Few students who sign up for one of Norman Corwin's journalism courses know much more about their white-haired professor than his catalog description as "a radio pioneer and author of many books."

So Corwin's colleague, journalism professor A.J. (Jack) Langguth, steps up to the plate.

"I go in each semester to his class, either the first session or sometimes a little into it, and he comes late - 90 minutes late, so he doesn't have to endure it - and with a brief preamble, I show the tape," Langguth said.

The "tape" is the 1995 documentary Corwin, which weaves reminiscences of Corwin's friends and admirers, including Charles Kuralt, Eric Sevareid and Norman Lear, with documentary footage of World War II and excerpts from Corwin's radio dramas of the '30s and '40s. Corwin originated 12 years ago as a student project directed by another faculty colleague, Joe Saltzman, and was finally completed by documentary filmmaker Les Guthman.

"After about 20 minutes [of the film], the students are completely in his hands," Saltzman said. "They know there's something special about this man."

And by the end of Corwin, Langguth said, "students are congratulating themselves on their wisdom in signing up for this course."

Corwin, whose modesty and charm are almost as legendary as his body of work, will be forced to endure twin tributes on April 30 and May 1, organized by the Museum of Television & Radio in Beverly Hills.

Both tributes are called "An Evening With Norman Corwin." The first, a public seminar at 7 p.m., April 30, at the museum, will feature Corwin discussing his career and taking questions from the audience. (See Calendar highlights, page 12.) The following night is an invitation-only dinner for Corwin and his legion of fans in journalism, the entertainment industry and elsewhere.

"I never had either the time or the inclination to savor it," Corwin said recently about his 60 years of acclaim by critics and colleagues for his radio and theater plays, books, poetry and screenplays (see box). "Also, I had in the back of my mind that recognition is ephemeral - it never bothered me or thrilled me one way or another. I was too absorbed in the task of getting out these programs. And it has been my attitude ever since to do the best work I can and let the response fall where it may."

Corwin, who will be 87 on May 3, is still writing and directing radio plays - but for National Public Radio instead of CBS, where he was the brightest star of radio's Golden Age in the 1930s and '40s. He is finishing the fourth of a series of six new radio dramas called "More by Corwin" that have been broadcast by NPR stations, including KUSC-FM, beginning last November.

"Our Lady of the Freedoms and Some of Her Friends," which will air on or near the Fourth of July, is a celebration of the Statue of Liberty as a symbol of American idealism. The fifth and sixth plays will air at Thanksgiving and in December.

"This is the most relaxed deadline I've ever had in radio," Corwin said.

Indeed, among Corwin's celebrated accomplishments was taking on a commission to write, direct and produce 26 radio features for CBS' heralded Columbia Workshop in 1941 - one a week. "I had to have a few marbles missing to agree to that, but it was too tempting," Corwin said. "It seemed to me at the time like 26 gold ingots being presented to me, and I said yes."

Corwin, who insisted on carrying a younger visitor's canvas bag on a recent walk through campus, mentions that his father lived to age 110, but doesn't dwell on his own age. Yet Corwin's continued productivity - and vitality - are a constant marvel to others.

"A lot of people, as we get older, shut down in our interests and our human concerns," Langguth said. "But it seems to me that Norman's are at least as active and maybe have grown with age, so that there's very little - from sports through politics and the arts - that he doesn't know about and doesn't still care passionately about."

Corwin was recruited to teach at USC in 1979 by Saltzman, then head of the School of Journalism's broadcasting program. "I wanted to get the top people in broadcasting. Talk about radio, about writing for the ear - Norman was simply the best," Saltzman said.

Once Corwin's students realize they are in the same room with someone who directed Orson Welles, Bette Davis, Edward G. Robinson, Jimmy Cagney and James Stewart, they are in awe, Langguth said.

"The fact that he refuses to turn over the class to reminiscence and memories, but instead throws himself with that same passion into discussing and improving their work may be the ultimate flattery - that they're getting criticism and praise from one of the legendary figures in the field they've chosen," Langguth said.

Corwin, in turn, sings the praises of USC: its enriching location in the heart of a complex metropolis, its cultural ambience, and above all, the quality of its faculty. "I came to the USC campus having decades of experience in the media. I had a working association with colleagues at every stage. None has been more gratifying to work with than those at USC," Corwin told Transcript, the USC faculty/staff publication, in 1986.

One year earlier, Saltzman organized a tribute for Corwin's 75th birthday. The master of ceremonies was Los Angeles Times cartoonist Paul Conrad, and Corwin was presented with Thirteen for Corwin, a collection of appreciations by friends like author Ray Bradbury and broadcast historian Erik Barnouw. In a letter published in the 1994 book Norman Corwin's Letters (Barricade Books), edited by Langguth, Corwin wrote to Eric Sevareid:

"A USC crowd - 350 strong - gave me a bash, and among the props was a skyscraper of a birthday cake with 75 candles ablaze, enough to warm up the Astrodome on a chilly evening."

Letters, which was culled from Corwin's personal archives of more than 10,000 notes to family, friends, critics and co-workers over 67 years, is the closest Corwin has come to writing an autobiography. He tried once:

"I decided to give it up. I had written about 400 pages and I got tired of the pronoun 'I' - I suffered from 'I'-strain," Corwin said with his characteristic love of word play.

When he talks about his career, especially the golden years with CBS, Corwin still revels in his good fortune.

"I think that I have profited greatly from serendipity - being there at that time, people coming to me and commissioning me to do things that I probably never would have thought of undertaking on my own."

Corwin notes that he had the rare freedom to explore such decidely uncommercial topics as the Bill of Rights - without having to sell the idea to sponsors or producers.

"I didn't have to clear it; I didn't have to argue my way or defend my script," Corwin said. "If the script was bad, it was my responsibility. If it was good, it was my achievement.

"That's what I mean by the serendipity of a boss saying, 'Would you like to take over the workshop for 26 weeks?' It's tremendous!"

Although Corwin was known for comedies and light verse plays like The Undecided Molecule, he was perhaps even more famous for his passionate meditations on war, patriotism and bigotry. His We Hold These Truths (1941), celebrating the Bill of Rights, was heard by more than 60 million listeners - one of the largest radio audiences ever - when it was performed one week after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

In 1983, he wrote Trivializing America (Lyle Stuart Inc.) about the "triumph of the mediocre" in American life, from journalism to government to entertainment.

His friend Jack Langguth calls it the book "of a very angry person, with an anger that's the best and most productive sort, the kind that rages against inhumanity and cruelty and evil. There's nothing personal and petty and vindictive about it; it's the anger of a good man against the aspects of society that are unjust.

"It was written when he was in his mid-70s," Langguth noted, "and it has the passion and vigor of a 25-year-old. During those 50 years intervening, most of us learn to make compromises and accept the world as it is. Norman has not; he still thinks it can be better and must be better."

Norman Corwin:

Highlights From 86 Years

The superman of tomorrow lies at the feet of you common men of this afternoon.

- from On a Note of Triumph by Norman Corwin, first produced on V-E Day, May 8, 1945.

* Norman Lewis Corwin was born on May 3, 1910, in Boston. Corwin married actress Katherine Locke in 1947; they had two children, Diane and Anthony. Locke died in 1995.

* At USC, Corwin is a part-time faculty member in the School of Journalism. He alternates teaching a course on arts reporting and one on column writing.

* Radio dramas: The Plot to Overthrow Christmas, They Fly Through the Air With the Greatest of Ease, The Odyssey of Runyon Jones, My Client Curley, Untitled, We Hold These Truths, On a Note of Triumph, The Undecided Molecule, 50 Years After 14 August, No Love Lost, Cervantes, The Curse of 589.

* Screenplays: Lust for Life (1956; nominated for an Academy Award), Story of Ruth, The Blue Veil.

* Stage plays: Rivalry, The World of Carl Sandburg, The Hyphen.

* Books: Thirteen by Corwin, Prayer for the 70s, Network at 50, Holes in a Stained Glass Window, Trivializing America, CONartist (text to cartoons by Paul Conrad), Years of the Electric Ear, Norman Corwin's Letters.

* Awards: a One World Award (1946; Corwin flew around the world, recording speeches of leaders of state, artists and scientists), two Peabody Medals, an Emmy, a Golden Globe, and induction into the Radio Hall of Fame