Constellation Prize & The Believer Magazine
Editorial Assist- Ep 1: The Crossing Guard by Bianca Giaever. May-June 2020
Feeling down about the human condition? Consider the spiritual dilemmas of a school crossing guard, a documentary filmmaker, an artist who likes belts, and more. Constellation Prize, a podcast from The Believer magazine, talks to subjects about their daily existential problems — how art, God, and loneliness fit in their lives.
The Crossing Guard is wonderful piece from by Bianca Giaever in her new Pod series with The Believer Magazine. Bianca spent 6 months with Sophia, talking about loneliness, faith and NY traffic.
I can’t say much about the piece or the protagonist without ruining it, but wisdom, quick wittiness and warmth ooze from this piece as it winds its way through the existential knots and weeds of life experienced from the sidewalk.
My part in this was working through the drafts as an editor, alongside Andrew Leland. We’d worked with Bianca before, and originally this episode was scheduled to become an episode of The Organist- though that never quite came to fruition due to our hiatus.
Thankfully Bianca went on get the piece into the world anyhow, and you can listen to a snippet below- or access the full show and more episodes here
Reviews:
Bianca launched Constellation Prize in July 2020.
The journal Los Angeles Review of Books- Podcast Review chose it as one of their Top 5 recommended releases for August 2020
‘Constellation Prize achieves something rare in podcasting, and for that, the project feels less like a podcast and more like an invitation to eavesdrop on the most intimate conversations at a party.’
It was picked up and rebroadcast by Death, Sex & Money (WNYC Studios), as part of their first Audio We Love Festival, October 2020, and selected as one of Bello Collective’s 100 Outstanding Podcasts from 2020 in December.
About The Believer
The Believer, a ten-time National Magazine Award finalist, is a bimonthly literature, arts, and culture magazine based at the Beverly Rogers, Carol C. Harter Black Mountain Institute, a department of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. In each issue, readers will find journalism, essays, intimate interviews, an expansive comics section, poetry, and on occasion, delightful and unexpected bonus items. Our poetry section is curated by Jericho Brown, Kristen Radtke selects our comics, and Joshua Wolf Shenk is our editor-in-chief. All issues feature a column by Nick Hornby, in which he discusses the things he’s been reading, as well as a comedy advice column.
