John Taliaferro is the author of “Great White Fathers: The Story of the Obsessive Quest to Create Mt. Rushmore.”
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
Katrina Browne produced and directed the documentary "Traces of the Trade" in an effort to come to terms with her family's legacy of slave trading. Browne talks with Jim Fleming and we hear excerpts from her film.
Matthew Clark produced a compilation CD of Chinese rock and roll. He plays excerpts for Anne Strainchamps and tells her about the various bands and the Chinese rock scene.
How do you set poetry to music? Grammy Award-winning jazz composer Maria Schneider did it with Ted Kooser's poems, sung by Dawn Upshaw. She tells Anne Strainchamps how she finds beauty in her art.
If you like novels about computers and the history of technology, then you must know Neal Stephenson's work. The author of Cryptonomicon and The Baroque Cycle talks with us about his new novel -- a fast-paced thriller about the world of hyper-gaming. It's called "Reamde."
Neuroscientist Sam Harris is on our minds this week. Harris is best known as one of the guys who helpd lauch the New Atheist movement. So it comes as a surprise to see the title of his new book -- "Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion."
Soprano Renee Fleming talks with Anne Strainchamps about the mystery of the human voice, and how she manages her voice, her characters, and her stage fright.
Can science finally answer the age-old mystery, how something can come out of nothing? Physicist Lawrence Krauss says yes, and in the process he’s set off an intellectual brawl with theologians and philosophers.
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