Mark Kurlansky tells Steve Paulson that salt made food a tradable commodity and that it inspired revolutions from India to France. Because people have to have salt, governments want to control and tax it.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
One of the most amazing things about National Parks is what you can hear. Or as acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton would put it, NOT hear. He's is the founder of the organization One Square Inch of Silence. The once square inch is an actual place located in the Hoh Rain Forest at Olympic National Park. The exact location is marked by a small red-colored stone placed on top of a moss-covered log. And after you hear (or don't hear) this piece you will want to go. So, here's a map.
The French have a curatorial attitude toward their language, but in fact they add new words all the time.
Maryanne Wolf thinks the dyslexia brain ought to be considered a gift that characterized some of history's leading figures.
Mona Golabek is a concert pianist. She tells Anne Strainchamps that her grandmother made loving music her parting gift to her daughter.
Writer and naturalist Peter Matthiessen talks with Steve Paulson about tigers and cranes.
M.G. Lord is the author of “Astro Turf: The Private Life of Rocket Science.” Her father worked for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena in the early days of the space program.
Michael Dirda won the Pulitzer Prize for his literary criticism in the Washington Post Book World. Among his collections of essays is Classics for Pleasure.
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