It's not that bad: (require 'uiop) (defun c () (uiop:run-program '("emacs" "-nw" "file.lisp") :output :interactive

It's not that bad: (require 'uiop) (defun c () (uiop:run-program '("emacs" "-nw" "file.lisp") :output :interactive :input :interactive)) EDIT: note that SBCL comes with UIOP included by default, but if you want to use SBCL's implementation-specific facility, it's only slightly different: (defun c () (sb-ext:run-program "/usr/bin/emacs" '("-nw" "file.lisp") :input t :output t))