In his study of the coevolution of radio and the novel in Argentina, Cuba, and the United States, Tom McEnaney, assistant professor of comparative literature and Spanish & Portuguese, explores how novelists in the radio age transformed realism as they struggled to channel and shape popular power. Acoustic Properties: Radio, Narrative, and the New Neighborhood of the Americas (Northwestern, 2017) engages literary works by such authors as Richard Wright, John Dos Passos, and Raymond Chandler, alongside Che Guevara and Fidel Castro’s Radio Rebelde, FDR’s fireside chats, and Evita Perón’s populist radio melodramas.

McEnaney is joined by Mark Goble (English). After a brief discussion of McEnaney's work, they open the floor for discussion.