Debra Dickerson talks with Jim Fleming about how African Americans may use their blackness as a self-limiting excuse not to achieve. And she's sick of it.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
Etienne Van Heerdon tells Steve Paulson that many of his fellow writers are obsessed with his country’s history and that they could always say things in fiction that they could never get away with in journalism.
Bill Ayers was a member of the Weather Underground. In this conversation with Steve Paulson, Ayers insists he was not a terrorist since his objective was never to kill people.
Darrin McMahon is the author of “Happiness: A History.” He tells Jim Fleming the Founding Fathers equated happiness with virtue...
Most people think of conflict as something to be avoided, but there's another way to view it -- as creative and generative. In his book "The Art of Rivalry," Boston Globe art critic Sebastian Smee explores how intense conflicts, broken friendships and personal reconciliations fueled some of the most dramatic breakthroughs in Modern Art. He tells Steve Paulson that the rivalry between Picasso and Matisse contributed, in part, to cubism.
"Gifts make slaves like whips make dogs" is an anthropologist's tale of inter-cultural difference in gift exchanges.
David Graeber takes us on a tour of gift giving, and gift economies. He also takes a swing at the question of whether it's possible to give a truly selfless gift.
Charles de Lint has pioneered a new contemporary mythic fiction. His new novel is "Widdershins."
Dick Ringler taught "Beowulf" for decades at the University of Wisconsin, and has just put out a new translation from the old English.
Pages
