Ira Glass Radio Quotations

Honestly, there are so many things about structuring a story for film and telling a story for film that are really different from doing radio.

But sadly, one of the problems with being on public radio is that people tend to think you're being sincere all the time.

But you can make good radio, interesting radio, great radio even, without an urgent question, a burning issue at stake.

I suppose I shouldn't go around admitting I speak untruths on the radio.

Where radio is different than fiction is that even mediocre fiction needs purpose, a driving question.

I've actually done events at radio stations where I feel like I've had to give a little talk in behalf of television as a medium.

Not owning a car anymore, I feel like I'm barely an American. I miss it. And I barely ever get to listen to the radio in the car, which is the best place for radio.

Radio is more powerful the closer we mimic the way we actually speak to each other. That's why Howard Stern is such a great radio talent. People on his show are actually speaking to each other. You might not like what they're saying, but they're real conversations.

The radio is good for taking somebody else's experience and making you understand what it would be like. Because when you don't see someone, but you hear them talking - and, uh, that is what radio is all about - it's like when someone is talking from the heart. Everything about it conspires to take you into somebody else's world.

For most people when you say - public radio - they automatically think it's like medicine. We only do stories that amuse and interest us. For people who haven't heard the show, we describe it like a movie where there are characters and you're interested in what's going to happen to them.