Alice Walker talks about some of the poems in her book “Absolute Trust in the Goodness of the Earth,” inspired by the events of September 11th.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
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Not all architecture in the Arab world glitters like a golden dome. Some are being shelled to dust by war. Such is the horrifying story of Homs, Syria. Once a cosmopolitan and tolerant city of more than one million, Homs has hosted clashes between rebel groups and President Bashar Assad’s forces since 2011. Those clashes have mortared and shelled the city into an oblivion. Thousands of residents have been killed. Most of the remaining have fled. But not all.
Marwa al-Sabouni and her family have stayed. Marwa al-Sabouni has her PhD. in Islamic architecture and wrote a compelling memoir about architecture and destruction in Homs called “The Battle for Home.”
Marwa al-Sabouni spoke with Anne Strainchamps via Skype from her apartment in Homs, Syria.
Poet Anna Rabinowitz found a shoe box full of old letters and photos of family and friends killed in the Holocaust. She wrote the poem "Darkling" to feature their voices. We also hear excerpts from the opera "Darkling."
Benjamin Kunkel is not only a bestelling novelist and co-founder of the literary magainze n+1. He tells Steve Paulson why he's also a become Marxist public intellectual.
Anne Karpf tells Steve Paulson our voices communicate all sorts of things, which listeners can understand even if they don't speak the same language.
In his new book “Better Living Through Criticism,” A.O. Scott distills his decades-long career into a simple to read manifesto that not only explains the qualities of a good critic, but argues their fundamental importance to any culture.
Philosopher Alva Noe says it's a mistake to regard consciousness as strictly a product of our brain. He says consciousness is something we do.
Albert Glinsky is the author of “Theremin: Ether Music and Espionage.” The book is a biography of Leon Theremin and a history of the instrument that bears his name.
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