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How To Interview Doctor Who, Ozzy Osbourne And Everyone Else
Want to learn how to interview people as a journalist? Or maybe you're a pro in need of a refresher course, with some fresh ideas thrown in. Let HOW TO INTERVIEW DOCTOR WHO, OZZY OSBOURNE AND EVERYONE ELSE be your guide!
Drawing on 25 years of experience and with over 1000 interviews behind him, British writer JASON ARNOPP aims to tell you everything he knows about interrogating the great and good. He has spent these decades interviewing celebrities and rock stars for the likes of Heat, Doctor Who Magazine, Q, SFX and Kerrang!, but the vast majority of the principles described here will apply to ANY journalistic interviewing task. You need this book in your toolbox!
Written in an engaging, conversational style, HOW TO INTERVIEW... packs in over 28,000 words of practical wisdom. You’ll learn about the craft of interviewing, all the way from deciding how you’ll record your interviews, to devising questions, to dealing with various types of interviewee, to writing and editing your article.
Beyond that, however, you’ll get a real feel for what it’s like out there on the front-line. The surprises which PR folk may spring on you when you arrive to conduct your interview. The challenge of getting a reluctant, or even downright angry, interviewee to warm to you and open up. Even what to do when you realise that your recording device has failed to record the interview!
Sections in the book include the following:
Three Things You'll Need To Refer To During The Interview
Five Qualities That Make For A Good Interviewer
Seven Ways To Set Your Interviewee At Ease
The Eight Types Of Interviewee
Interviewing With An Audience
Fandom Vs Professionalism
The PR Establishes A No-Go Area
Can An Interviewee Ever Become Your Friend?
Underhand Tactics & Grey Areas
Becoming A Fly On The Wall
The Dreaded Roundtable Interview
Alcohol
Nightmare Situations
Transcription: A Necessary Evil
How Verbatim Do You Need To Be With Those Quotes?
The Structure Of An Interview Article
Author Arnopp even throws in a personal guarantee. If you buy this book and are left with questions, he’ll answer them via a Formspring account exclusive to purchasers.
Learn the JOURNALISTIC SECRETS of interviewing, with this incredible, indispensable volume! If you sat the author down in a bar, bought him drinks and picked his brains, leading scientists estimate you'd pay ten times as much as the price of this book!
TESTIMONIALS
"This guide to interviewing is tremendous fun, with some genuine insight into the whole process. Fascinating stuff, and properly amusing too. Brilliant!" - TOM SPILSBURY (Editor of DOCTOR WHO MAGAZINE.)
"With a great sense of humour and a sharp ear for the telling quote, Jason Arnopp is an interviewer who always gets the goods. Read and learn” - ANDREW HARRISON (Editor-At-Large of Q, former Editorial Director of MIXMAG and SMASH HITS.)
"Boy, I wish this book had been around when I started out. You can buy it as a PDF direct from the author for less than the cost of most magazines, and I'd advise new journalists to do so" - CATHERINE BRAY (FILM4.COM editor)
"Jason Arnopp is one of those ludicrous, funny people who manages to get the most reticent of stars to tell him things that they really shouldn't. As a journalist, he is blessed with a remarkable bedside manner. He might be able to teach you a thing or two” - PHIL ALEXANDER (MOJO Editor-In-Chief and former KERRANG! Editor.)
“It was my very happy experience to work with and read Jason Arnopp for a number of years on Kerrang! One singular thing marked Jason apart in his field – he had the invaluable ability to ask the unexpected question that caught both subject and reader off guard, and unfailingly meant you found out something new about whomever he was interviewing" - PAUL REES (former Editor of Q and KERRANG!)
Drawing on 25 years of experience and with over 1000 interviews behind him, British writer JASON ARNOPP aims to tell you everything he knows about interrogating the great and good. He has spent these decades interviewing celebrities and rock stars for the likes of Heat, Doctor Who Magazine, Q, SFX and Kerrang!, but the vast majority of the principles described here will apply to ANY journalistic interviewing task. You need this book in your toolbox!
Written in an engaging, conversational style, HOW TO INTERVIEW... packs in over 28,000 words of practical wisdom. You’ll learn about the craft of interviewing, all the way from deciding how you’ll record your interviews, to devising questions, to dealing with various types of interviewee, to writing and editing your article.
Beyond that, however, you’ll get a real feel for what it’s like out there on the front-line. The surprises which PR folk may spring on you when you arrive to conduct your interview. The challenge of getting a reluctant, or even downright angry, interviewee to warm to you and open up. Even what to do when you realise that your recording device has failed to record the interview!
Sections in the book include the following:
Three Things You'll Need To Refer To During The Interview
Five Qualities That Make For A Good Interviewer
Seven Ways To Set Your Interviewee At Ease
The Eight Types Of Interviewee
Interviewing With An Audience
Fandom Vs Professionalism
The PR Establishes A No-Go Area
Can An Interviewee Ever Become Your Friend?
Underhand Tactics & Grey Areas
Becoming A Fly On The Wall
The Dreaded Roundtable Interview
Alcohol
Nightmare Situations
Transcription: A Necessary Evil
How Verbatim Do You Need To Be With Those Quotes?
The Structure Of An Interview Article
Author Arnopp even throws in a personal guarantee. If you buy this book and are left with questions, he’ll answer them via a Formspring account exclusive to purchasers.
Learn the JOURNALISTIC SECRETS of interviewing, with this incredible, indispensable volume! If you sat the author down in a bar, bought him drinks and picked his brains, leading scientists estimate you'd pay ten times as much as the price of this book!
TESTIMONIALS
"This guide to interviewing is tremendous fun, with some genuine insight into the whole process. Fascinating stuff, and properly amusing too. Brilliant!" - TOM SPILSBURY (Editor of DOCTOR WHO MAGAZINE.)
"With a great sense of humour and a sharp ear for the telling quote, Jason Arnopp is an interviewer who always gets the goods. Read and learn” - ANDREW HARRISON (Editor-At-Large of Q, former Editorial Director of MIXMAG and SMASH HITS.)
"Boy, I wish this book had been around when I started out. You can buy it as a PDF direct from the author for less than the cost of most magazines, and I'd advise new journalists to do so" - CATHERINE BRAY (FILM4.COM editor)
"Jason Arnopp is one of those ludicrous, funny people who manages to get the most reticent of stars to tell him things that they really shouldn't. As a journalist, he is blessed with a remarkable bedside manner. He might be able to teach you a thing or two” - PHIL ALEXANDER (MOJO Editor-In-Chief and former KERRANG! Editor.)
“It was my very happy experience to work with and read Jason Arnopp for a number of years on Kerrang! One singular thing marked Jason apart in his field – he had the invaluable ability to ask the unexpected question that caught both subject and reader off guard, and unfailingly meant you found out something new about whomever he was interviewing" - PAUL REES (former Editor of Q and KERRANG!)
- GenresNonfiction
ebook
First published August 12, 2011
4 people are currently reading
34 people want to read
About the author
Jason Arnopp
33 books638 followersJason Arnopp is the author of the chiller-thriller novels Ghoster (2019) and The Last Days Of Jack Sparks (2016). He is also the co-author of Inside Black Mirror with Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones.
Arnopp wrote the Lionsgate horror feature film Stormhouse, the New Line Cinema novel Friday The 13th: Hate-Kill-Repeat, various official Doctor Who works of fiction (including the BBC audiobook Doctor Who: The Gemini Contagion) and script-edited the 2012 Peter Mullan film The Man Inside.
Arnopp has also written 2012's Beast In The Basement, a horror novella available at Amazon, and experimental ghost story A Sincere Warning About The Entity In Your Home.
He is the author of non-fiction ebook How To Interview Doctor Who, Ozzy Osbourne And Everyone Else. He is on Twitter here, and is represented by literary agent Oli Munson at The AM Heath Agency. He is also represented for film and TV by Lawrence Mattis at Circle Of Confusion.
He runs a private cult - sorry, that should have read CLUB - at Patreon, where members enjoy various perks.
Arnopp wrote the Lionsgate horror feature film Stormhouse, the New Line Cinema novel Friday The 13th: Hate-Kill-Repeat, various official Doctor Who works of fiction (including the BBC audiobook Doctor Who: The Gemini Contagion) and script-edited the 2012 Peter Mullan film The Man Inside.
Arnopp has also written 2012's Beast In The Basement, a horror novella available at Amazon, and experimental ghost story A Sincere Warning About The Entity In Your Home.
He is the author of non-fiction ebook How To Interview Doctor Who, Ozzy Osbourne And Everyone Else. He is on Twitter here, and is represented by literary agent Oli Munson at The AM Heath Agency. He is also represented for film and TV by Lawrence Mattis at Circle Of Confusion.
He runs a private cult - sorry, that should have read CLUB - at Patreon, where members enjoy various perks.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 23, 2020
Helpful, fun, educational
Honestly, I was in the mood for a random kind of read, having had a mind-numbing novel I mistakenly tried. I’d been on an Arnopp kick lately, and even though I’m not in the field I have always loved journalism. This book doesn’t disappoint.
Probably one of the better how-to pieces I’ve read, focused more on the human side of doing the job than an academic rigor of diagrams and theories that will never work in reality. Arnopp is a master at this subject, as well as a master of terrifying fiction. It’s truly not fair that he manages to be good at multiple crafts.
Honestly, I was in the mood for a random kind of read, having had a mind-numbing novel I mistakenly tried. I’d been on an Arnopp kick lately, and even though I’m not in the field I have always loved journalism. This book doesn’t disappoint.
Probably one of the better how-to pieces I’ve read, focused more on the human side of doing the job than an academic rigor of diagrams and theories that will never work in reality. Arnopp is a master at this subject, as well as a master of terrifying fiction. It’s truly not fair that he manages to be good at multiple crafts.
January 16, 2022
As someone who (when real life didn't get in the way) used to write reviews and such for a music website, I have briefly dabbled with conducting interviews. Fair to say, I was rubbish at them.
Really wish I'd been able to read this beforehand, as it not only highlights some of the exact struggles I faced, but offers handy guidance on how one can actually what Icoukd have done to make it work.
Highly recommended for anyone who has an interest in doing this sort of thing whether it be as a hobby or on a more professional basis.
It may be too late for me, but it definitely isn't too late for you....
Really wish I'd been able to read this beforehand, as it not only highlights some of the exact struggles I faced, but offers handy guidance on how one can actually what Icoukd have done to make it work.
Highly recommended for anyone who has an interest in doing this sort of thing whether it be as a hobby or on a more professional basis.
It may be too late for me, but it definitely isn't too late for you....
January 14, 2017
A lot of the information in the book is very logical, but you often don't realize how logical something is until you hear it. As a practical guide to conducting interviews this book works, but it is also a great deal of fun and moves along quickly. This is helped by anecdotes and Arnopp's light manner.
I got a big smile from the first line of the introduction:
"Interviewing people is something of a dark art. Not because occult worship is involved - not in the vast majority of cases, anyway - but because outside of journalist school, there's generally no-one to teach you how."
That does make a good case for the book, but also knowing that Arnopp writes horror, it is specific to him and a fun inside joke. And if anyone ever writes about those cases where occult worship is involved in celebrity interviews, it will probably be him.
I got a big smile from the first line of the introduction:
"Interviewing people is something of a dark art. Not because occult worship is involved - not in the vast majority of cases, anyway - but because outside of journalist school, there's generally no-one to teach you how."
That does make a good case for the book, but also knowing that Arnopp writes horror, it is specific to him and a fun inside joke. And if anyone ever writes about those cases where occult worship is involved in celebrity interviews, it will probably be him.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews