Augsburg creative writing mentor Neal Karlen describes connection to Prince in Star Tribune column

Laura Swanson Lindahl '15 MBA — Fri, 29 Apr 2016 11:36:37 +0000

Neal Karlen, a mentor in Augsburg College’s Master of Arts in Creative Writing program, described the unlikely friendship he developed with music icon Prince in a recent Star Tribune column. Karlen is among an elite group of writers granted in-depth interviews with Prince in the mid-1980s. Over time, discussions between the print writer and the songwriter developed into something akin to friendship, according Karlen.

“I always told Prince I knew he really didn’t consider me a friend, but as one of the few people in Minneapolis who was probably awake, like he always was, in the middle of the night, and was ‘Willing and Able,’ as my favorite song of his is titled, to talk about loneliness and death,” Karlen wrote.

“I even rubbed it in, in the opening of my second Rolling Stone cover story on Prince, published in 1990.

‘The phone rings at 4:48 in the morning,'”

The post Augsburg creative writing mentor Neal Karlen describes connection to Prince in Star Tribune column appeared first on News and Media.

Neal Karlen Archives - News and Media

Augsburg creative writing mentor Neal Karlen describes connection to Prince in Star Tribune column