stint DJing at the Plastic People club in Shoreditch^[4] and entitled There Is Love in You, it was released on 25 January 2010.^[5] The album was preceded by a limited edition release of the 12" single "Love Cry".

In 2011, Hebden released a split 12" with Burial and Thom Yorke, entitled "Ego/Mirror". He has been chosen by Caribou to perform at the ATP Nightmare Before Christmas festival that they co-curate in December 2011 in Minehead, England.^[6]

Selected discography[link]

Albums (as Four Tet)[link]

• Dialogue (Output Recordings, May 1999)
• Pause (Domino Records, 28 May 2001)
• Rounds (Domino Records, 5 May 2003) - UK #60^[7]
• Everything Ecstatic (Domino Records, 23 May 2005) - UK #59^[7]
• Remixes (Domino Records, 25 September 2006)
• Ringer (Domino Records, 21 April 2008)
• There Is Love in You (Domino Records, 25 January 2010) - #35 UK, #157 US

Mix albums[link]

• Late Night Tales: Four Tet (Azuli Records, 4 October 2004) (DJ mix album compiled by Hebden)
• DJ-Kicks: Four Tet (Studio !K7, 26 June 2006) (mix album in the DJ-Kicks series)
• FabricLive.59 (Fabric Records, September 2011) (mix album in the Fabric discography series)

Albums (as Kieran Hebden)[link]

• The Exchange Session Vol. 1 (with Steve Reid; Domino Records, 27 February 2006)
• The Exchange Session Vol. 2 (with Steve Reid; Domino Records, 22 May 2006)
• Tongues (with Steve Reid; Domino Records, 19 March 2007)
• NYC (with Steve Reid; Domino Records, 4 November 2008)

References[link]

• Guardian interview
• TheMilkFactory interview
• Sound On Sound interview
• Four Tet chooses his nine most influential records

External links[link]

• Official website
• Fourtet on SoundCloud
• Review of 'Sing' on the Daily Music Guide
• Kieran Hebden Red Bull Music Academy video lecture session
• Kieran Hebden on Myspace
• Kieran Hebden at Allmusic
• Kieran Hebden discography at MusicBrainz
• Four Tet on Andrew Meza's BTS Radio
• Four Tet Essential Mix
• Kieran Hebden interview @ MUTEK

Starlee Kine is an American public radio producer and writer. She was born in California. Her work has been featured on This American Life^[1] and Marketplace. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times Magazine. She is currently working on a book about self-help titled It IS Your Fault.

Kine is also a regular guest on the Canadian radio show WireTap with host Jonathan Goldstein.

[edit] This American Life work

• Episode 75  – Kindness of Strangers
• Episode 146 – Urban Nature
• Episode 183 – Missing Parents' Bureau
• Episode 205 – Plan B
• Episode 208 – Office Politics
• Episode 223 – Classifieds
• Episode 226 – Reruns
• Episode 231 – Time to Save the World
• Episode 238 – Lost in Translation
• Episode 248 – Like It Or Not
• Episode 259 – Promised Land
• Episode 261 – The Sanctity of Marriage
• Episode 277 – Apology
• Episode 283 – Remember Me
• Episode 335 – Big Wide World^[2]
• Episode 339 – Break-Up
• Episode 354 – Mistakes Were Made^[3]
• Special Live Event (Episode 379) – Return To The Scene Of The Crime
• Episode 424 - Kid Politics

External links[link]

• Child Actors – Starlee Kine's piece about child labor on Marketplace – 23 January 2003
• It's a Hard Knock This American Life – Starlee Kine profile in The New Yinzer – Spring 2008

References[link]

This United States biographical article related to radio is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Tony Hendra (born 1941) is an English satirist and writer who has worked mostly in the United States. Educated at St Albans School (where he was a classmate of Stephen Hawking) and Cambridge University, he was a member of the Cambridge University Footlights revue in 1962, alongside John Cleese, Graham Chapman and Tim Brooke-Taylor.

Career[link]

In 1964 Hendra moved to America, where he worked as a comedian, sometimes teamed with comic actor Nick Ullett as "Hendra and Ullett," appearing on the Merv Griffin Show multiple times and six times on the Ed Sullivan Show. He wrote for National Lampoon magazine from its beginning in 1970 and in 1971 became the first editor hired by founders Doug Kenney and Henry Beard. In 1972 Hendra co-created National Lampoon's first album Radio Dinner with Michael O'Donoghue on which he performed a parody of John Lennon entitled Magical Misery Tour. In 1973 he produced, directed and co-wrote (with Sean Kelly), the Lampoon's off-Broadway revue Lemmings in which Hendra cast John Belushi, Chevy Chase and Christopher Guest in their first starring roles. Hendra was an editor of the Lampoon until 1974, and was co-editor-in-chief with Sean Kelly from 1975-1978.

Freelance editor[link]

After leaving the Lampoon in 1978 Hendra began working as a freelance editor, writer and actor. During the New York newspaper strike of 1978 he helped create the parody Not the New York Times featuring Christopher Cerf, George Plimpton, and Rusty Unger, and published by Larry Durocher and Josh Feigenbaum. In 1982 he was editor-in-chief of Off the Wall Street Journal and, in 1983, of Off the Wall Street Journal II. Other parodies Hendra created and edited included The Irrational Inquirer, Playboy: the Parody and Not the Bible (1983).

Hendra was featured on the cover of Newsweek (April 25, 1983) with Sean Kelly and Alfred Gingold.

Hendra was editor-in-chief of Spy Magazine from 1993 to 1994.

Television and movies[link]

In 1984 Hendra co-created, co-produced and co-wrote the British television satirical show Spitting Image for which he, Jon Blair, and John Lloyd were nominated for a British Academy Award in 1985. He was ousted from the production after the first six shows, to be replaced by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor.

His most notable acting role was starring in This Is Spinal Tap, as the band's manager, Ian Faith. He also had roles in several other films and television programs, including appearances on "Miami Vice", "The Bill Cosby Mysteries", and "Law and Order - Criminal Intent".

In 1997 Hendra co-wrote with director Ron Shelton The Great White Hype, a satire of racism in boxing, starring Samuel Jackson, Damon Wayans, Jamie Foxx, Jeff Goldblum and Peter Berg.

He co-conceived and wrote the English dubs of 3 of the films created by Belgian animator Picha, including The Missing Link (1980), The Big Bang (1987), and Snow White: The Sequel (2007).

Books[link]

• Last Words (2009) co-author with George Carlin
• The Messiah of Morris Avenue (2006) Hendra's first novel depicts the second coming of Christ in a future United States ruled by the religious right.
• Father Joe: The Man Who Saved My Soul (2004) A memoir.
• Brotherhood (A photographic tribute to the NYFD heroes of 9/11), with foreword by Frank McCourt. (2001)
• The GIGAWIT Dictionary of the E-nglish Language (2000)
• The Book of Bad Virtues (1994)
• Brad '61: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man with Roy Lichtenstein (1993)
• Born to Run Things: An Utterly Unauthorized Biography of George Bush (1992)
• Tales from the Crib (with Bob Saget) (1991)
• The 90's: A Look Back co-edited with Peter Elbling, designed by Paula Scher (1989)
• Going Too Far The Rise and Demise of Boomer Humor 1955-1980 (1987)
• The Sayings of Ayatollah Khomeini Trans. The Little Green Book of Ayatollah Khomeini (Paris). (Editor) (1980)
• The 80's: A Look Back at the Tumultuous Decade 1980-1989 (1979) Editor with Christopher Cerf and Peter Elbling.

Family life and controversy[link]

Hendra married Judith Christmas in 1964. The couple had two daughters, the younger of whom is Jessica Hendra. Tony and Judith Hendra underwent an acrimonious divorce in 1985. Hendra subsequently remarried; he and his second wife, Carla Hendra, live in New York and have three children together.

In 2004, at the time that Father Joe was achieving best-seller status, Jessica Hendra contacted the New York Times, requesting that the newspaper publish an op-ed piece she had written in which she alleged that her father had sexually abused her as a young child. The newspaper declined to publish the op-ed piece, but they did assign a reporter to investigate her charges. On July 1, 2004, the Times published an article on the front page of the Arts section about Jessica Hendra's allegations. The story, by reporter N.R. Kleinfield, included details about the alleged acts of molestation, along with Tony Hendra's denial: "I can only just categorically deny this. It's not a new allegation. It's simply not true, I'm afraid."^[1]

After the Times was criticized for publishing the story in the absence of proof,^[2] the paper's ombudsman, Daniel Okrent, wrote an article examining the newspaper's decision. Okrent quoted an email exchange with Kleinfield in which the latter wrote that, based on his reporting, he had concluded that Jessica Hendra had indeed been molested. At the same time, Okrent expressed concern about the possibility that Jessica Hendra's charges were false, citing in particular the damage that could be caused to Hendra's young children who were 11, 12 and 14 at the time. "As an editor," Okrent concluded, "the verities of the profession might have led me to publish this article. But as a reader, I wish The Times hadn't."^[3]

Jessica Hendra subsequently published a memoir, How to Cook Your Daughter, that repeated the abuse allegations. The book was published by Judith Regan of ReganBooks.

Notes[link]

External links[link]

• A link to "Magical Misery Tour" Hendra's 1972 parody of John Lennon
• Lemmings review
• A profile of Hendra by The Independent.
• New York Times Book Review by Andrew Sullivan of Tony Hendra's book Father Joe.
• [1] Articles in Harpers Magazine by Hendra on bullfighting and the Spanish Civil War and his memoirs of life in comedy.
• http://www.thecommentary.ca/ontheline/20060418a.html Tony Hendra audio interview re: The Messiah of Morris Avenue (18 April 2006).
• God Save This Book An essay by Davis Sweet defending Father Joe.
• Tony Hendra at the Internet Movie Database
• Tony Hendra at the Internet Broadway Database

Ted Conover (born January 17, 1958, in Okinawa and raised in Denver, Colorado) is an American author and journalist. A graduate of Denver's Manual High School and Amherst College and a Marshall Scholar, he is also a distinguished writer-in-residence in the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute of New York University. He teaches graduate courses in the Literary Reportage concentration and an undergraduate course on journalism and empathy.

Writing career[link]

Conover's books of narrative nonfiction have typically been explorations of off-beat social worlds. He will often become an active participant in the subculture he is writing about. His first experiment with this melding of anthropological and journalistic method took place in 1980, when he rode freight railroads back and forth across the western United States with some of the last remaining hobos. This experience, initially rendered as an ethnography for an honors thesis, became the basis of his first-person book, Rolling Nowhere: Riding the Rails with America's Hoboes (1984).

A few of those Conover met on the rails were Mexican nationals, and in his next book, Coyotes: A Journey Across Borders with America's Illegal Migrants (1987), he turned his attention to illegal immigrants, describing them as "the true modern-day incarnation of the classic American hobo." Conover spent a year traveling with Mexicans in order to write Coyotes; he lived in a "feeder" valley in the Mexican state of Querétaro, spent time in Arizona, Idaho, California, and Florida, and crossed the border three times. The 1987 book came out in a new edition in 2006 with a new preface and subtitle: "A Journey Across Borders With America's Mexican Migrants."

His next project, which he has stated he undertook in part to see whether the participatory approach could work with wealthier people, describes life in the mining-town-turned-lifestyle-capital of Aspen, Colorado, where Conover worked as a driver for the Mellow Yellow Taxi Company, the Aspen Times, and for a catering company. The result was Whiteout: Lost in Aspen (1991).

A few years later, Conover took a job at Sing Sing prison in New York state, where he worked for nearly a year — without the state's knowledge — as a rookie correction officer. The resulting book, Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing (2000), was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize^[1] and won the 2000 National Book Critics Circle Award in General Nonfiction,^[2] among other honors. For many months, prisoners and their visitors were banned from reading Newjack; now, inmates who receive a copy have to wait up to several months while the state redacts several pages that it considers a threat to security.^{[citation needed]}

His most recent work is The Routes of Man: Travels in the Paved World (2011). Conover discussed it^[3] in the Paper Cuts blog of the New York Times Book Review.

In addition to books, much of Conover's work has been published in magazines. He frequently contributes to The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, National Geographic Magazine, Travel + Leisure, and others.^[4] He is on the editorial board of the literary magazine The Common, based at Amherst College, and published work in the debut issue.^[5]

Bibliography[link]

• Rolling Nowhere: Riding the Rails with America's Hoboes, 1984, ISBN 978-0-670-60319-0
• Coyotes: A Journey Across Borders with America's Illegal Migrants, 1987, ISBN 0-394-75518-9
• Whiteout: Lost In Aspen, 1991, ISBN 978-0-394-57469-1
• Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing, 2000, ISBN 978-0-375-50177-7
• The Routes of Man: Travels in the Paved World, 2011, ISBN 978-1-4000-4244-9 hardcover, 978-1400077021 paper

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official site
• Ted Conover articles at Byliner
• Review of Newjack at Letters On Pages
• Review of Whiteout at Letters On Pages
• Interview at Guernica Magazine
• Interview at DaysOfYore.com
• Interview at Rolf Potts' Vagabonding