The guardian books podcast (fiction and non-fiction reviews and loads more)

http://www.theguardian.com/books/series/books

film reviews 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3u6LVHlGTk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHxdPHMsIdk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0xgdzDO25k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yaw7m5Of3Cc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43gAIBzXzsw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoZpCmcnM_s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jonkduDdc5k

book reviews
http://bookriot.com/podcast/


music reviews

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vcjy0dr42gc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aspbCJ68zqY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7UfcEtU8AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PECeceTOCU8

Some audiobooks to read out loud.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P72AD8ktEq4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSZ3wtqBpTE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbE4NXHoTLI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwHs2mPoVfQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHpriA3E5vg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INO1XRZLYh8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9WYQmbmLeQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_6aaH2gtIg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGpfu-KpuLw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wExK37zBmX8

More GRANTA stuff.

vids
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65mtLCbODCk&list=UU-QBOHsJwH6kjI6QcrGvv3w&index=1

podcasts
https://soundcloud.com/ted-hodgkinson-granta

A New generation of young British writers. You now speak their language. Are you going to miss what they have to offer?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8E7HLUaRF4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49e7JomuB2I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPmyJWOYLms
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65mtLCbODCk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lM1WwfARBPU

a whole lot of audiobooks...promises are made not to be broken, someone said
http://www.openculture.com/freeaudiobooks
http://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/books/

T I M E L E S S ! ! !

Rives

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFS-er6oZ30

Def Poetry Jam

 amazing artists galore.
                   tons of food for thought.
            sublime lines
if you see but a couple
         you'll surely want more.

 Lauryn Hill
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkSObnpCimA&feature=relmfu


Alicia keys
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkSObnpCimA&feature=related
POW by Alicia Keys(transcript)
http://www.seeklyrics.com/lyrics/Alicia-Keys/P-o-w.html

Check out the customers' reviews. Step Across This Line or Notes form a Big Country?

http://www.amazon.com/Step-Across-This-Line-Nonfiction/dp/0679463348

http://www.amazon.com/Notes-Big-Country-Bill-Bryson/dp/0552997862/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1321613496&sr=1-1

I realized it might be possible to actually see these writers having a goat what they do best: using words. True, They are novelists, not orators and some writers feel oddly ill at ease when confronted with spoken word.

Martin Amis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nw0QwZpUiT8

Kazuo Ishiguro
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=batJu1ypW-Y

Salman Rushdie (very juicy stuff; indepth exploration of the issue of a variety of issues. This interview doesn't really have much to do with the author's novels):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc60ro81dIw

Ian McEwan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc60ro81dIw

Esther Freud (the authors interviews the author of Beirut Blues)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddxVtrqfxjs&feature=related

Hanif Kureishi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzYMGkmkv_g

Rose Tremain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fx3M7Kn-EME

Will Self
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-dBLO-Zn4g

Ben Okri
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orNNO90R-JI

Philip Kerr
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlTyoygUTII

I got this info from a short essay Salman Rushdie wrote in 1993. Those of you who are into reading might get at least half as excited as I did when you lay your eyes on the lists, which obviously are not exhaustive but allow for quite a cluster of talented individuals.

In the early eighties these guys were given the weight label 'Best of Young British Novelists'. If Mr Salman Rushdie doesn't remember who were the bunch of literary critics who decided those and not other were the names and surnames on the lists, it is maybe not that important after all. Or maybe it is...

...I' ll try n google it...

Alright. The list was published in the literary magazine GRANTA, whose editor is Bill Bufford (Mr Rushdie did of course mentioned that further below. Why didn't I bother reading a bit further?) Anyway, here are the twenty writers:

Martin Amis, Pat Barker, Julian Barnes, Ursula Bentley, William Boyd, Buchi Emecheta, Maggie gee, Kazuo Ishiguro, Alan Judd, Adam Mars-jones, Ian McEwan, Shiva Naipaul, Philip Norman, Christopher Priest, Salman Rushdie, Clive Sinclair, Lisa St Aubin de Teran, Graham Swift, Rose Tremain and E.N. Wilson.

In 1990's list included the following word weavers:

Ian Bands, Louis de Bernieres, Anne Billson, Tibot Fischer, Esther Freud, Allan Hollinghurst, Kazuo Ishiguro, A. L. Kennedy, Philip KErr, Hanif Kureishi, Adam Lively, Adam Mars-Jones, Candia MacWilliams, Lawrence Norfolk, Ben Okri, Caryl Phillips, Will Self, Nicholas Shakespeare, Helen Simpson and Jeanette Winterson

HEre's another useful blog you can check out: www.englishfifthyear.blogspot.com

Always worth revisiting... or discovering.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jYOqu4b9BY&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejM3odcn3Tk&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3Bcz8VRmyE&feature=related

words about words.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/themes/words_about_words.html

Shakespearean surprises...

http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/Shaker/index.html?