Walk into the children's section of any bookstore and the magic wands and secret portals almost materialize in front of you. Wizards, witches, demons, time travel, dragons, orphans, orphaned dragons – doesn't anyone know how to write a non-magical book anymore?! In this hour of To the Best of...Read more
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Episode Archives
“We can be bought,” they said,” but we can’t be bored.” The king and queen of American theater, Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne turned down a fantastic sum from the movies in the middle of the depression to continue to live their illusion on the stage. In this hour of To the Best of Our...Read more
Kayfabe is an old carny term for fakery. Now it’s the code of honor for professional wrestling. Kayfabe means you never, EVER admit to ANYONE under ANY circumstances that pro wrestling’s fake. In this hour of To The Best Of Our Knowledge - the spectacle of professional wrestling. We’ll talk real...Read more
A rose by any other name may smell as sweet, but you still need a word to describe that glorious smell. We'll try out new words from the online world with a New York Times language blogger - words like YakkaWow and suicide cuisine. Also, the rise of a new world language called Globish....Read more
Everybody gets excited about whatever's new, but what about what's really, really old? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we commemorate geologic time. We'll meet the scientists who found the oldest object on Earth - a three point four billion year old zircon! And the Jazz...Read more
Do you get eight hours of sleep a night? If not, join the millions of sleep-deprived Americans stumbling through life half-awake. Scientists say our national sleep debt may be behind the epidemics of diabetes and obesity – maybe even cancer. In this hour of To the Best of Our...Read more
Say you’re in Vegas playing high-stakes poker. You haven’t slept in days. To make matters worse, you’re being stared down by two of the best poker players in the world. And...you’re bluffing. So, you bet it all to bring the pot to well over a million dollars. In this hour of To the Best of...Read more
Did you know that Teddy Roosevelt was one of nine U.S. presidents who had hooks for hands? Well, that's just one of countless facts included in John Hodgman's new almanac. But, as it turns out, all of these facts are fake. In this hour of the Peabody Award-winning To the Best of Our Knowledge,...Read more
What’s the best way to get someone to talk? NPR’s Terry Gross has done more interviewers than just about anyone else in public radio. But she prefers to talk to them long distance, with no eye contact. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Terry Gross on the art of the interview.Read more
Behold the spectacle of epic proportions! The abundant feast laid out! Tribes decked in battle attire!
Yes, friends. It's Super Bowl weekend, and have we got a show for you...Read more
The world of plants can be a dangerous place. Gorgeous monkshood, with stalks of purple blooms can cause delusions and death. A plump cashew can make you miserable if it isn't steamed properly. And aconite, almost indistinguishable from parsley can cause paralysis and stop your beating heart...Read more
“The medium is the message.” “We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us.” “We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backwards into the future.” Those are just a few of Marshall McLuhan’s famous quotes. McLuhan is one of the most influential media thinkers of...Read more
Whittier called them "the saddest words: it might have been." But turn it around and you'll find places we create to replace the world we live in -- past, present and future. On To the Best of Our Knowledge, other worlds. Scientist Brian Greene looks at the physics of the multiverse, and...Read more
In this age of globalization, why would anyone want borders, an army, currency? Isn’t that kind of … old school? Read more
Maybe you can sing like Jennifer Lopez or Ricky Martin. If not, looking like them is the next best thing. Right now, it’s never been cooler to be Hispanic. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the Latino Revolution. From the rise of Latino-chic to the spicy secretes of salsa. ...Read more
Buried scrolls, clay tablets, priceless artifacts and expensive forgeries – this week, we bring you stories from the strange and amazing world of biblical archeology.Read more
A fashion model with prosthetic legs… a musician who can’t hear… a writer who can’t see. Instead of disabled, differently-abled, handicapped – why not better-abled?Read more
These days it seems we just can’t get enough of it. Over the past few years, luxury spending in the United States has been growing four times faster than overall spending. We’re spending more money on more products and services that we don’t really need – like Evian bottled water and Prada...Read more
Everybody needs a little help, and some of us need a lot. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we’ll meet some helpers - and they’re not all human. We’ll visit a stable where they do equine assisted therapy, and we’ll hear from a writer who’s a volunteer fireman in his small hometown...Read more
When he was 10-years-old, Brian Raftery realized he couldn't sing. Despite his lack of vocal prowess, Raftery is obsessed with karaoke. He's traveled around the world to trace karaoke's evolution from a cult fad to a multimillion-dollar industry. In this hour, we'll explore the world of karaoke...Read more
Albert Camus was many things: war hero, Nobel Prize-winning novelist, and one of the 20th century’s most fascinating public thinkers. We examine the life and legacy of Camus on his 100th birthday: how a poor kid from Algeria became a revered French writer, hungry to find meaning in...Read more
The collapse of the twin towers gave birth to a strange new world. It was a city of fire and dust, rubble crunching under foot and eerie underground rivers. William Langewiesche was the only journalist with unrestricted access to Ground Zero. What he found there was startling, natural, and...Read more