Author Interviews

Billy Bragg says he initially pursued songwriting as a way to escape working in the local car factory.

Billy Bragg On Skiffle, The Movement That Brought Guitar To British Radio

3:29pm July 19, 2017

by Terry Gross

The singer describes skiffle as "a bunch of British school boys in the mid '50s playing Lead Belly's repertoire ... on acoustic guitars." Bragg's new book is Roots, Radicals And Rockers.

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Books
Arts

London Literally Stank In The Summer Of 1858 — Just Ask Dickens And Darwin

9:21pm July 18, 2017

by Robert Siegel

In One Hot Summer, historian Rosemary Ashton follows Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin and Benjamin Disraeli through an unpleasant couple of months — as the River Thames flowed with hot, smelly sewage.

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Cover detail from Devil's Bargain, by Joshua Green.

Inside The 'Shakespearean Irony' Of Trump And Bannon's Relationship

5:07pm July 18, 2017

by Terry Gross

Author Joshua Green says that although Steve Bannon was instrumental to Donald Trump's election, it now appears that the president lacks the ability to implement Bannon's nationalist vision.

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Keith Emerson of Emerson, Lake & Palmer, an essential prog-rock band derided in the 1970s by critic Lester Bangs.

Can't Prog Rock Get Any Respect Around Here?

5:05am July 18, 2017

Critic Lester Bangs once declared progressive rock "musical sterility at its pinnacle." David Weigel, author of The Show That Never Ends: The Rise And Fall Of Prog Rock, begs to differ.

How Black Leaders Unwittingly Contributed To The Era Of Mass Incarceration

2:20pm July 17, 2017

James Forman Jr., son of civil rights activists, says that African-American leaders seeking to combat drugs and crime often supported policies that disproportionately targeted the black community.

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'American Fire' Tells A True Story Of Love And Arson In Rural Virginia

11:07am July 17, 2017

by Michel Martin

In 2012 and 2013, Accomack County, Va., was plagued by arson. The culprits, it turned out, were a local man and his girlfriend. In a new book, journalist Monica Hesse tells their story.

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Jack Gilbert, co-author of the book "Dirt Is Good," says kids should be encouraged to get dirty, play with animals and eat colorful vegetables.

'Dirt Is Good': Why Kids Need Exposure To Germs

7:15am July 16, 2017

by Lulu Garcia-Navarro

Should I use antibacterial soaps? How often should I bathe my child? Those are just some of the questions Jack Gilbert, a microbiome scientist, answers in his new book.

Books
Arts

New Novel Explores 'What We Lose' When We Lose A Parent

6:35am July 16, 2017

by Lulu Garcia-Navarro

When Zinzi Clemmons was taking care of her dying mother, she only had time to write brief vignettes — and those fragments became the core of her new novel about identity and loss, What We Lose.

Books

The Total Eclipse Of 1878

8:52am July 15, 2017

NPR's Scott Simon interviews science writer David Baron about his new book American Eclipse, the story of the total solar eclipse of 1878.

Books
Arts

Lawrence Osborne Doesn't Care If You Like His Characters In 'Beautiful Animals'

6:00pm July 14, 2017

by Ari Shapiro

"Likable characters are usually completely forgettable ... " he says. "We love villains ... because they show us these disturbing complexities." His sun-drenched summer novel is set on a Greek island.

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