Roy Blount Jr. is a humorist, word maven and the author of "Alphabet Juice"...
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
Stephen Long is the founder of Northern Woodlands Magazine. He takes us for a walk in his Vermont woods and teaches us how to "read" a forest.
Operatic bass Samuel Ramey tells Anne Strainchamps about his various devil roles and why he likes singing them.
What compels someone to commit acts of terror? Anthropologist Scott Atran has spent a decade talking with jailed suicide bombers and jihadist leaders. He says they're motivated by core human values: brotherhood, loyalty and the dream of a better world.
South African singer/songwriter Vusi Mahlasela talks with Steve Paulson about his experiences singing political music during the time of Apartheid.
According to self-described "space dork" Andy Weir, he was just sitting around at home one day imagining a manned Mars mission — not with any goal in mind, but just as a thought experiment. Soon, he realized this would be a pretty good premise for a story. And boy was he right. His novel "The Martian" started as a series of blog posts and has become a blockbuster motion picture. In this interview, he reads excerpts from the novel and discusses the balance between pure fantasty and scientific accuracy in science fiction.
There may be as many opinions about selfies as there are Twitter handles. Are they self-empowerment, or narcissism? Are they just personal branding? Or can they be art? Writer and critic Sarah Nicole Prickett came in to give us a primer.
The most popular baby names in the US last year were Noah and Emma. We know that because 20 years ago, Michael Shackleford wrote a computer program to track the annual popularity of baby names. Expectant parents everywhere should thank him.
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