Arts

'The Covenant of Water' tells the story of three generations in South India

11:13am May 02, 2023

by Jenny Bhatt

Much will be written about Abraham Verghese's latest novel in the coming months and years; it's a literary feat that deserves to be lauded as much as those of the likes of Dickens and Eliot.

Members of the Writers Guild of America walk the picket line in 2007.

Arts

Writers Guild of America goes on strike

10:37am May 02, 2023

by Mandalit del Barco

Members of the Writers Guild of America are asking for a larger piece of the streaming platforms' pie. The WGA said picketing would begin Tuesday afternoon.

Queue Listen Now

Arts

South Korean art student eats banana that was part of an art installation

5:54am May 02, 2023

In artist Maurizio Cattelan work called "Comedian," a ripe banana is duct-taped to a wall. The student snagged the fruit and taped the peel back on after eating it.

Queue Listen Now

Here are all the best looks from the Met Gala 2023

10:24pm May 01, 2023

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

The annual Met Gala fundraiser pays tribute to designer Karl Lagerfeld, who has a controversial legacy in the fashion industry.

A German woman returned the kindness shown to her husband by helping a stranded teen

6:23pm May 01, 2023

When she was 18, Brenda Arnold planned a trip to visit her sister in Germany. The only information she had was her sister's address. When she arrived, she rang the doorbell, but no one answered.

Queue Listen Now

Eastwind Books, an anchor for the SF Bay Area's Asian community, shuts its doors

5:33pm May 01, 2023

NPR's Ailsa Chang talks with Harvey and Beatrice Dong about the closing of their Berkeley shop Eastwind Books and the decades they've spent promoting Asian-American authors.

Queue Listen Now

Cookbook celebrates the tradition of Gullah Geechee cuisine

4:46pm May 01, 2023

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

An 89-year-old first-time cookbook author, Emily Meggett, celebrates the cuisine of South Carolina's Gullah Geechee community and its African and Southern traditions.

How South Africa nearly descended into civil war instead of a multi-racial democracy

1:47pm May 01, 2023

by Dave Davies

Journalist Justice Malala explains how Nelson Mandela and F. W. de Klerk kept the country on a path to peace after the 1993 assassination of Chris Hani. His book is The Plot to Save South Africa.

Queue Listen Now

The actors Justin Theroux (left) and Woody Harrelson play G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt in the new HBO miniseries White House Plumbers. The show premieres on May 1.

Arts

'White House Plumbers' puts a laugh-out-loud spin on the Watergate break-in

1:47pm May 01, 2023

by David Bianculli

Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux are co-conspirators in HBO's outrageous five-part series about the men behind the Watergate break-in. White House Plumbers is definitely worth seeing and savoring.

Queue Listen Now

"I was told by the world I wasn't allowed to write classic country, even though I'd written so much of it and I loved doing it," Mya Byrne says of her new album, Rhinestone Tomboy, which melds her punk sensibility with polished songwriting

How Mya Byrne paved her long, winding road to country music with grit and sparkle

1:30pm May 01, 2023

by Jewly Hight

Mya Byrne loved country music since her childhood in New Jersey. But it took years of searching and traveling to lead to the place where she could make her new album, Rhinestone Tomboy.