Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchPeter Richardson, "Savage Journey: Hunter S. Thompson and the Weird Road to Gonzo" (U California Press, 2022)
Episode 148
Hunter S. Thompson was never a hippie, but his writing nonetheless helped define the counterculture and the San Francisco scene of the 1960s and earl…
2 years, 6 months ago
Ronald C. White, "On Great Fields: The Life and Unlikely Heroism of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain" (Random House, 2023)
Episode 213
Before 1862, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain had rarely left his home state of Maine, where he was a trained minister and mild-mannered professor at Bowd…
2 years, 6 months ago
Peter Brown, "Journeys of the Mind: A Life in History" (Princeton UP, 2023)
Episode 1392
Over the past seven decades, Peter Brown has transformed our collective understanding of the late Roman Empire and the European Middle Ages alike, es…
2 years, 6 months ago
Sean Howe, "Agents of Chaos: Thomas King Forçade, High Times, and the Paranoid End of the 1970s" (Hachette Books, 2023)
Episode 58
It wasn’t easy writing a biography the mysterious, shape-shifting Thomas King Forçade, but after nine years of research and extensive interviews, Sea…
2 years, 6 months ago
Jeffrey S. Gurock, "Marty Glickman: The Life of an American Jewish Sports Legend" (NYU Press, 2023)
Episode 263
For close to half a century after World War II, Marty Glickman was the voice of New York sports. His distinctive style of broadcasting, on television…
2 years, 6 months ago
Mark Davidson and Parker Fishel, "Bob Dylan: Mixing Up the Medicine" (Callaway, 2023)
Episode 213
Several years ago, a treasure trove containing some 6,000 original Bob Dylan manuscripts was revealed to exist. Their destination? Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Th…
2 years, 6 months ago
Burkhard Bilger, "Fatherland: A Memoir of War, Conscience, and Family Secrets" (Random House, 2023)
Episode 211
A New Yorker staff writer investigates his grandfather, a Nazi Party Chief, in this “unflinching, gorgeously written, and deeply moving exploration o…
2 years, 6 months ago
Susan Blumberg-Kason, "Bernardine's Shanghai Salon: The Story of the Doyenne of Old China" (Post Hill Press, 2023)
Episode 164
In 1929, Bernardine Szold Fritz left Paris on a train bound for China. She was on her way to her fourth wedding, and her fourth husband: An American …
2 years, 6 months ago
Emma K. Sutton, "William James, MD: Philosopher, Psychologist, Physician" (U Chicago Press, 2023)
Episode 208
Emma K. Sutton's William James, MD: Philosopher, Psychologist, Physician (U Chicago Press, 2023) is the first book to map William James's preoccupati…
2 years, 6 months ago
Ramsey Lewis and Aaron Cohen, "Gentleman of Jazz: A Life in Music" (Blackstone, 2023)
Episode 212
This immersive new autobiography provides insight into the early life and illustrious career of the late great Ramsey Lewis, one of the most popular …
2 years, 6 months ago