Podcasts by Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI Radio in New York
Leonard Lopate, the Peabody and James Beard Award-winning broadcaster, is back on WBAI where he began his radio career. Tune in weekdays from 1-2pm at 99.5fm New York or you can listen to the show live at WBAI.org.
Further podcasts by Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI Radio in New York
Podcast on the topic Kunst
All episodes
Michael Clinton on ROAR into the second half of your life from 2022-02-18T19:54:31
On this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, Michael Clinton, author of “ROAR into the Second Half of Your Life," will share his findings about the most significant social movement of ou...
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Tim Kane on The Immigrant Superpower, How Brains, Brawn, and Bravery Make America Stronger from 2022-02-17T22:57:32
On this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI-99.5FM, author Tim Kane discusses his book The Immigrant Superpower, How Brains, Brawn, and Bravery Make America Stronger. In his book Kane co...
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Gal Beckerman on The Quiet Before from 2022-02-15T22:30:28
In his book, Gal Beckerman editor at The New York Times Book Review, takes us back to the seventeenth century, to the correspondence that jump-started the scientific revolution, and then forward th...
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John Pomfret on From Warsaw with Love from 2022-02-14T21:53:53
Award-winning journalist and writer for the Washington Post -- spanning over several decades, John Pomfret converses about his book “From Warsaw with Love”. Pomfret’s publication is a portrait of a...
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language experts Kathryn and Ross Petras from 2022-02-11T19:50:59
Join us for a discussion when sibling language experts and regular contributors to the program Kathryn and Ross Petras stop by. This language duo are authors of the bestselling You're Saying It Wro...
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Dr. Neil Lanctot on The Approaching Storm from 2022-02-09T19:24:01
Join us for a compelling conversation with historian Neil Lanctot, Ph.D. When he discusses his book, The Approaching Storm. A colorful triptych of three American icons who changed history and the e...
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Dr. John Abramson on Sickening, How Big Pharma Broke American Health Care and How We Can Repair It from 2022-02-08T21:02:36
Tune in to this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large, when author Dr. John Abramson, one of America's top drug litigation experts discuss Sickening, How Big Pharma Broke American Health Care and...
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Stephen Zunes, on his newly updated Western Sahara: War, Nationalism, and Conflict Irresolution from 2022-02-08T01:36:09
Stephen Zunes, a leading scholar of the Middle East and North Africa gives in depth insight into The Western Sahara and Moroccan conflict. Western Sahara a sparsely populated territory about the si...
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David Rudolf on American Injustice from 2022-02-03T20:22:34
(2/3/2022) In the past thirty years alone, more than 2,800 innocent American prisoners – their combined sentences surpassing 25,000 years – have been exonerated and freed after being condemned for ...
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Executive Producer Jesse Lent’s last show from 2022-02-01T21:35:04
(2/1/2022) As some listeners may recall, Leonard Lopate at Large premiered on July 16, 2018 on WBAI. What they may not be aware of is that other than Leonard, the show only had one staff member—exe...
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executive producer Jesse Lent’s final show from 2022-02-01T21:35:04
(2/1/22) As some listeners may recall, Leonard Lopate at Large premiered on July 16, 2018 on WBAI. What they may not be aware of is that other than Leonard, the show only had one staff member—execu...
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Susan Delson & Richard Koszarski on NYC’s Movie Renaissance: 1945-1955 at Film Forum from 2022-01-28T23:07:24
(1/28/22) The festival NYC’s Movie Renaissance: 1945-1955 is running at Film Forum from Jan. 28 to Feb. 10. Mainly comprised of film shot on the East Coast during a brief surge of local production ...
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investigative journalist Bob Hennelly on New York's new mayor Eric Adams and his administration from 2022-01-26T23:13:29
(1/26/22) Before working at WNYC, investigative journalist and regular contributor Bob Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His written work has appeared in the Ne...
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Michael Waldman of the Brennan Center for Justice on the new edition of his book The Fight to Vote from 2022-01-24T22:56:18
(1/24/22) Michael Waldman is the president of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law. His book The Fight to Vote, recently updated with a new edition including over 60 pages of new mat...
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Peter S. Goodman on Davos Man: How the Billionaires Devoured the World from 2022-01-21T20:47:41
(1/21/22) Davos Man: How the Billionaires Devoured the World, the new book from New York Times global economics correspondent Peter S. Goodman exposes how billionaires’ systematic plunder of the wo...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell of Accurate Building Inspectors take your calls. from 2022-01-20T23:37:44
(1/20/22) As regular listeners know, there are few construction questions that Alvin and Lawrence Ubell of Accurate Building Inspectors don’t know how to answer. In this installment of Leonard Lopa...
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Dr. Mark Vonnegut on The Heart of Caring: A Life in Pediatrics from 2022-01-19T03:22:23
(1/18/22) There is a lot more to Mark Vonnegut than simply being the son of an iconic author. As a pediatrician, Dr. Vonnegut has spent 40 years treating children for coughs, fevers, ear infections...
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industrial hygienist Monona Rossol on how to protect yourself from the Omicron variant from 2022-01-12T00:03:21
(1/11/22) Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safety s...
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Stephen Marche on The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future from 2022-01-10T23:18:10
(1/10/22) No matter your political leaning, most of us can sense that America might be barreling toward a catastrophe of some sort. Drawing upon sophisticated predictive models and more than 150 in...
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Gerry Dawes on Sunset in a Glass: Adventures of a Food and Wine Road Warrior from 2022-01-07T02:59:36
(1/6/22) Sunset in a Glass: Adventures of a Food and Wine Road Warrior is a collection of true stories from Spanish culinary and travel authority Gerry Dawes, a recipient of Spain’s esteemed Spain'...
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Matthew Schmidt of the University of New Haven on Russia and Ukraine from 2022-01-05T00:22:27
(1/4/22)“Where does Russia belong in the pantheon of nations? What does it see itself offering the world of today and the world of tomorrow,” writes Dr. Matthew Schmidt associate professor of natio...
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Pete Muroski answers your questions on winter gardening. from 2021-12-22T00:21:06
(12/21/21) Regular contributor to the show Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes in Pawling, New York is an expert on just about anything you’d want in your garden. He also knows how to get the most ou...
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Neil Richards on Why Privacy Matters from 2021-12-20T22:19:33
(12/20/21) Everywhere we look, corporations and governments are spying on us—seeking personal information about who we are and whom we know. Ad networks monitor our web-surfing to send us "more rel...
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Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly discusses his latest reporting on frontline workers. from 2021-12-17T23:28:14
(12/17/21) In addition to his work on WBAI and WNYC, investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the...
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Jorge Contreras on The Genome Defense: Inside the Epic Legal Battle to Determine Who Owns Your DNA from 2021-12-17T00:39:28
(12/16/21) When attorney Chris Hansen discovered that women were being charged exorbitant fees to test for hereditary breast and ovarian cancers, tests they desperately needed—all because Myriad Ge...
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Donald Cohen on his book The Privatization of Everything from 2021-12-15T23:45:25
(12/15/21) Ever since President Ronald Reagan successfully branded government as a dangerous threat, privatization has touched every aspect of our lives, from water and trash collection to the just...
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philosopher Slavoj Zizek on his new book Heaven In Disorder from 2021-12-13T23:41:39
(12/13/21) As we being to emerge from the pandemic, other crises move center stage—outrageous inequality, climate disaster, desperate refugees, mounting tensions of a new cold war. The abiding moti...
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language experts Kathryn and Ross Petras on the year in words from 2021-12-10T23:16:32
(12/10/21) Sibling language experts and regular contributors to the program Kathryn and Ross Petras are the authors of the bestselling You're Saying It Wrong: A Pronunciation Guide to the 150 Most ...
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Dr. David Wilcox on How To Avoid Being a Victim of the American Healthcare System from 2021-12-07T23:46:56
(12/7/21) Have you ever wondered what really goes on at your insurance provider’s office? Why do your claims get denied? Why are your prescription drug prices so high? How To Avoid Being a Victim o...
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Deborah Caldwell Stone of the American Library Association on banned books from 2021-12-02T22:14:05
(12/2/21) In the 1982 Supreme Court decision Island Trees School District v. Pico, the justices ruled that school officials can’t ban books in libraries simply because of their content. However, at...
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Monona Rossol on how to stay safe from the pandemic this holiday season from 2021-12-01T22:42:16
(12/1/21) Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safety s...
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Senator Gloria J. Romero on Just Not That Likable: The Price All Women Pay for Gender Bias from 2021-11-30T23:58:30
(11/30/21) In 2005, Gloria J. Romero became the first woman ever to hold the title of Democratic majority leader of the California State Senate. In her new book, Just Not That Likable: The Price Al...
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Howard W. French on Born in Blackness: Africa, Africans & the Making of the Modern World from 2021-11-30T01:06:11
(11/29/21) The history of Africa has long been relegated to the remote outskirts of our global story. What if, instead, we put Africans at the center of our thinking about the origins of modernity?...
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Julie Luongo & Joseph J. Trunzo on Long Haul COVID: A Survivor’s Guide from 2021-11-24T00:28:22
(11/23/21) For anyone still experiencing the extended symptoms known as long COVID, health effects from the virus that stubbornly won’t go away, a full recovery is still not in sight months after s...
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Christopher W. Shaw on First Class: The U.S. Postal Service, Democracy, and the Corporate Threat from 2021-11-23T00:30:33
(11/22/21) The fight over the future of the Postal Service is on. Leadership at the USPS has been handed over to special interests whose plans includes higher postage costs, slower delivery times a...
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Henry Gee of on A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth: 4.6 Billion Years in 12 Pithy Chapters from 2021-11-19T22:46:18
(11/19/21)In the beginning, Earth was an inhospitably alien place?in constant chemical flux, covered with churning seas, crafting its landscape through incessant volcanic eruptions. Amid all this t...
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Dr. Charles Fuchs & Abbe Gluck on A New Deal for Cancer: Lessons from a 50-Year War from 2021-11-19T00:36:57
(11/18/21) Cancer is a complex, evasive enemy and there are no quick victories in the fight against it. But the battle has been a monumental feat of medical and scientific research and fundraising ...
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gardening expert Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes on coping with this strange harvest season from 2021-11-16T20:10:26
(11/16/21) With unpredictable weather creating a bizarre harvest season up and down the East Coast, our favorite gardening guru Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes in Pawling, NY returns to the progr...
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Bob Hennelly discusses the government response to COVID-19 from 2021-11-15T20:15
(11/15/21) In addition to his work on WBAI and WNYC, investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the...
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Daniel Gade on Wounding Warriors: How Bad Policy is Making Veterans Sicker and Poorer from 2021-11-11T21:48:30
(11/11/21) Retired US Army lieutenant colonel, American University professor, public policy leader and former Republican Senate candidate from Virginia Daniel Gade teamed up with Wall Street Journa...
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Ina Archer & Donald Bogle on Nina Mae McKinney, the 1st Black movie star from 2021-11-11T00:02:52
(11/10/21) Discovered by director King Vidor when she was a Broadway chorus girl in the production Blackbirds of 1928, South Carolina-born actress Nina Mae McKinney (1912-1967) was still a teenager...
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Seth David Radwell on his book American Schism from 2021-10-28T19:21:03
(10/28/21)Two distinct Americas have always coexisted throughout the history of our nation. In his book American Schism: How the Two Enlightenments Hold the Secret to Healing Our Nation, Seth David...
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attorney Richard O. Jacobs on his book Democracy of Dollars from 2021-10-27T20:24:17
(10/27/21) We don’t vote for federal judges; they’re appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. However, public influence has undeniably had a dramatic effect on the Court, it is the w...
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Gregory Zuckerman on A Shot to Save the World from 2021-10-26T19:22:43
(10/26/21) No one was prepared for what happened when a mysterious respiratory illness emerged in Wuhan, China in January of 2020. Politicians, government officials, business leaders and public-hea...
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Durwood Zaelke on his book Cut Super Climate Pollutants Now! from 2021-10-25T19:33:37
(10/25/21) Even by the most conservative estimates, we have a decade or less to radically slow global warming before we risk hitting irreversible tipping points that will lock in catastrophic clima...
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Erica Abeel on her latest book The Commune from 2021-10-22T18:48:26
(10/22/21) Erica Abeel’s new historical fiction novel The Commune is a look at the Hamptons commune populated by the newly liberated women present at the creation of the seminal 1970 Women's March ...
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Kathryn and Ross Petras take your calls on the latest language trends from 2021-10-20T23:46:46
(10/21/21) Sibling language experts and regular contributors to the show Kathryn and Ross Petras are the authors of the New York Times bestseller You're Saying It Wrong: A Pronunciation Guide to th...
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Chude Pam Allen & Steven Hiatt on Reluctant Reformers: Racism & Social Reform Movements in the US from 2021-10-19T19:39:28
(10/19/21) Chude Pam Allen and Robert Allen’s new book Reluctant Reformers: Racism and Social Reform Movements in the United States, an updated edition of the latter’s iconic 1974 title, explores t...
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former New York Times food critic Byan J. Miller on his new book Dining in the Dark from 2021-10-15T22:15:06
(10/15/21) From the early 1980s to the mid-1990s, Bryan Miller was a household name among East Coast foodies as the restaurant critic for the New York Times. Over the course of his decade as a colu...
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Jennifer Rubin on Resistance: How Women Saved Democracy from Donald Trump from 2021-10-15T00:21:22
(10/14/21) From the first Women’s March the day after the 2017 inauguration to the Blue Wave in the 2018 midterms or the flood of female presidential candidates in 2020, women from across the ideol...
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Alec Ross on The Raging 2020s: Companies, Countries, People—and the Fight for Our Future from 2021-10-08T22:16:22
(10/8/21) Companies hold the power to shape our daily lives, the state holds the power to make them fall in line and the people hold the power to choose their leaders. But now, this balance has sha...
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Diane Coyle on Cogs and Monsters: What Economics Is, and What It Should Be from 2021-10-07T19:58:43
(10/7/21) Digital technology, big data, big tech, machine learning and AI are revolutionizing both the tools of economics and the phenomena it seeks to measure. In her book Cogs and Monsters: What ...
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Ian Buruma on The Colonial Trap from 2021-10-06T18:35:15
(10/6/21)“Whatever the justification for foreign intervention, the results are the same,” Ian Buruma writes in his Project Syndicate op-ed The Colonial Trap. “Dependency—not just on another state, ...
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Robert J. Davis on Supersized Lies: How Myths about Weight Loss Are Keeping Us Fat from 2021-10-05T00:05:06
(10/4/21) There’s no shortage of false prophets out there serving up misguided dieting advice. Count calories! Cut carbs! Exercise more! Skip meals! Add this powder to your water! Pop a pill! Yet a...
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Eyal Press on Dirty Work: Essential Jobs and the Hidden Toll of Inequality in America from 2021-10-01T02:17:37
(9/30/21) Drone pilots who carry out targeted assassinations, undocumented immigrants who man the kill floors of industrial slaughterhouses, guards who patrol the wards of the United States’ most v...
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Andrew Cockburn on The Spoils of War: Power, Profit and the American War Machine from 2021-09-28T21:23:06
(9/28/21) US soldiers are stationed in over 800 locations across the world to enforce our country’s concept of the rule of law. In his new book The Spoils of War: Power, Profit and the American War...
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Clara Kann and Devin Shoemaker on cultivating wine on a Brooklyn rooftop from 2021-09-24T03:04:25
(9/23/21)The streets of Brooklyn may not be considered ideal terrain for cultivating wine grapes, but what about our rooftops? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, Rooftop Reds d...
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Joseph J. Ellis on The Cause: The American Revolution and its Discontents, 1773-1783 from 2021-09-23T00:32:09
(9/22/21) George Washington is said to have remarked that anyone who attempted to provide an accurate account of the American Revolution would be accused of writing fiction. Of course, no one calle...
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Rachel Boynton on her documentary Civil War (or, Who Do We Think We Are) from 2021-09-14T23:23:48
(9/14/21) Civil War (or, Who Do We Think We Are), the new film by Emmy-nominated director Rachel Boynton (Big Men, Our Brand is Crisis) considers how Americans tell the story of the Civil War and i...
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Elsa Panciroli on Beasts Before Us: The Untold Story of Mammal Origins and Evolution from 2021-09-13T21:21:42
(9/13/21) You may think the story of human evolution begins following the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs. Yet, over the last 20 years scientists have made discoveries that have forced th...
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Ada Ferrer of NYU on her new book Cuba: An American History from 2021-09-10T19:47:33
(9/10/21) In 1961, at the height of the Cold War, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Cuba. For over five decades, the standoff continued before Barack Obama normalized relations wi...
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James Reston Jr. on The Nineteenth Hijacker: A Novel of 9/11 from 2021-09-10T00:31:31
(11/9/21) James Reston Jr. is the author of 18 books ranging from politics to medieval history to science to baseball. In his latest, The Nineteenth Hijacker: A Novel of 9/11, he set out to use fic...
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Tom Surgal on his new free jazz documentary Fire Music from 2021-09-07T22:39:12
(9/7/21)Although the free jazz movement of the 1960s and ‘70s was much maligned in some jazz circles, its pioneers—Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Sun Ra, Albert Ayler and John Coltrane—are now ackn...
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Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the law school at UC Berkeley, on his new book Presumed Guilty from 2021-09-03T21:54:20
(9/3/21) Police officers are nine times more likely to kill African-American men than they are other Americans. Yet, in his new book Presumed Guilty: How the Supreme Court Empowered the Police and ...
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Alice McDermott on What About the Baby? Some Thoughts on the Art of Fiction from 2021-09-02T22:32:38
(9/2/21) In her new book What About the Baby? Some Thoughts on the Art of Fiction, bestselling novelist Alice McDermott assembles the pithiest wisdom about the act of writing that she has collected...
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William Sargent on Crab Wars: A Tale of Horseshoe Crabs, Ecology, and Human Health from 2021-09-01T20:52:28
(9/1/21) Every drug certified by the FDA must be tested using the horseshoe crab derivative known as Limulus lysate. Because of this, a multimillion-dollar industry has emerged involving the licens...
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Bob Hennelly on the fall of Andrew Cuomo from 2021-08-27T22:16:51
(8/27/21) Investigative journalist and regular contributor to the show Bob Hennelly’s work has appeared in the New York Times, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, th...
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Damian Paletta of the Washington Post on Nightmare Scenario from 2021-08-26T23:43:42
(8/26/21) From the initial discovery of the coronavirus, President Trump refused to take responsibility and encouraged the entire GOP to ignore safety guidelines. In their book Nightmare Scenario: ...
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Karen J. Greenberg of Fordham University on her book Subtle Tools from 2021-08-25T19:37:06
(8/25/21) In the wake of the September 11 terror attacks, the US government implemented a wave of overt policies to fight the nation’s enemies. Unseen and undetected by the public, however, another...
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Gary Ginsberg on First Friends: The Powerful, Unsung(And Unelected) People Who Shaped Our Presidents from 2021-08-24T21:25:13
(8/24/21) The history section of your local bookstore is most likely stacked with books by and about Presidents, First Ladies even First Pets. In his new book First Friends: The Powerful, Unsung (A...
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Tim Robbins on his new play We Live On from 2021-08-19T19:49:40
(8/19/21) From his star-making performances in Bull Durham and The Professional to his celebrated role alongside Morgan Freeman in The Shawshank Redemption, from his Oscar for best supporting actor...
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Jonathan Rapping on Gideon's Promise: A Public Defender Movement to Transform Criminal Justice from 2021-08-18T19:18:46
(8/18/21) Public defenders represent more than 80 percent of the people accused of a crime in this country. More often than not, even the best of those defenders are overworked, underpaid and incen...
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Lee McIntyre on How to Talk to a Science Denier from 2021-08-16T20:07:32
(8/16/21)"Climate change is a hoax and so is coronavirus." "Vaccines are bad for you." These days, many of our fellow citizens reject scientific expertise and prefer ideology to facts. They are not...
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Julie K. Brown on Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story from 2021-08-14T01:07:47
(8/13/21) In her new book Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story, journalist Julie K. Brown recounts her uncompromising and risky investigation of Jeffrey Epstein's underage sex trafficki...
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Mike Rothschild on his book The Storm Is Upon Us from 2021-08-09T20:43:33
(8/9/21)“Climate change is a hoax—and so is coronavirus.” “Vaccines are bad for you.” These days, many of our fellow citizens reject scientific expertise and prefer ideology to facts. They are not ...
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Geoff Manaugh and Nicola Twilley on Until Proven Safe: The History and Future of Quarantine from 2021-07-29T22:16:39
(7/29/21) Quarantine is our most powerful response to uncertainty—it means waiting to see if something hidden inside us will be revealed. In quarantine, we are considered infectious until proven sa...
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industrial hygienist Monona Rossol on how to protect yourself from the Delta variant from 2021-07-28T22:16:55
(7/28/21)Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safety se...
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sociologist Keith Kahn-Harris on the dangers of denialism from 2021-07-26T22:03:03
(7/26/21) “Denialism has moved from the fringes to the center of public discourse, helped in part by new technology. As information becomes freer to access online…so the opportunities for counterin...
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Jamila Wignot discusses her new documentary Ailey. from 2021-07-22T22:35:55
(7/22/21) You know the name Alvin Ailey, but how much do you know about the man behind the iconic modern dance company? Peabody Award-winning director Jamila Wignot’s new documentary Ailey, which m...
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Bob Hennelly talks about his new book Stuck Nation. from 2021-07-21T22:21:01
(7/21/21) Regular listeners probably know investigative journalist Bob Hennelly from his cutting political analysis segments on this show and others informed by his own hard-nosed reporting. But in...
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Kathryn and Ross Petras on if we’re talking differently now that the U.S. is starting to reopen from 2021-07-20T22:48:02
(7/20/21) As New York and much of the country starts to emerge from the pandemic, has the way we talk to each other changed? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, sibling language...
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Jan-Werner Müller on his new book Democracy Rules from 2021-07-15T21:59:15
(7/15/21) Everyone knows that democracy is in trouble, but do we know what democracy actually is? In his new book Democracy Rules, German political philosopher and Princeton University professor Ja...
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Pete Muroski offers summer gardening tips. from 2021-07-14T20:36:46
(7/14/21) With the summer in full swing, our resident gardening expert Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes in Pawling, NY joins us again to help you get the most out of the warmer months. Pete also t...
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Michael Patrick MacDonald on Orangemen's Day in the UK from 2021-07-12T22:17:28
(7/12/21) Regular contributor to the program Michael Patrick MacDonald is the author of the book All Souls: A Family Story From Southie and the acclaimed Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebell...
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Sherry Buchanan discusses her new book On The Ho Chi Minh Trail. from 2021-07-09T21:13:28
(7/9/21) Part travelogue, part history and part reflective meditation on conflict and reconciliation, Sherry Buchanan’s new book On The Ho Chi Minh Trail: The Blood Road, The Women Who Defended It,...
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Bryan Burrough on Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth from 2021-07-07T21:27:51
(7/7/21/) Every nation needs its creation myth, and since Texas was a nation before it was a state, it's no surprise that its myths bite deep. But no piece of history is more important to Texans th...
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Elizabeth Hinton discusses her book America on Fire. from 2021-07-06T19:40:39
(7/6/21) In 1968, President Lyndon Johnson launched the “War on Crime,” sending militarized police forces into impoverished Black neighborhoods. Facing increasing surveillance and brutality, reside...
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Jonathan Balcombe on Super Fly: The Unexpected Lives of the World's Most Successful Insects from 2021-07-02T21:26:08
(7/2/21) From an expert in animal consciousness, comes a book that will turn the fly on the wall into the elephant in the room. For most of us, the only thing we know about flies is that they're an...
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Mia Bloom & Sophia Moskalenko on Pastels and Pedophiles: Inside the Mind of QAnon from 2021-07-01T19:56:32
(7/1/21)On Jan. 6, thousands of people descended on the US Capitol to aid President Donald Trump in combating what they perceived as a shadowy cabal of Satan-worshipping pedophiles. They, like mill...
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Former Ohio congressman Dennis Kucinich discusses his book The Division of Light and Power. from 2021-06-29T20:43:49
(6/29/21) You may know Dennis Kucinich as a Democratic candidate for president in 2004 and 2008 or from his eight terms representing Ohio in Congress. But you probably don’t know about this chapter...
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David Potter on his new book Disruption: Why Things Change from 2021-06-25T20:41:33
(6/25/21) Why do societies change course? The question is critical to the historical study of any era but is just as important today. In his book Disruption: Why Things Change, David Potter, the Fr...
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Sarah Klein on the Adult Survivors Act currently stalled in the New York State Assembly from 2021-06-24T23:35:29
(6/24/21) On June 3, the New York Senate passed the Adult Survivors Act. The law, if signed into law, would create a one-year window to revive civil lawsuits for sex crimes committed against anyone...
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Ross Barkan on The Prince: Andrew Cuomo, Coronavirus, and the Fall of New York from 2021-06-23T20:42:16
(6/23/21) After the events of the past year, Governor Andrew Cuomo is now easily as famous as his father Mario, also a governor of New York for three terms. Like Robert Moses before him, he has bec...
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Alexander Betts on The Wealth of Refugees: How Displaced People Can Build Economies from 2021-06-21T19:47:05
(6/21/21) We live in an age of displacement. Refugee numbers are increasing and climate change and COVID-19 are making the situation much worse. Meanwhile, rising populist nationalism around the wo...
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Bob Hennelly breaks down the New York City mayoral race ahead of Tuesday's primaries. from 2021-06-18T21:17:44
(6/18/21) With 13 candidates battling to become New York City’s next mayor in the June 22 Democratic primary, you are forgiven for not knowing exactly where every candidate stands on the issues. In...
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Kevin Cook on The Burning Blue: The Untold Story of Christa McAuliffe and NASA's Challenger Disaster from 2021-06-17T22:49:37
(6/17/21) On Jan. 28, 1986, NASA’s space shuttle Challenger exploded after taking off from Cape Canaveral. Christa McAuliffe, America’s “Teacher in Space,” was instantly killed, along with the othe...
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Les Standiford on Battle for the Big Top from 2021-06-16T20:51:34
(6/16/21) If you’re over the age of 40, whether you thought it was thrilling or cruel, chances are the circus played some kind of role in your childhood. In his new book, Battle for the Big Top: P....
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Ben Cohen on Above the Law: How Qualified Immunity Protects Violent Police from 2021-06-15T21:14:06
(6/15/21) A police officer kills a 12-year-old boy. It’s caught on video. The officer faces no legal consequences. A police officer strangles a man selling cigarettes. It’s caught on video. The off...
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Walden Bello on the global pandemic of fascism from 2021-06-09T22:52:50
(6/9/21) Covid numbers may be in decline, but according to professor of Sociology at SUNY Binghamton and former member of the House of Representatives of the Philippines Walden Bello, there is anot...
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Monona Rossol on whether New York City is really ready for a July 1 reopening from 2021-06-08T20:01:09
(6/8/21) Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safety se...
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Michael Blanding on North by Shakespeare from 2021-06-08T00:35:09
(6/7/21) In this new book North by Shakespeare: A Rogue Scholar's Quest for the Truth Behind the Bard's Work, investigative journalist Michael Blanding presents the parallel narratives of renegade ...
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Alex Bezzerides on Evolution Gone Wrong: The Curious Reasons Why Our Bodies Work (Or Don't) from 2021-06-04T21:11:34
(6/4/21) From blurry vision to crooked teeth, ACLs that tear at alarming rates and spines that seem to spend a lifetime falling apart, it’s a curious thing that human beings have beaten the odds as...
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Cal Flynn on Islands of Abandonment: Nature Rebounding in the Post-Human Landscape from 2021-06-01T22:59:16
(6/1/21) Some of the only truly feral cattle in the world wander through an abandoned island off the northernmost tip of Scotland. A variety of wildlife not seen in many lifetimes has rebounded on ...
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Julia Sweig on Lady Bird Johnson: Hiding in Plain Sight from 2021-05-28T19:35:30
(5/28/21) Perhaps the most underestimated First Lady of the 20th century, Lady Bird Johnson was also one of the most accomplished and often her husband Lyndon B. Johnson’s secret weapon. Managing t...
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Rawn James Jr. on The Truman Court: Law and the Limits of Loyalty from 2021-05-27T22:16:20
(5/27/21) Perhaps the most overlooked aspect of Harry S. Truman’s presidency is his judicial legacy, with even the finest of Truman biographies neglecting to consider the influence the 33rd preside...
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Judy Batalion on her book The Light of Days from 2021-05-24T19:42:57
(5/24/21) After witnessing the brutal murder of their families and the violent destruction of their communities, a cadre of Jewish women in Poland—some still in their teens—helped transform the Jew...
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Andy Norman on Mental Immunity from 2021-05-21T21:18:13
(5/21/21) Astonishingly irrational ideas are spreading. Covid denial persists in the face of overwhelming evidence. Anti-vaxxers compromise public health. Conspiracy thinking hijacks minds and inci...
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Bob Hennelly on if it is safe to fully reopen New York City from 2021-05-20T20:59:08
(5/20/21) Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along...
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Daniel Garodnick on Saving Stuyvesant Town from 2021-05-19T20:19:12
(5/19/21) From city streets to City Hall, this is the story of how one middle class community defeated the largest residential real estate deal in American history. In Saving Stuyvesant Town: How O...
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Alan Taylor on American Republics: A Continental History of the United States, 1783-1850 from 2021-05-17T21:39:16
(5/17/21) After reading two-time Pulitzer Prize winning historian Alan Taylor’s new book American Republics: A Continental History of the United States, 1783-1850 it is not understand why this form...
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Kim A. Snyder and Sam Fuentes on their new documentary Us Kids from 2021-05-14T22:34:52
(5/14/21) Us Kids, the latest film from documentarian Kim A. Snyder (Newtown), chronicles the March For Our Lives movement started by the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parklan...
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Jon Meacham on his new podcast Fate of Fact from 2021-05-13T20:40:56
(5/13/21) Fate of Fact, the latest podcast from Pulitzer-Prize winning historian and best-selling author Jon Meacham, looks at the strong grip misinformation and disinformation have on American pol...
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Jonathan Taplin on The Magic Years: Scenes from a Rock-and-Roll Life from 2021-05-12T22:18:48
(5/12/21) It would be fair to say that Jonathan Taplin has led a charmed life. Tour manager for Bob Dylan and The Band in the ‘60s, producer of Martin Scorsese’s 1973 debut Mean Streets featuring t...
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Michelle Miller-Adams on The Path to Free College: In Pursuit of Access, Equity, and Prosperity from 2021-05-11T20:27:09
(5/11/21) Given the raging national debate about providing tuition-free college funded at the national level, the time is right for a book that looks at how we can actually do it. In her new book T...
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Gabrielle Bluestone on Hype: How Scammers, Grifters, and Con Artists Are Taking Over the Internet from 2021-05-06T23:47:17
(5/6/21) We live in an age where scams are the new normal. Today’s viral grifters have ascended to fame and descended into infamy, yet the question remains—why do these types of digital fraud conti...
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Minouche Shafik on What We Owe Each Other: A New Social Contract for a Better Society from 2021-05-04T20:18:48
(5/4/21) Whether we realize it or not, all of us participate in the social contract every day. Caring for others, paying taxes and benefiting from public services are a major part of what binds us ...
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Karen L. Cox on No Common Ground: Confederate Monuments and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Justice from 2021-04-30T19:48:38
(4/30/21) When it comes to Confederate monuments, there is no common ground. Polarizing debates over their meaning have intensified into legislative maneuvering to preserve the statues, legal battl...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell on easy home projects to tackle right now from 2021-04-28T21:01:18
(4/28/21) Spring is finally here. But, with the pandemic still at dangerous levels in the New York area, many of us are still stuck at home. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, ...
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Todd Miller on Build Bridges, Not Walls: A Journey to a World Without Borders from 2021-04-27T20:11:18
(4/27/21) By the time Todd Miller spotted him, Juan Carlos had been wandering alone in a remote border region for days. Parched, hungry and disoriented, he approached Todd and asked him for a ride....
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Leonard and executive producer Jesse Lent look back at their first 500 shows. from 2021-04-26T22:37:40
(4/26/21) It has been nearly three years since Leonard Lopate at Large premiered on WBAI on July 16, 2018. Over the course of 500 shows, Leonard has talked to many of the nation’s foremost thinkers...
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Bob Hennelly on how to figure out who infrastructure spending can help the most from 2021-04-23T19:38:52
(4/22/21) Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along...
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John F. Wasik on Lincolnomics: How President Lincoln Constructed the Great American Economy from 2021-04-22T22:00:53
(4/22/21) Some of Abraham Lincoln’s most enduring policies came to him before the Civil War, visions of a country linked by railroads running ocean to ocean, canals turning small towns into bustlin...
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John Harris on The Last Slave Ships: New York and the End of the Middle Passage from 2021-04-20T21:01:38
(4/20/21) Long after the transatlantic slave trade was officially outlawed in the early 19th century by every major slave-trading nation, US merchants were still sending hundreds of illegal slave s...
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Louis Menand on The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War from 2021-04-19T20:49:54
(4/19/21) The Cold War was not just a contest of power. It was also about ideas?economic and political, artistic and personal. In his new book The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War, Pulit...
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Tsedal Neeley on Remote Work Revolution: Succeeding from Anywhere from 2021-04-16T20:00:57
(4/16/21) The rapid changes brought on by COVID-19 have led to a major boom in remote working, leaving managers and employees scrambling to adjust. After experiencing the benefits of working from h...
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Jim Freeman on Rich Thanks to Racism: How the Ultra-Wealthy Profit from Racial Injustice from 2021-04-15T19:58:04
(4/15/21) Despite Obama-era fantasies of a post-racial America, discrimination based on race remains a fundamental problem in all areas of our daily lives. In his new book Rich Thanks to Racism: Ho...
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Phillip Lopate on The Golden Age of the American Essay: 1945-1970 from 2021-04-14T21:57:18
(4/14/21) As asserted in the New & Noteworthy section of the New York Times about Columbia University professor of nonfiction writing Phillip Lopate’s latest anthology The Golden Age of the America...
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Marlon Peterson on Bird Uncaged: An Abolitionist's Freedom Song from 2021-04-12T19:20:09
(4/12/21) Marlon Peterson grew up in 1980s Crown Heights, raised by Trinidadian immigrants. In the aftermath of childhood trauma, he participated in a robbery that resulted in two murders. At the a...
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Colin Jerolmack on Up to Heaven and Down to Hell: Fracking, Freedom & Community in an American Town from 2021-04-09T20:54:36
(4/9/21) Shale gas extraction—commonly known as fracking—is often portrayed as an energy revolution that will transform the American economy and geopolitics. But in greater Williamsport, Pennsylvan...
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Alec MacGillis on Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America from 2021-04-08T21:33:30
(4/8/21) ProPublica reporter Alec MacGillis’s new book Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America is not another inside account from a former Amazon employee or exposé of the dominant com...
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Chuck Collins on The Wealth Hoarders: How Billionaires Pay Millions to Hide Trillions from 2021-04-07T21:58:24
(4/7/21) For decades, a secret army of tax attorneys, accountants and wealth managers has been developing into the shadowy Wealth Defence Industry. These agents of inequality are paid big money to ...
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Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes on making the most of planting season from 2021-04-06T21:52:48
(4/6/21) Regular contributor to the show Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes in Pawling, New York is an expert on just about anything you’d want in your garden. He also has a comprehensive knowledge ...
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Davarian L. Baldwin on In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities from 2021-03-31T22:22:46
(3/31/21) Universities play an outsized role in America’s cities. They bring diverse ideas and people together and they generate new innovations. But they also gentrify neighborhoods and exacerbate...
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Rob Dunn on Delicious: The Evolution of Flavor and How It Made Us Human from 2021-03-30T21:28:40
(3/30/21) What exactly is a flavor? Why are some so pleasing while others are not? William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor at North Carolina State University Rob Dunn’s new book Delicious: T...
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Dorothy Wickenden on The Agitators: Three Friends Who Fought for Abolition and Women's Rights from 2021-03-29T21:29:22
(3/29/21) Harriet Tubman—no-nonsense, funny, prescient and strategically brilliant—was one of the most important conductors on the Underground Railroad. She hid the enslaved men, women and children...
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Séverine Autesserre on The Frontlines of Peace: An Insider's Guide to Changing the World from 2021-03-26T21:19:25
(3/26/21) The word "peacebuilding" evokes a story we've all heard over and over—violence breaks out, foreign nations are scandalized, peacekeepers and million-dollar donors come rushing in, warring...
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Leonard and executive producer Jesse Lent take calls on what you want to do when the world reopens. from 2021-03-24T22:25:53
(3/24/21) With vaccination levels rising and infection rates dropping, the dream of being able to gather together in public again seems to be getting closer every day. In this installment of Leonar...
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Bob Hennelly on how COVID-19 vaccination is going from 2021-03-23T20:38:17
(3/23/21) Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along...
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Glenn Frankel on Shooting Midnight Cowboy from 2021-03-22T21:00:29
(3/22/21) The Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Glenn Frankel’s latest book, Shooting Midnight Cowboy: Art, Sex, Loneliness, Liberation, and the Making of a Dark Classic, tells the story of the con...
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Michael Heller on Mine! How the Hidden Rules of Ownership Control Our Lives from 2021-03-19T20:07:27
(3/19/21) A hidden set of rules governs who owns what—explaining everything from whether you can recline your airplane seat to why HBO lets you borrow a password illegally. In his new book Mine! Ho...
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Giles Sparrow on A History of the Universe in 21 Stars: (and 3 imposters) from 2021-03-18T22:04:35
(3/18/21) On a clear evening, if you look up you can see thousands of stars shining in the dark sky, each with a story of their own. In his new book A History of the Universe in 21 Stars: (and 3 im...
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Drs. Michael Okun and Ray Dorsey on Ending Parkinson's Disease: A Prescription for Action from 2021-03-16T19:56:45
(3/16/21) Brain diseases are now the world's leading cause of disability and no cognitive ailment is increasing its reach faster than Parkinson's disease. In the past 25 years, the number of people...
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Kathryn and Ross Petras on whether the way we talk has changed since Biden took office from 2021-03-15T23:16:17
(3/15/21) After five years of near-constant upheaval in all areas of American life including language, have new words been created since Joe Biden was sworn in as president on Jan. 20? In this inst...
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metabolism expert Dr. Herman Pontzer discusses his book Burn about how to really lose weight from 2021-03-12T21:43:34
(3/12/21)We burn 2,000 calories a day. So, if we exercise and cut carbs, we'll lose more weight, right? Wrong. In his paradigm-shifting new book, Burn: New Research Blows the Lid Off How We Really ...
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Dr. Richard B. Gunderman on Contagion: Plagues, Pandemics and Cures from the Black Death to Covid-19 from 2021-03-11T21:04:49
(3/11/21) Behind every disease is a story, from the natural history of the disease to its description, discovery and treatment. John A. Campbell Professor of Radiology at Indiana University Dr. Ric...
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Céline Cousteau on her new documentary Tribes on the Edge from 2021-03-05T20:17:24
(3/5/21) The Vale do Javari indigenous territory is home to 4,000 indigenous people from six known tribes, but it also protects the largest number of tribal peoples living in complete isolation in ...
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Kate Taverna and Carol Van Strum on their documentary The People vs. Agent Orange from 2021-03-04T21:13:23
(3/4/21) The dioxins present in Agent Orange, the defoliant used in the Vietnam War, continue to leave a legacy of death, deformity and disability in their wake. In The People vs. Agent Orange, doc...
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Michael Moss on Hooked: Food, Free Will, and How the Food Giants Exploit Our Addictions from 2021-03-03T21:37:14
(3/3/21) A gripping account of the legal battles, insidious marketing campaigns and cutting-edge food science that have brought us to our current public health crisis, Pulitzer Prize-winning journa...
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Judith Pearson on From Shadows to Life: A Biography of the Cancer Survivorship Movement from 2021-03-02T22:38:55
(3/2/21) In 1986, the National Coalition of Cancer Survivorship started a movement that changed the definition of what it means to be a survivor after 23 members—linked by their shared experiences ...
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Martha Crenshaw on preventing domestic terrorism from 2021-02-25T20:36:45
(2/25/21) “The problem the authorities faced on Jan. 6 was not an inability to respond, but failure to anticipate the threat,” Dr. Martha Crenshaw, senior fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Sp...
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Jason Dearen on Kill Shot: A Shadow Industry, a Deadly Disease from 2021-02-24T23:04:09
(2/24/21) Kill Shot: A Shadow Industry, a Deadly Disease, the latest book by Associated Press investigative reporter Jason Dearen, is the story of how hubris and fraud led to the most deadly drug c...
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Bob Hennelly on who COVID-19 is hitting the hardest from 2021-02-23T23:16:22
(2/23/21)Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along ...
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Bob Hennelly on whom COVID-19 is hitting the hardest from 2021-02-23T22:16:22
(2/23/21)Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along ...
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Mark Bray of Rutgers on what Antifa is and what it isn’t from 2021-02-19T22:02:40
(2/19/21)The anti-facist movement Antifa is a common scapegoat for the political right in America in everything from the mass Black Lives Matter protests of last summer to the Jan. 6 insurrection a...
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Ellis Cose on whether any of the events of Jan. 6 are protected speech from 2021-02-17T23:49:42
(2/17/21) According to Donald Trump and many of his supporters, the former President cannot be held legally responsible for the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, because the First Amendment of th...
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Brenda Wineapple on the similarities between the presidencies of Andrew Johnson and Donald Trump from 2021-02-15T21:04:32
(2/15/21) You’ve heard it said over and over in the past four years that Donald Trump was “like no president in modern history,” but what about in all of American history? Known for his racist diat...
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Jennifer Caroll Foy, Lilly Ledbetter and Freida Lee Mock on Ruth: Justice Ginsburg in her Own Words from 2021-02-12T21:42:52
(2/12/21) Freida Lee Mock’s new documentary Ruth: Justice Ginsburg in her Own Words is the story of how Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who couldn’t get a job despite tying first in her graduating law class, ...
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Leonard Cassuto and Robert Weisbuch on The New PhD: How to Build a Better Graduate Education from 2021-02-11T23:17:29
(2/11/21) For too many students, today's PhD is a bridge to nowhere. According to The New PhD: How to Build a Better Graduate Education by Leonard Cassuto and Robert Weisbuch, 50 percent of student...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell on converting your home into an office from 2021-02-10T00:56:01
(2/9/20)With so many of us working remotely because of the pandemic, you may be thinking about making your home office more permanent—or at least more comfortable. Regular contributors to the show,...
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Simon Winchester on Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the Modern World from 2021-02-05T22:43:12
(2/5/21) Land—whether meadow or mountainside, desert or peat bog, parkland or pasture, suburb or city—is central to our existence. In his latest book Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the M...
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Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes answers your questions about indoor gardening. from 2021-02-04T23:35:46
(2/4/21) When it comes to filling your outdoor space with local plants, regular contributor to the show Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes in Pawling, New York has an encyclopedic knowledge of how t...
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Gershom Gorenberg on his latest book War of Shadows from 2021-02-01T22:24:18
(2/1/21) Israeli journalist and historian Gershom Gorenberg’s latest book War of Shadows: Codebreakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East is a cinematic story o...
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Monona Rossol on the latest in protecting yourself from COVID-19 from 2021-01-29T21:35:43
(1/29/21)Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder and of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safet...
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Monona Rossol on how to reopen businesses and schools safely during the pandemic from 2021-01-29T20:35:43
(1/29/21)Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safety se...
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Jonathan Daniel Wells on his book The Kidnapping Club from 2021-01-28T22:17:51
(1/28/21) We often think of slavery as a southern phenomenon, far removed from the booming cities of the North. But even though slavery had been outlawed in Gotham by the 1830s, Black New Yorkers w...
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Bob Hennelly on how the pandemic is disproportionately affecting 9/11 first responders from 2021-01-27T21:50:08
(1/27/21) Investigative journalist and regular contributor to the show Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami ...
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Craig Unger on how the KGB cultivated Donald Trump from 2021-01-26T20:57:14
(1/26/21) Craig Unger’s new book American Kompromat: How the KGB Cultivated Donald Trump, and Related Tales of Sex, Greed, Power, and Treachery describes how a relatively insignificant targeting op...
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Tim Ward on Pro Truth: A Practical Plan for Putting Truth Back Into Politics from 2021-01-21T23:05:51
(1/21/21)In his latest book, Pro Truth: A Practical Plan for Putting Truth Back Into Politics co-written with Dr. Gleb Tsipursky, author Tim Ward explains how to protect yourself from lies and help...
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Michael Patrick Macdonald on what a post-Brexit UK will look like from 2021-01-19T22:07:18
(1/19/21)Regular contributor to the program Michael Patrick MacDonald is the author of the New York Times bestselling memoir All Souls: A Family Story From Southie. He is also a regular contributor...
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Barnes Carr on The Lenin Plot: The Unknown Story of America's War Against Russia from 2021-01-15T21:12:33
(1/15/21) It remains one of the most audacious spy plots in American history—a bold and extremely dangerous operation to invade Russia, defeat the Red Army and mount a coup in Moscow against Soviet...
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Tom Bowman on What If Solving the Climate Crisis Is Simple? from 2021-01-13T21:20:15
(1/13/21) It is the defining issue of our times, but what if we’re thinking about solving global warming in completely the wrong way. In his latest book What If Solving the Climate Crisis Is Simple...
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Thane Rosenbaum on what speech is actually protected by the US Constitution from 2021-01-12T20:27:18
(1/12/21) As President Trump’s supporters cry out that their free speech has been stifled both in the bloody display at Wednesday’s storming of the US Capitol Building that killed four and the resu...
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Sinan Aral of MIT on the role social media played in the storming of the US Capitol from 2021-01-07T23:26:53
(1/7/21) On Wednesday, Jan. 6, when an armed mob of Trump supporters occupied the US Capitol building in DC for several hours at the President’s behest, the incident was almost entirely organized o...
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Barbara A. Res on Tower of Lies: What My 18 Years of Working With Donald Trump Reveals About Him from 2021-01-05T21:20:06
(1/5/21) Barbara A. Res worked directly with Donald Trump for nearly two decades on some of his biggest projects and had nearly unlimited access to him. The future President even selected her to ov...
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Ian Buruma on The Churchill Complex: The Curse of Being Special from Winston & FDR to Trump & Brexit from 2021-01-05T00:14:24
(1/4/21) It's impossible to understand the last 75 years of American history without understanding the bond between American presidents and British prime ministers. FDR, of course, had Churchill. J...
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sibling language experts Kathryn and Ross Petras on the new language COVID-19 has created from 2020-12-22T21:20:24
(12/22/20) You’ve heard of a staycation, but how about a quarantini and some contact-free delivery in the bubble with your quaranteam? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, our fa...
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veterinary experts Debra F. Horwitz and Carlo Siracusa on helping your cat cope with holiday stress from 2020-12-22T00:30:38
(12/21/20) The holidays can be a stressful time for a cat. From new strange people and packages showing up in their domicile to their beloved humans disappearing for days (or even weeks) at a time,...
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Bob Hennelly looks at the government response to COVID-19. from 2020-12-17T20:02:02
(12/17/20) Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press alon...
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Sarah Frier on No Filter: The Inside Story of Instagram from 2020-12-16T22:25:01
(12/16/20) In 2010, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger released a photo-sharing app called Instagram, with one simple but irresistible feature; it would make anything you captured look more beautiful. ...
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Rebecca Wragg Sykes on Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art from 2020-12-14T21:31:53
(12/14/20)Since their discovery more than 160 years ago, Neanderthals have only gained importance in most anthropologists’ perception of early humans. In her new book Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Lov...
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David Vine on his new global history The United States of War from 2020-12-11T20:30:02
(12/11/20) The United States has been in a constant state of war since 2001. However, this is not quite as significant when you consider that the United States has been at war or invaded other coun...
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James Erskine and Michele Smith on their new Billie Holiday documentary from 2020-12-08T20:30:40
(12/8/20)Billie Holiday, one of the greatest vocalists of all time, was always controversial—a proud black woman who preferred white audiences, an exploited artist and a violent drug addict, a loya...
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Hao Wu discusses his documentary 76 Days on the early days of the coronavirus in Wuhan, China. from 2020-12-04T20:44:24
(12/4/20)Filmed in Wuhan, China by an independent crew, the MTV Documentary Films release 76 Days chronicles the city’s 76-day lockdown for COVID-19. Directed by Hao Wu and two China-based journali...
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Ryan White on his new documentary Assassins examining the murder of Kim Jong Un's brother from 2020-12-03T20:31:22
(12/3/20) The confounding 2017 murder of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s brother Kim Jong Nam in a Malaysian airport sparked an international investigation at the heart of the new Ryan White docu...
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Tim Wise on his new book Dispatches from the Race War from 2020-12-01T23:03:07
(12/1/20) On the publication date of his new collection of essays, Dispatches from the Race War, social justice advocate Tim Wise joins us for a frank discussion on racism in America in this instal...
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Phil Proctor and David Ossman on Firesign Theater from 2020-11-30T20:05:49
(11/30/20) Called “the Beatles of comedy” by the Library of Congress, the four-man troupe Firesign Theatre wrote and performed together for over 40 years, but it is their sketches from between 1968...
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Andre Gregory & Wallace Shawn discuss My Dinner With Andre in honor of Andre's This Is Not My Memoir from 2020-11-25T23:54:16
(11/25/20) This is Not My Memoir tells the life story of Andre Gregory, iconic theatre director, writer and actor. Co-written with Todd London, the book shares memories of a charmed life lived in t...
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David Nasaw on The Last Million: Europe's Displaced Persons from World War to Cold War from 2020-11-24T21:13:09
(11/24/20) David Nasaw’s latest book The Last Million: Europe's Displaced Persons from World War to Cold War is a sweeping history of the 1 million refugees left behind in Germany after WWII. Join ...
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Talia Lavin discusses her book Culture Warlords: My Journey Into the Dark Web of White Supremacy from 2020-11-23T22:02:39
(11/23/20) Talia Lavin is every skinhead’s worst nightmare—a loud, unapologetic Jewish woman, acerbic, smart and profoundly antiracist, with the investigative chops to expose the tactics and ideolo...
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Dr. Jess Ting and Tania Cypriano on their documentary Born To Be from 2020-11-20T20:41:40
(11/20/20) The new documentary Born to Be follows the work of Dr. Jess Ting, a plastic surgeon at New York’s Mount Sinai Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery offering transgender and non-bin...
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Efrem Sigel on his memoir Juror Number 2: The Story of a Murder, the Agony of a Neighborhood from 2020-11-18T21:18:01
(11/18/20) Efrem Sigel’s book Juror Number 2: The Story of a Murder, the Agony of a Neighborhood recounts his experience on a jury in the murder trial that changed the course of his life as he stru...
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Phillip Lopate on his new anthology The Glorious American Essay from 2020-11-16T22:25:34
(11/16/20)The New York Times Book Review described author, critic and Professor of Writing at Columbia University Phillip Lopate’s new anthology The Glorious American Essay: One Hundred Essays from...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell on how to get your living space ready for winter from 2020-11-11T21:51:51
(11/11/20) As regular listeners know, there are few building issues that our favorite masters of home repair Alvin and Lawrence Ubell don’t know how to fix. Though with cases of COVID-19 on the ris...
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Robyn Symon discusses her documentary Do No Harm on the shocking suicide rate among doctors. from 2020-11-09T20:44:45
(11/9/20) Jumping off hospital rooftops, hanging themselves in janitorial closets, overdosing on drugs—they’re A students and their suicides are often like well-planned school projects. Doctors are...
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chef Lara Lee on her new Indonesian cookbook Coconut & Sambal from 2020-11-06T21:01:18
(11/4/20) Despite being home to more than 267 million people, the culture of the Southeast Asian country of Indonesia (consisting of over 17,000 islands, 6,000 of which are populated), remains most...
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filmmakers Maxx Caicedo and Nelson G. Navarrete on their documentary A La Calle from 2020-11-04T21:21:20
(11/4/20) In the new documentary A La Calle, which translates as “to the street” in Spanish, directors Maxx Caicedo and Nelson G. Navarrete look at Venezuela’s recent political upheavals through th...
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Jesse Wegman of the New York Times on why the Electoral College should be eliminated from 2020-11-03T21:21:27
(11/3/20) The framers of the Constitution battled over it. Lawmakers have tried to amend or abolish it more than 700 times. To this day, millions of voters and even members of Congress, misundersta...
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Bob Hennelly on what to to watch for on Election Day from 2020-11-02T22:22:22
(11/2/20) Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appea...
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Marion Nestle and Kerry Trueman take your calls. from 2020-10-30T20:48:46
(10/30/20)Marion Nestle is the Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies and Public Health at New York University. Her latest book, Let's Ask Marion What You Need to Know about the Poli...
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Ken Kwapis on his book But What I Really Want to Do Is Direct: Lessons from a Life Behind the Camera from 2020-10-29T21:43:13
(10/29/20)The career of Ken Kwapis reads like a top five list of iconic TV series. The casts of The Larry Sanders Show, Freaks and Geeks, The Office, The Bernie Mac Show and Parks and Recreation ha...
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Sean B. Carroll on A Series of Fortunate Events: Chance and the Making of the Planet, Life, and You from 2020-10-27T21:46:50
(10/27/20) Dr. Sean B. Carroll is the Allan Wilson Professor of Molecular Biology and Genetics and at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dr. Carroll’s lates...
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David S. Reynolds on his new biography Abe: Abraham Lincoln in His Times from 2020-10-26T21:21
(10/26/20) Abraham Lincoln did not come out of nowhere. But if the 16th US president was shaped by his times, he also managed at his life's fateful hour to shape them to an extent few could have fo...
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sibling language experts Kathryn & Ross Petras on how COVID-19 has changed the way we talk from 2020-10-23T20:08:46
(10/23/20) Regular contributors to the show Kathryn Petras and Ross Petras, the sister and brother team of word masters, are the authors of “You’re Saying It Wrong,” “That Doesn’t Mean What You Thi...
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former ACLU director Ira Glasser & Nico Perrino on their new documentary Mighty Ira from 2020-10-22T21:40:58
(10/22/20) As executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for 23 years, Ira Glasser transformed the organization from a fledgling small operation on the verge of bankruptcy into...
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Jon Meacham on his new podcast It Was Said revisiting some of American history's greatest speeches from 2020-10-21T19:22:20
(10/21/20) Jon Meacham is a renowned presidential historian, contributing writer to The New York Times Book Review, contributing editor at TIME, and Pulitzer Prize-winning author. His book, “The So...
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Robert C. Hockett on Financing the Green New Deal: A Plan of Action and Renewal from 2020-10-20T21:28:16
Robert C. Hockett is the Edward Cornell Professor of Law at Cornell Law School and was one of the key architects of one of the most discussed policy proposals of our time, the Green New Deal. His n...
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Prof. Carlton F. W. Larson talks about his book On Treason: A Citizen's Guide to the Law. from 2020-10-16T18:44:29
(10/16/20) The word treason—the only crime specifically defined in the US Constitution—is tossed around a lot by politicians and pundits on both sides of the aisle these days. But, as accusations o...
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Tim Robbins on his new aural cinema project Bobbo Supreme from 2020-10-15T20:43:51
From his star-making performances in “Bull Durham" and Robert Altman’s “The Professional” to his revered role alongside Morgan Freeman in “The Shawshank Redemption,” from his Oscar-winning turn in ...
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Michael Fosberg discusses his book Nobody Wants to Talk About It. from 2020-10-14T19:26:54
(10/14/20) Chicago native Michael Fosberg has been working to create a national dialogue on race and identity since 2001, when he launched his one-man autobiographical play Incognito. For the past ...
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Luis A. Miranda Jr. & John James on their new HBO documentary Siempre, Luis from 2020-10-13T20:44:14
(10/13/20)The new HBO documentary “Siempre, Luis” follows Puerto Rican activist Luis A. Miranda Jr. throughout the course of a year as his devotion to family and country propels his devotion to emp...
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Shaun King on Make Change: How to Fight Injustice, Dismantle Systemic Oppression, and Own Our Future from 2020-10-09T20:55:42
As a leader in the Black Lives Matter movement, Shaun King has become one of the most prominent figures on the frontlines of the modern fight for civil rights. In his new book “Make Change: How to ...
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Tim Weiner on The Folly and the Glory: America, Russia, and Political Warfare 1945–2020 from 2020-10-08T22:00:45
(10/8/20) “The Folly and the Glory: America, Russia, and Political Warfare 1945–2020” is Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award winner Tim Weiner’s look at the 75-year battle between the US and...
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Pete Muroski on getting your garden ready for the colder months from 2020-10-07T21:22:28
(10/7/20)It may not feel like a normal fall, but your garden doesn’t know it’s a pandemic. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, gardening expert Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes...
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Monona Rossol takes your calls on how to stay safe during the pandemic. from 2020-10-05T20:55:40
(10/5/20)Chemist, artist and industrial hygienist Monona Rossol is the founder and of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc. The not-for-profit corporation is dedicated to providing health and safet...
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John Dean on his latest book Authoritarian Nightmare: Trump and His Followers from 2020-10-02T19:45:12
Best known for his role in covering up the Watergate scandal when serving as White House Counsel for Richard Nixon from July 1970 until April 1973, it was John Dean’s subsequent testimony to Congre...
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MIT professor Sinan Aral on his book The Hype Machine from 2020-10-01T19:49:23
(10/1/20) Drawing on two decades of his own research and business experience, the David Austin Professor of Management at MIT Sinan Aral’s new book “The Hype Machine: How Social Media Disrupts Our ...
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Jennifer Taub on Big Dirty Money: The Shocking Injustice and Unseen Cost of White Collar Crime from 2020-09-29T19:48:33
(9/29/20) There is a crime spree happening in America and the privileged perps are getting away with it. Professor of Law at Western New England University Jennifer Taub’s new book Big “Dirty Money...
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Ian Somerhalder, Rebecca Tickell and Josh Tickell on their new Netflix documentary Kiss The Ground from 2020-09-28T22:26:26
(9/28/20) Narrated by Woody Harrelson, the new Netflix documentary “Kiss the Ground” sheds light on the alternative farming method called regenerative agriculture that experts claim has the potenti...
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veterinary experts Meghan E. Herron, Debra F. Horwitz and Carlo Siracusa on Decoding Your Cat from 2020-09-25T19:24:35
One of the main reasons pet owners in the US give up their cats (often leading to euthanasia) is because of unwanted behaviors. Drs. Meghan E. Herron, Debra F. Horwitz and Carlo Siracusa’s book “De...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell take your calls on construction in the COVID-19 era from 2020-09-24T20:38:30
(9/24/20) As regular listeners know, there are few building issues that our favorite masters of home repair Alvin and Lawrence Ubell don’t know how to fix. But the pandemic has created a whole new ...
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investigative journalist Bob Hennelly on the latest government response to COVID-19 from 2020-09-22T21:24:34
(9/22/20) Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appea...
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Leonard & executive producer Jesse Lent take your calls on what is getting you through the pandemic. from 2020-09-21T23:14:13
(9/21/20) With so many of us trapped in the house (or in cramped New York City apartments), the need for entertainment that can be enjoyed from the comfort of your couch has never been greater. So,...
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Marion Nestle and Kerry Trueman discuss their book Let's Ask Marion. from 2020-09-18T22:11:57
(9/18/20) Marion Nestle is the Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies and Public Health at New York University. Her latest book “Let's Ask Marion What You Need to Know about the Poli...
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Chris Whipple on The Spymasters: How the CIA Directors Shape History and the Future from 2020-09-17T21:52:27
(9/17/20) Since its inception in 1947, the Central Intelligence Agency has been a powerful player on the world stage, operating largely in the shadows to protect American interests. Based on extens...
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Eric Merola on his documentary The Andorra Hustle from 2020-09-16T21:11:07
(9/16/20) On March 10, 2015, the tiny country of Andorra, located between France and Spain in the Pyrenees mountains, found itself at the center of one of the most convoluted and outrageous bank ro...
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Marc Levinson on Outside the Box: How Globalization Changed from Moving Stuff to Spreading Ideas from 2020-09-15T22:18:24
(9/15/20) Globalization has profoundly shaped the world we live in, yet its rise was neither inevitable nor planned. It is also one of the most contentious issues of our time. While it may have mad...
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Ellis Cose on The Short Life and Curious Death of Free Speech in America from 2020-09-14T22:31:32
(9/14/20) Free speech has long been one of American's most revered freedoms. Yet now, more than ever, free speech is reshaping America’s social and political landscape even as it is coming under at...
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Carl Hoffman on the upside-down world of President Trump’s MAGA rallies from 2020-09-11T22:44:15
To those on the left, Donald Trump’s rallies are a Black Mass of American politics with the President summoning the nation’s darkest forces. To his supporters the rallies are a form of pilgrimage; ...
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Victoria De Grazia on The Perfect Fascist: A Story of Love, Power, and Morality in Mussolini’s Italy from 2020-09-10T21:20:41
(9/10/20) The new book “The Perfect Fascist: A Story of Love, Power, and Morality in Mussolini’s Italy” from Moore Collegiate Professor of History at Columbia University Victoria De Grazia pivots f...
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Joseph E. LeDoux discusses his book The Deep History of Ourselves. from 2020-09-09T22:12:09
(9/9/20) In his latest book “The Deep History of Ourselves: The Four-Billion-Year Story of How We Got Conscious Brains” neuroscientist and Henry And Lucy Moses Professor of Science at NYU Joseph Le...
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Demetri Papas and Steve Gabriel on everything you've ever wanted to know about mushrooms from 2020-09-04T21:20:51
(9/4/20)According to the website Healthline.com, “you can’t go wrong with mushrooms. They’re fat-free, low-sodium, low-calorie, and cholesterol-free. They’re also packed with fiber, vitamins, and m...
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Prof. Thomas A. Schwartz on Henry Kissinger and American Power: A Political Biography from 2020-09-03T21:38:09
Over the past six decades, Henry Kissinger has been one of America’s most consistently praised?and reviled?public figures. Diplomatic historian and Distinguished Professor of History Political Scie...
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Edward Ball on Life of a Klansman: A Family History in White Supremacy from 2020-09-02T23:18:45
(9/2/20) In an era when racist ideology and violence are again running rampant in the public square, National Book Award–winner Edward Ball’s “Life of a Klansman: A Family History in White Supremac...
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Christian Parenti on Radical Hamilton: Economic Lessons from a Misunderstood Founder from 2020-09-01T21:54:52
In his latest book “Radical Hamilton: Economic Lessons from a Misunderstood Founder” investigative journalist Christian Parenti reconsiders the history of America’s founding and the men who orchest...
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Julie C. Suk on her book We the Women: The Unstoppable Mothers of the Equal Rights Amendment from 2020-09-01T00:38:40
(8/31/20) CUNY Graduate Center professor Julie C. Suk’s new book “We the Women: The Unstoppable Mothers of the Equal Rights Amendment” is the true story of the women who persisted across generation...
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Richard Kreitner on the secret history of America's imperfect union from 2020-08-28T01:04:11
(8/27/20) The basic premise of journalist and historian Richard Kreitner’s new book “Break It Up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America's Imperfect Union” is simple—The United Stat...
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Jeff Hobbs discusses his latest book Show Them You're Good from 2020-08-19T00:39:06
(8/18/20)Four teenage boys are high school seniors at two very different schools within the city of Los Angeles, the second largest school district in the nation with nearly 700,000 students. In hi...
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Prof. Eric Alterman discusses his book Lying in State: Why Presidents Lie—And Why Trump is Worse from 2020-08-17T22:37:09
(8/17/20) If there's one thing we know about Donald Trump, it's that he lies. But he's by no means the first president to do so. In his latest book “Lying in State: Why Presidents Lie—And Why Trump...
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Jeffrey Toobin on True Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Investigation of Donald Trump from 2020-08-15T00:02:17
Donald Trump's campaign chairman went to jail. So did his personal lawyer. His long-time political consigliere was convicted of serious federal crimes and his national security advisor pled guilty ...
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Jim Sciutto discusses his book The Madman Theory: Trump Takes On the World. from 2020-08-13T22:05:31
Richard Nixon tried it first. Hoping to make communist bloc countries uneasy and thus unstable, Nixon let them think he was just crazy enough to nuke them. He called this the madman theory. Nearly ...
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Grace Lee and Marjan Safinia on their PBS documentary series And She Could Be Next from 2020-08-12T23:48:38
(8/12/20) As demographics in the US shift toward a non-white majority, Americans inspired to vote for the first time will increasingly decide our elections. Grace Lee and Marjan Safinia’s new two-p...
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David Gessner on Leave It As It Is: A Journey Through Theodore Roosevelt's American Wilderness from 2020-08-11T23:07:25
(8/11/20) “Leave it as it is,” Theodore Roosevelt reportedly declared when gazing across the Grand Canyon for the first time. “The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.” Roosevelt’s...
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Tom Philpott on Perilous Bounty: The Looming Collapse of American Farming and How We Can Prevent It from 2020-08-10T23:05:17
(8/10/20)More than a decade after Michael Pollan transformed the conversation about what we eat, a combination of global diet trends and corporate interests have left American agriculture in a stat...
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Ramona S. Diaz discusses her latest documentary A Thousand Cuts. from 2020-08-07T23:10:17
(8/10/20)In 2016, outsider candidate Rodrigo Duterte upset the political establishment in the Philippines by winning the presidency after promising vengeance and violence. Within hours of him takin...
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Ellis Cose on his book Democracy, If We Can Keep It: The ACLU’s 100-Year Fight for Rights in America from 2020-08-06T21:00:24
(8/6/20) As the centennial of the founding of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) was approaching, the organization asked columnist and contributing editor for Newsweek Ellis Cose to become i...
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Prof. Katherine D. Kinzler on How You Say It: Why You Talk the Way You Do And What It Says About You from 2020-08-03T21:30:51
(8/3/20) We gravitate toward people like us; it’s human nature. Race, class, and gender shape our social identities, the people we perceive as “like us” or “not like us.” But one overlooked factor ...
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Dr. Bob Spires on what other countries can tell about us safely reopening schools from 2020-07-31T21:20:06
(7/31/20) "As American school officials debate when it will be safe for schoolchildren to return to classrooms, looking abroad may offer insights,” reads the opening line of Dr. Bob Spires’s articl...
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Bob Hennelly on evictions and rent freezes in the age of COVID-19 from 2020-07-30T21:50:42
(8/30/20) Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appea...
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Dr. Gerald M. Goldhaber on greed, racism and COVID-19 from 2020-07-29T23:36:54
(7/29/20)Back in April, we welcomed Dr. Gerald M. Goldhaber to the show to discuss his new book “Murder, Inc.: How Unregulated Industry Kills or Injures Thousands of Americans Every Year...And What...
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James B. Steele disusses the updated version of America: What Went Wrong? The Crisis Deepens from 2020-07-24T20:22:53
According to two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter James B. Steele, the downward spiral of America’s middle class is no accident. In “America: What Went Wrong?: The Crisis Deepens,” he and longt...
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Claire Bond Potter discusses her book Political Junkies from 2020-07-23T19:44:57
(7/23/20) With fake news on Facebook, trolls on Twitter and viral outrage everywhere, it's easy to believe that the Internet changed everything about American politics. But in her latest book “Poli...
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Monona Rossol on reopening schools and businesses safely in the wake of the pandemic from 2020-07-22T18:50:49
(7/22/20) “Democracy Now” co-host Juan Gonzales has called Monona Rossol a hero for her work in helping to cope with the environmental disaster that arose in lower Manhattan following the tragic ev...
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Julian E. Zelizer on Newt Gingrich and the rise of the new Republican party from 2020-07-21T19:22:44
(7/21/20) Julian E. Zelizer’s latest book “Burning Down the House: Newt Gingrich, the Fall of a Speaker, and the Rise of the New Republican Party” is the story of how Congressman Newt Gingrich (Spe...
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Pete Muroski on gardening in the age of COVID-19 from 2020-07-14T20:23:56
(7/14/20) Regular contributor to the show Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes in Pawling, New York is an expert on just about anything you’d want in your garden. He also knows how to get the most out...
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Dylan Taylor-Lehman on history’s most stubborn micronation, Sealand from 2020-07-13T21:27:43
When, in 1967, self-made millionaire named Paddy Roy Bates inaugurated himself ruler of the Principality of Sealand, a tiny dominion of the high seas, he began the extremely strange, completely tru...
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Heather Cox Richardson discusses her book How the South Won the Civil War from 2020-07-10T20:31:47
Heather Cox Richardson’s latest book “How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America” traces the story of the American paradox, the competin...
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Larry Tye on Demagogue: The Life and Long Shadow of Senator Joe McCarthy from 2020-07-07T22:27:25
(7/7/20)In the long history of American demagogues, from Huey Long to Donald Trump, never has one caused so much irreparable damage to the country in such a short time as Senator Joseph McCarthy. M...
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Greg Mitchell on Hollywood and the atom bomb from 2020-07-06T20:37:38
(7/20/20) Greg Mitchell’s new book “The Beginning or the End: How Hollywood?and America?Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb” chronicles the first efforts of American media and culture to pro...
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Sam Feder, Jen Richards and Susan Stryker on their Netflix doc Disclosure: Trans Lives On Screen from 2020-07-02T21:06:46
(7/2/20)The new Netflix documentary “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen” is an unprecedented, eye-opening look at transgender depictions in film and television, revealing how Hollywood simultaneousl...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell on home repair projects you can tackle right now from 2020-07-01T23:09:02
(7/1/20) As regular listeners know, there are few building issues that our favorite masters of home repair Alvin and Lawrence Ubell don’t know how to fix. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at L...
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Dr. Khyati Y. Joshi on White Christian Privilege: The Illusion of Religious Equality in America from 2020-06-29T20:49:50
(6/29/20)The United States is recognized as the most religiously diverse country in the world. Yet, its laws and customs, which many have come to see as normal features of American life, actually k...
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Tom Shepard, Melanie Nathan and Cheyenne Adriano on the PBS doc Unsettled: Seeking Refuge in America from 2020-06-26T19:59:54
(6/26/20) The new PBS documentary “Unsettled: Seeking Refuge in America” reveals the untold stories of LGBTQ refugees and asylum seekers who have fled persecution from their home countries and are ...
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Francois Vannucci on Einstein’s two mistakes from 2020-06-25T20:57:27
(6/25/20)“Einstein is an example of an inventive and free spirit; yet he still kept his biases,” reads Paris Diderot University professor and researcher Francois Vannucci’s article for The Conversa...
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Bob Hennelly on New Jersey’s secret history of slavery from 2020-06-23T21:48:55
(6/23/20) Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate...
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Gerard Koeppel on his new book Not a Gentleman's Work from 2020-06-16T21:05:34
The Herbert Fuller, a three-masted sailing ship loaded with New England lumber, left Boston bound for Buenos Aires on July 8, 1896 with 12 people on board. Just before 2am on the vessel’s sixth day...
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Sydney Ladensohn Stern on The Brothers Mankiewicz: Hope, Heartbreak, and Hollywood Classics from 2020-06-15T22:26:12
(6/15/20) Herman J. (1897–1953) and Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1909–1993) wrote, produced, and directed over 150 pictures. Herman wrote the screenplay for “Citizen Kane” with Orson Welles, sharing the h...
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Jeffrey D. Sachs on The Ages of Globalization: Geography, Technology, and Institutions (6/3/20) from 2020-06-03T19:50:49
In his new book The Ages of Globalization: Geography, Technology, and Institutions” economist Jeffrey D. Sachs turns to world history to shed light on how we can meet the global challenges of the 2...
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David Frum on his latest book Trumpocalypse: Restoring American Democracy (6/1/20) from 2020-06-01T21:16:47
What happens when a third of the electorate refuses to abandon President Trump, no matter what he does? In his latest book “Trumpocalypse: Restoring American Democracy,” conservative political comm...
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Bob Hennelly on how structural racism is affecting the pandemic (5/29/20) from 2020-05-29T19:58:36
Before he became a familiar journalistic voice across New York City’s radio dial, Bob Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appeared in the New York...
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sibling language experts Kathryn and Ross Petras on their latest quandaries (5/28/20) from 2020-05-28T19:12:06
Do you ever notice odd patterns in the meaning or spelling of similar words? Kathryn and Ross Petras have too. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, our favorite language experts ...
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J. Chester Johnson discusses the Elaine race massacre. (5/26/20) from 2020-05-26T23:10:52
The 1919 Elaine race massacre, despite possibly being the worst race riot in our country’s history, has been widely unknown for the better part of a century. In 2008, when the Episcopal Church form...
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Cynthia Kinahan and Jim Lahey on baking in the age of COVID-19 (5/21/20) from 2020-05-21T22:20:58
Cynthia Kinahan owns Pawling Bread Co, a bakery revered for their fresh sourdough loaves and black–sesame-stuffed croissants. Born in Malaysia, Cynthia discovered the allure of American cuisine aft...
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Esaw Snipes-Garner and the filmmakers of American Trial: The Eric Garner Story (5/19/20) from 2020-05-19T21:37:58
Roee Messinger’s new film “American Trial: The Eric Garner Story” is an unscripted courtroom drama imagining the trial that never happened involving Daniel Pantaleo, an NYPD officer videotaped admi...
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Robert Kolker on his latest book Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family (5/18/20) from 2020-05-18T20:14:51
Don and Mimi Galvin appeared to be living the American dream. After World War II, Don's work with the Air Force brought them to Colorado, where their 12 children perfectly spanned the baby boom—the...
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Ben Katchor on his illustrated history The Dairy Restaurant (5/13/20) from 2020-05-13T23:55:27
In his latest graphic novel “The Dairy Restaurant” writer and New Yorker cartoonist Ben Katchor retells the history of where we choose to eat—a history that starts with the first man who was allowe...
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former Minnesota Attorney General Barbara Freese on her book Industrial-Strength Denial (5/12/20) from 2020-05-12T21:57:33
Former Minnesota Attorney General and environmental attorney Barbara Freese stared corporate denial in the face when cross-examining coal industry witnesses over a decade ago who were disputing the...
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Howard Steven Friedman discusses his book Ultimate Price: The Value We Place on Life. (5/7/20) from 2020-05-08T00:45:11
How much is a human life worth? The calculations that that corporations and governments use to generate such a horrific number are often buried in technical language, yet they influence our economy...
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Alexander Glustrom, Katie Mathews & Daniel Bennett on Mossville: When Great Trees Fall (5/6/20) from 2020-05-06T23:14:42
A once-thriving community founded by formerly enslaved and free people of color, Mossville, Louisiana has become a breeding ground for petrochemical plants and their toxic black clouds. Many of the...
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Sayu Bhojwani discusses Trump's new immigration policies. (5/5/20) from 2020-05-05T22:34:26
Sayu Bhojwani is the founder and president of the New American Leaders Project, a national, nonpartisan organization focused on bringing New Americans into the political process. From 2002 to 2004,...
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Michael J. Thompson and Gregory R. Smulewicz-Zucker on democratic socialism (5/4/20) from 2020-05-04T21:07
Democratic socialism is on the lips of activists and politicians from both the left and the right. Some call it extremism; some call it common sense. But what is it and what effect would it really ...
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Valerie Hansen talks about her latest book The Year 1000. (4/20/20) from 2020-04-30T21:01:52
People often believe that the years immediately prior to AD 1000 lacked any major cultural developments or geopolitical encounters, that the Europeans hadn’t yet reached North America and that the ...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell talk about COVID-19’s effect on construction. (4/29/20) from 2020-04-29T23:04:02
As regular listeners know, there are few building issues that our favorite masters of home repair Alvin and Lawrence Ubell don’t know how to fix. But with most large construction projects shut down...
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Michael Patrick MacDonald on Ireland and the UK in the age of COVID-19 (4/28/20) from 2020-04-28T22:09:07
Regular contributor to the program Michael Patrick MacDonald is the author of the New York Times bestselling memoir "All Souls: A Family Story From Southie" and the acclaimed "Easter Rising: A Memo...
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Bob Hennelly discusses the government response to COVID-19. (4/24/20) from 2020-04-24T22:04:28
Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appeared in the...
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Monona Rossol on the difficulties of making the workplace safe from the novel coronavirus (4/23/20) from 2020-04-23T20:56:54
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. The president of Arts, Crafts and Theater Safety, Inc., a not-for-profit corporation dedicated to providing health and safety services ...
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Michael Rips talks about his book The Golden Flea on the Chelsea flea market. (4/21/20) from 2020-04-21T22:30:10
All around the world, people wander through flea markets in search of lost treasure. The Chelsea flea market, sprawled over several blocks within an old Manhattan garage, holds a special place in t...
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Boston Globe music critic Bill Beuttler on jazz in the 21st century (4/17/20) from 2020-04-17T21:57:31
As jazz enters its second century it is reasserting itself as dynamic and relevant, according to Boston Globe jazz writer and Emerson College professor Bill Beuttler. Bill’s book “Make It New: Resh...
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legendary music publicist Howard Bloom on his memoir Einstein, Michael Jackson & Me (4/16/20) from 2020-04-16T20:52:01
Jethro Tull’s manager Derek Sutton called Howard Bloom “the greatest press agent that rock and roll has ever known.” Howard was science nerd who knew nothing about pop when he founded the biggest P...
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Kevin Peter Hand on his book Alien Oceans about looking for life on habitable planets (4/20/20) from 2020-04-14T20:48:49
Where is the best place to find life beyond Earth? We often look to Mars as the most promising site in our solar system, but recent scientific missions have revealed that some of the most habitable...
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Halina Dyrschka and Julia Voss on groundbreaking abstract painter Hilma AF Klint (4/13/20) from 2020-04-13T20:44:35
Swedish artist Hilma af Klint (1862-1944) was an abstract artist before the term existed—a visionary trailblazing figure who, inspired by spiritualism, modern science and the riches of the natural ...
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La La Brooks of The Crystals, Sammy Strain of The Chips and Brent Wilson on doo-wop (4/9/20) from 2020-04-10T00:20:57
It's the unmistakable falsetto leads, lilting harmonies and deep backing vocals set to a street corner rhythm that created the unmistakable sounds of songs like the 1959 Little Anthony and the Impe...
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Frank Smyth on his unauthorized history of the NRA (4/8/20) from 2020-04-08T21:55:36
The National Rifle Association (NRA) is unique in American life. Few other civic organizations are as old or as large. None is as controversial. It is in no small part thanks to the NRA that US gun...
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Seth Tibbott talks about turning Tofurky into a success story. (4/6/20) from 2020-04-06T23:57:29
Success didn’t happen overnight for Tofurkey founder and CEO Seth Tibbott. It took 15 years of consistent failure. In his new book “In Search of the Wild Tofurky: How a Business Misfit Pioneered Pl...
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Dr. Gerald M. Goldhaber on his book Murder, Inc. about the harms caused by corporate greed (4/3/20) from 2020-04-03T21:03:36
Do you assume the products you buy, the food you eat, the medicines you take, and the cars you drive are safe? Think again. We're exposed on a daily basis to life-threatening hazards of which we're...
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Peter Gatien on his book The Club King: My Rise, Reign, and Fall in New York Nightlife (4/2/20) from 2020-04-02T18:33:26
In the 1980s and ‘90s the large-scale nightclubs Limelight, Tunnel, Club USA, and Palladium dominated New York City’s entertainment scene, their influences reverberating around the world. With a ca...
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Thane Rosenbaum talks about his new book Saving Free Speech...from Itself (4/1/20) from 2020-04-01T21:09:39
In an era of political correctness, race-baiting, and, of course, “fake news,” liberals and conservatives are up in arms both about free speech, its perceived excesses and what the First Amendment ...
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Douglas Tallamy and Pete Muroski on Nature's Best Hope (3/27/20) from 2020-03-27T19:25:39
Douglas W. Tallamy’s first book, “Bringing Nature Home,” awakened thousands of readers to an urgent situation—wildlife populations are in decline because the native plants they depend on are fast d...
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Sarah Teale and Harri Hursti on HBO's Kill Chain: The Cyber War on America's Elections (3/26/20) from 2020-03-26T21:54:19
From directors Sarah Teale, Russell Michaels and Simon Ardizzone, the team behind the 2006 Emmy-nominated documentary “Hacking Democracy,” the new HBO original doc “Kill Chain: The Cyber War on Ame...
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Bob Hennelly on how the Coronavirus is affecting unions (3/24/20) from 2020-03-24T20:15:12
Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appeared in the...
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Sibling language experts Kathryn and Ross Petras on their book Awkword Moments (3/23/20) from 2020-03-23T21:02:35
Are there words you’re sure people are mispronouncing or misusing all the time? Maybe you just want to expand your vocabulary without sounding forced. Kathryn and Ross Petras have got you covered. ...
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Mike Jaccarino on America's Last Great Newspaper War (3/20/20) from 2020-03-20T22:11:16
When author Mike Jaccarino was offered a job at the Daily News in 2006, he was asked a single question, “kid, what are you going to do to help us beat the Post?” That was the year things went sidew...
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Katherine Stewart on the rise of religious nationalism (3/19/20) from 2020-03-19T22:03:02
For decades, the Religious Right has presented itself as a social movement preoccupied with a number of cultural issues, including abortion and same-sex marriage. In her new book “The Power Worship...
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journalist Anna Prouse on her role in rebuilding southern Iraq (3/17/20) from 2020-03-17T21:23:12
Anna Prouse is a journalist and advisor, handpicked by General David Petraeus to lead reconstruction efforts in southern Iraq. Due to a strange series of coincidences, her life was actually saved b...
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Jim Al-Khalili discusses his book The World According to Physics. (3/13/20) from 2020-03-13T20:36:01
In his new book “The World According to Physics,” quantum physicist, New York Times bestselling author, and BBC host Jim Al-Khalili offers a fascinating and illuminating look at what physics reveal...
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Nora Armani, Teresa Mular, Melodie Carli & Raffaello Degruttola on socially relevant film (3/12/20) from 2020-03-12T23:29:25
Actress and filmmaker Nora Armani founded The Socially Relevant Film Festival New York in 2013 in response to the amount of violent stories she was seeing told across most mainstream entertainment ...
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Dr. Carder Stout discusses his memoir on Lost in Ghost Town. (3/10/20) from 2020-03-10T19:28:32
In his new book “Lost in Ghost Town: A Memoir of Addiction, Redemption, and Hope in Unlikely Places,” psychologist to the Hollywood elite Dr. Carder Stout delivers a page-turning memoir about his f...
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President Karen Cooper and programmer Mike Maggiore discuss 50 years of Film Forum. (3/9/20) from 2020-03-09T22:35:37
From the times its screens were first illuminated in 1970 as an alternative space for independent films, with 50 folding chairs, one projector and a $19,000 annual budget, the iconic Manhattan movi...
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gardening expert Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes on preparing for spring (3/6/20) from 2020-03-06T21:15:42
With a mild winter soon to be a memory, our favorite gardening guru Pete Muroski of Native Landscapes returns to the program just in time to answer your questions on getting your outdoor plants rea...
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former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch on the fight to save public education (3/5/20) from 2020-03-05T22:52:36
From one of the foremost authorities on education and the history of education in the United States, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch comes an impassioned look at the ways...
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home repair expert Alvin Ubell on getting your residence ready for spring (3/4/20) from 2020-03-04T21:33:07
When it comes to fixing things around the house, there’s no one better to tell you what do and how to do it than Alvin Ubell. In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we open the p...
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Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novelist Art Spiegelman on screwball comics (3/3/20) from 2020-03-03T23:55:10
Art Spiegelman has almost single-handedly brought comic books out of the toy closet and onto the literature shelves. In 1992, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his masterful Holocaust narrative Maus— w...
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Jeremy Salt discusses his book The Last Ottoman Wars: The Human Cost, 1877–1923. (3/2/20) from 2020-03-02T21:56:15
During the last half a century of its existence, the Ottoman Empire and the lands around its borders were places of constant political turmoil and unceasing military action. The enormous costs of w...
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Michael Segal & Maurice Possley discuss the events in their book Conviction at Any Cost. (2/28/20) from 2020-02-29T00:40:01
It took decades for Michael Segal to grow his small insurance agency into the fifth largest independent insurance brokerage in the United States. The $250 million firm had 950 employees when a ques...
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Linda Shelton and Ronald K. Brown discuss 35 years of Evidence dance at the Joyce Theater. (2/26/20) from 2020-02-27T01:27:26
When Brooklyn native Ronald K. Brown and his dance company Evidence bring their signature contemporary African style back to The Joyce Theater this week with a program that honors two of the compan...
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G. Wayne Miller on his book Kid Number One: Alan Hassenfeld and Hasbro (2/24/20) from 2020-02-24T23:19:45
Having escaped religious persecution in Eastern Europe in 1903, the grandfather and great-uncle of the former Hasbro CEO Alan Hassenfeld arrived in America as penniless teenage immigrants—refugees ...
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Robert P. Crease on 10 great thinkers throughout history (2/20/20) from 2020-02-21T00:43:45
When does a scientific discovery become accepted fact? Why have scientific facts become easy to deny? And what can we do about it? In his latest book “The Workshop and the World: What Ten Thinkers ...
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Jeff Madrick discusses his book Invisible Americans: The Tragic Cost of Child Poverty. (2/19/20) from 2020-02-19T22:47:40
More than one out of every six American children lives below the poverty line. But statistics alone can’t convey just how rampant this issue has become. In his new book “Invisible Americans: The Tr...
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Michael Patrick MacDonald on Brexit Day and beyond in Ireland and the UK (2/14/20) from 2020-02-14T23:29:37
Michael Patrick MacDonald is the author of the best-selling memoir, "All Souls: A Family Story From Southie" and the acclaimed "Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion." He has been awarded ...
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former Republican strategist Rick Wilson on how to defeat Donald Trump in 2020 (2/12/20) from 2020-02-12T22:59:21
In his new book “Running Against the Devil: A Plot to Save America from Trump--and Democrats from Themselves” former Republican strategist Rick Wilson draws from his decades of national political e...
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Anastasia Nesvetailova & Ronen Palan on their book Sabotage: The Hidden Nature of Finance (2/10/20) from 2020-02-10T20:06:11
Anastasia Nesvetailova and Ronen Palan’s new book “Sabotage: The Hidden Nature of Finance” is an intellectual detective story tracing the origins of financial sabotage, starting with the work of a ...
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Richard Cahan on River of Blood: American Slavery From The People Who Lived It (2/7/20) from 2020-02-07T23:12:11
In the late 1930s, as part of the government employees tracked down 3,000 men and women who had been enslaved before and during the Civil War. The federal workers asked them probing questions about...
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H. Keith Melton and Robert Wallace on their book Spy Sites of New York City (2/5/20) from 2020-02-05T22:59:55
Throughout its history, New York City has been a battleground for international espionage, a place where secrets are created, stolen and passed on through clandestine meetings and covert communicat...
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Anna Mae Duane discusses her new book Educated for Freedom. (2/4/20) from 2020-02-04T23:17:48
In the 1820s, few Americans could imagine a viable future for black children. Even abolitionists saw just two options for African American youth—permanent subjection or exile. Anna Mae Duane’s book...
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Bob Hennelly discusses his latest political reporting. (2/3/20) from 2020-02-03T23:07:38
Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appeared in the...
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Ray Isle of Food & Wine on the latest round of tariffs on wine and cheese (1/31/20) from 2020-01-31T22:21:29
“Are you a fan of Whispering Angel rosé? Or for that matter, any Provençal rosé? What about Chianti? Or Côtes du Rhône? Do you drink Spanish wines—Rioja, Albariño, Priorat, Cava? Barolo? Barbaresco...
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Double bass virtuoso Sigurd Hole performs live in our studio. (1/30/20) from 2020-01-30T23:30:04
Sigurd Hole has been one of Norway's most sought after musicians for the past decade. He has been part of more than 40 album releases and has appeared on many of the world’s most famous stages, fro...
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Cedric L. Alexander talks about his book In Defense of Public Service. (1/29/20) from 2020-01-29T20:36:33
In his new book “In Defense of Public Service: How 22 Million Government Workers Will Save our Republic,” former deputy mayor and police chief-turned-CNN commentator Cedric L. Alexander argues that...
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Stanislas Dehaene on why our brains learn better than computers (1/28/20) from 2020-01-28T22:46:31
The human brain is an extraordinary machine. Its ability to process information and adapt to circumstances by reprogramming itself is unparalleled and it remains the best source of inspiration for ...
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Home repair experts Alvin and Lawrence Ubell discuss new tenant protection laws. (1/27/20) from 2020-01-27T21:12:23
In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, our favorite handymen Alvin and Laurence Ubell discuss new laws aimed at demystifying some of the regulations protecting renters' quality of ...
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Josh Wesson answers your questions about wine. (1/24/20) from 2020-01-24T21:12:26
Do you have questions about wine that you’re afraid will get you scowled at by the cashier at your local shop? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, wine expert Josh Wesson takes ...
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Tim Robbins talks about his touring production The New Colossus. (1/23/20) from 2020-01-23T23:10:24
From his star-making roles in "Bull Durham" and Robert Altman’s “The Professional” to his enduring performance alongside Morgan Freeman in “The Shawshank Redemption,” Tim Robbins holds a special pl...
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Language experts Kathryn & Ross Petras take your calls. (1/22/20) from 2020-01-22T21:09:27
Do you have any unresolved questions about this odd creation we call the English language? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, Kathryn and Ross Petras, authors of the New York T...
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Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney on his latest documentary Citizen K (1/21/20) from 2020-01-21T21:39:57
“Citizen K” is the latest film from Alex Gibney, winner of the 2008 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. The outrageous story of cunning uber-oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky – once the wealthi...
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Leonard's gospel tribute to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (1/20/20) from 2020-01-20T19:00:10
Martin Luther King Jr. would have been 91 years old this year. “I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states,” King wrote in his 1963 Letter from a Birmingham Jail. “I canno...
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Michael J. Thompson & Gregory R. Smulewicz-Zucker on science's role in a democracy (1/17/20) from 2020-01-17T23:17:59
Michael J. Thompson and Gregory R. Smulewicz-Zucker’s book “Anti-Science and the Assault on Democracy: Defending Reason in a Free Society” features essays they edited on the role that science must ...
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Leonard and Executive Producer Jesse Lent invite listeners to answer their many questions. (1/16/20) from 2020-01-16T23:20:25
Every day on Leonard Lopate at Large, we bring in writers, artists, reporters and artists to answer our questions about their area of expertise. But there are some questions that even the experts h...
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Composer Charlie Morrow talks about his new book and eclectic career. (1/14/20) from 2020-01-14T21:39:31
Charlie Morrow is a composer, sound artist, performer, and innovator whose goal over the past four decades has been to bring experimental sound and music to a wider audience. He’s also the composer...
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Zev Feldman and Will Friedwald on the early recorded work of Nat King Cole (1/13/20) from 2020-01-13T23:01:07
The new Resonance Records box set “Hittin’ The Ramp: The Early Years (1936-1943)” is the first large-scale collection of the pivotal early recordings of Nat King Cole’s 29-year recording career. Ma...
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Delfeayo Marsalis performs live in our studio with The Uptown Jazz Orchestra. (1/10/20) from 2020-01-10T20:23:26
Over the course of his prolific career, trombonist, composer, producer, educator and NEA Jazz Master Delfeayo Marsalis has been hailed as one of the “most imaginative...trombonists of his generatio...
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Michael Aaron Rockland on his latest book The George Washington Bridge: Poetry in Steel (1/9/20) from 2020-01-09T22:35:28
Since opening in 1931, the George Washington Bridge, linking New York and New Jersey, has become the busiest bridge in the world, with over 100 million vehicles passing over it each year. Many peop...
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S. James Gates Jr. & Cathie Pelletier discuss their book Proving Einstein Right. (1/8/20) from 2020-01-08T23:31:39
S. James Gates Jr. and Cathie Pelletier’s “Proving Einstein Right: The Daring Expeditions that Changed How We Look at the Universe” chronicles the perilous journey of the scientists who set out to ...
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Dr. Sarah Hill on the dangerous psychological effects of birth control pills (1/7/20) from 2020-01-07T22:20:21
Dr. Sarah Hill’s new book “This Is Your Brain on Birth Control: The Surprising Science of Women, Hormones, and the Law of Unintended Consequences” shines a light on how hormonal birth control affec...
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Bob Hennelly on the effects of income inequality in all areas of American life (1/6/20) from 2020-01-06T23:46:58
Before being known for his groundbreaking political reporting at WNYC, Bob Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His written work has appeared in the New York Times...
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Tobin Smith breaks down the Fox News playbook. (1/3/20) from 2020-01-03T20:31:37
From longtime Fox News contributor, guest anchor and two-time New York Times bestselling author Tobin Smith comes a new book, “Foxocracy: Inside the Network's Playbook of Tribal Warfare an insider'...
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David Rothenberg on how economist and union organizer Marvin Miller changed baseball (1/2/20) from 2020-01-02T23:09:51
In 1960, Hall of Fame hitter Mickey Mantle signed a 1-year contract worth $65,000 a year—the Yankees were giving him a $7,000 pay cut. Since there was no free agency in 1960, Mantle had no place to...
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Choreographer Donald Byrd discusses Greenwood, his 5th work for Alvin Ailey. (12/30/19) from 2019-12-30T23:23:08
On May 30, 1921, an incident occurred in the elevator of a Greenwood office building. Though what actually transpired is unclear, a young Black man was arrested for attempted assault on a White tee...
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Barbara Natterson-Horowitz & Kathryn Bowers on what animals can tell us about adolescence (12/18/19) from 2019-12-18T15:50:07
In their new book Wildhood: The Epic Journey from Adolescence to Adulthood in Humans and Other Animals, Harvard evolutionary biologist Barbara Natterson-Horowitz and award-winning science writer Ka...
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Bob Holman on his life in poetry (12/17/19) from 2019-12-18T00:24:07
Henry Louis Gates Jr. wrote in a New Yorker profile that Bob Holman has “done more to bring poetry to cafes and bars than anyone since [Lawrence] Ferlinghetti.” He brought the spoken word scene an...
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Robert and Vincent Gardino on their book Grave Trippers: History at Our Feet (12/16/19) from 2019-12-16T20:02:20
Though considered too morbid for many Americans who aren’t visiting departed loved one to visit, according to Vincent and Robert Gardino, cemeteries are peaceful and welcoming places full of wonder...
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Legendary producer and performer Peter Asher on his life with The Beatles (12/12/19) from 2019-12-12T23:06:26
When Peter Asher was 19 years old, his younger sister began dating an up-and coming musician named Paul McCartney. Fueled by the Lennon-McCartney songwriting partnership, The Beatles were about to ...
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Alvin and Laurence Ubell on winterizing your residence (12/11/19) from 2019-12-12T01:18:59
When it comes to fixing things around the house, there’s no one better to tell you what do and how to do it than Alvin and Laurence Ubell. In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, ...
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Sam Roberts talks about his History of New York in 27 Buildings. (12/10/19) from 2019-12-10T23:01:17
New York Times correspondent Sam Roberts has told the story of New York through its people (“Only in New York”) and its artifacts (“A History of New York in 101 Objects”). Now he rises to another c...
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Gane Ka-Shu Wong and Michael Melkonian on if algae can reveal how plants evolved (12/6/19) from 2019-12-06T23:10:42
“If you’ve ever noticed a slimy film of algae on a rock, chances are you didn’t pay it much attention,” writes Carl Zimmer in his Nov. 14 New York Times article How Did Plants Conquer Land? These H...
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Rachel Glickhouse of ProPublica on the problems with police tracking of hate crimes (12/5/19) from 2019-12-05T23:00:03
According to a recent ProPublica article by Rachel Glickhouse, the number of police precincts across the US reporting hate crimes to the FBI fell slightly in 2018. With just 13 percent of the respo...
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Christopher Ryan discusses his latest book Civilized to Death. (12/2/19) from 2019-12-02T21:06:40
Christopher Ryan’s new book “Civilized to Death: The Price of Progress” explores the ways in which “progress” has perverted the way we live: how we eat, learn, feel, mate, parent, communicate, work...
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conductor John Mauceri on the art of listening to classical music (11/27/19) from 2019-11-29T20:00:13
Have you ever asked yourself “why should I listen to classical music?” or “how can I get the most from the listening experience?” In his book “For the Love of Music: A Conductor's Guide to the Art ...
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Mickey Huff and Nolan Higdon on media manipulation in the US (11/26/19) from 2019-11-26T23:20:27
It's no secret that the goal of corporate-owned media is to increase the profits of the few, not to empower the many. As a result, people are increasingly immersed in an information system structur...
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Ornithologist David B. Lank discusses his research into the behavior of birds. (11/25/19) from 2019-11-25T23:28:23
Have you ever wondered why birds evoke such a strong curiosity in humans? There aren’t lizard-watchers or beetle-watchers. Ornithologist David B. Lank is a researcher at Simon Fraser University’s d...
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Christopher Ketcham discusses the fight over protecting public lands. (11/22/19) from 2019-11-22T22:29
The public lands of the western United States include 450 million acres of grassland, steppe land, canyons, forests and mountains. It's one of the last unspoiled realms of the American West and it ...
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Joseph Caldwell talks about his memoir In The Shadow Of The Bridge. (11/18/19) from 2019-11-18T22:37:04
Opening with a tender moment shared with William Gale Gedney on the Brooklyn Bridge in 1959, Joseph Caldwell’s “In The Shadow Of The Bridge: A Memoir” charts his three decades spent in downtown Man...
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Bob Hennelly discusses his reporting on local stories that are mostly being ignored. (11/12/19) from 2019-11-12T23:54:29
Bob Hennelly’s writing has been featured in the New York Times, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along with dozens of other magazines and n...
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Environmental expert Monona Rossol takes your calls. (11/11/19) from 2019-11-11T23:09:12
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. She was born into a theatrical family and worked as a professional entertainer from age 3 to 17. Currently, she is the president of Art...
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Environmental expert Monona Rossol takes your calls. (11/11/19)BONUS HOUR from 2019-11-11T23:08:41
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. She was born into a theatrical family and worked as a professional entertainer from age 3 to 17. Currently, she is the president of Art...
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Prof. Paul S. Adler on overcoming economic inequality (11/8/19) from 2019-11-08T21:54:13
We live in a time of crises according to Paul S. Adler—economic turmoil, environmental degradation, social disintegration and international rivalry. In "The 99 Percent Economy: How Democratic Socia...
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WBAI's program director Linda Perry and general manager Berthold Reimers on what happened (11/7/19) from 2019-11-08T00:08:26
On our first day back on the air after the station was taken over by a rogue faction at the Pacifica network, WBAI’s program director Linda Perry and general manager Berthold Reimers take your call...
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Sean Carroll on Something Deeply Hidden: Quantum Worlds and the Emergence of Spacetime (9/26/19) from 2019-09-26T20:43:42
Sean Carroll’s latest book “Something Deeply Hidden: Quantum Worlds and the Emergence of Spacetime” may change everything you think you know about space and time. His thinking begins with the fact ...
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Dr. Jennifer Ashton talks about her book Life After Suicide. (9/25/19) from 2019-09-25T21:53:27
Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the US, yet Dr. Jennifer Ashton never thought it could happen in her family. Weeks after the chief medical correspondent for ABC News had her divorce f...
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Nicholas Buccola on James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr. and America's race problem (9/24/19) from 2019-09-25T00:52:56
On February 18, 1965, a televised debate in Cambridge, England became the forum for a historic faceoff between James Baldwin, the leading literary voice of the civil rights movement, and William F....
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Jill Eikenberry and Michael Tucker of L.A. Law discuss their new Off-Broadway play. (9/20/19) from 2019-09-20T22:54:12
Fans of the legendary 1980s legal drama “L.A. Law” will be no stranger to both fictional and real-life couple Jill Eikenberry and Michael Tucker, but may be curious what they’re up to these days. T...
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Robert Boyers discusses his book The Tyranny of Virtue. (9/19/19) from 2019-09-19T21:59:52
Written from the perspective of a liberal intellectual with a long career as a college professor, Robert Boyers’s new book “The Tyranny of Virtue: Identity, the Academy, and the Hunt for Political ...
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Leonard and producer Jesse Lent take your calls on if the debates are helping you decide. (9/18/19) from 2019-09-18T18:50:47
With the race to secure the Democratic nomination for president heating up, the debates are the way most Americans will be getting to know the candidates for the first time. But is this rapid-fire ...
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Marc Randolph talks about his role in the creation of Netflix. (9/17/19) from 2019-09-17T20:58:17
With over 150 million subscribers, Netflix's industry dominance may seem inevitable, but the 21st century's most disruptive startup began with few believers and calamity at every turn. The transfor...
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environmental expert Monona Rossol on vaping and other public health hazards (9/16/19) from 2019-09-16T20:17:58
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. She was born into a theatrical family and worked as a professional entertainer from age 3 to 17. Currently, she is the president of Art...
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Thomas J. Campanella on his comprehensive history of Brooklyn (9/13/19) from 2019-09-13T19:54:33
America's most storied urban underdog, Brooklyn has become an internationally recognized brand in recent decades—celebrated and scorned as one of the hippest destinations in the world. Thomas J. Ca...
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Con Chapman on the life and music of iconic jazz saxophonist Johnny Hodges (9/12/19) from 2019-09-12T23:05:50
In his 1970 eulogy of saxophonist Johnny Hodges, fellow jazz legend Duke Ellington ended with the words, “never the world's most highly animated showman or greatest stage personality, but a tone so...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell on how 9/11 changed construction in New York City (9/11/19) from 2019-09-12T02:39:59
As regular listeners know, there are few building issues that Alvin and Lawrence Ubell don’t know how to fix. In this special September 11 edition of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, Larry and Al c...
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Chef Danny Mena talks about a new cookbook featuring his favorite Mexico City dishes. (9/10/19) from 2019-09-10T21:30:42
Inspired by his favorite hometown restaurants, fondas, loncherías and taco stands and adapted for the home cook, Danny Mena's Made in Mexico—The Cookbook: Classic And Contemporary Recipes From Mexi...
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John Reed discusses his book A Drama in Time: The New School Century. (9/9/19) from 2019-09-09T21:48:15
John Reed’s book “A Drama in Time: The New School Century” is an expansive, illustrated history of one of America's most progressive universities. Founded by political dissidents in 1919, The New S...
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Pete Muroski takes your end of summer gardening questions. (9/6/19) from 2019-09-06T21:01:56
As we head into September, our favorite gardening guru Pete Muroski returns to the program just in time to answer your questions on getting your garden ready for the fall. Pete Muroski takes your c...
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Language experts Kathryn and Ross Petras take your calls. (9/5/19) from 2019-09-05T20:43:26
Are there words you’re sure people are mispronouncing or misusing all the time? In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, Kathryn and Ross Petras, authors of their New York Times be...
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Bob Hennelly on immigrants and labor unions (9/4/19) from 2019-09-04T23:36:31
Bob Hennelly’s writing has been featured in the New York Times, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along with dozens of other magazines and n...
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Bob Batchelor on his book The Bourbon King about infamous bootlegger George Remus (9/3/19) from 2019-09-03T21:31:59
Love, murder, political intrigue, mountains of cash and rivers of bourbon—Bob Batchelor’s book The Bourbon King: The Life and Crimes of George Remus, Prohibition's Evil Genius is a journey into the...
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Caitlin Zaloom on the ways families sacrifice financially to pay for for college (8/30/19) from 2019-08-30T18:39:27
The struggle to pay for college is one of the defining features of middle-class life in America today. At kitchen tables all across the country, parents agonize over whether to burden their childre...
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Lauren A. Wright on Star Power: American Democracy in the Age of the Celebrity Candidate (8/29/19) from 2019-08-29T22:48:58
Are celebrity politics the spice of American public life or a pox on policy progress? Dr. Lauren A. Wright’s book “Star Power: American Democracy in the Age of the Celebrity Candidate” identifies a...
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Stuart Wexler on the rise of white nationalism and its link to anti-Semitism (8/28/19) from 2019-08-28T22:39:17
Journalist Stuart Wexler is one of the nation’s preeminent investigative researchers on domestic terrorism and radical religious activities. His books include “The Awful Grace of God: Religious Ter...
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Groundbreaking chef and food writer Rozanne Gold takes your calls. (8/27/19) from 2019-08-27T22:26:17
Rozanne Gold is a celebrated chef, author, journalist and philanthropist known for her innovative take on food. At the age of 24, Rozanne became first chef to New York Mayor Ed Koch. She went on to...
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Bill McKibben on his latest book Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out? (8/26/19) from 2019-08-26T21:35:09
Thirty years ago, Bill McKibben offered one of the earliest warnings about climate change in his groundbreaking book The End of Nature. In his latest offering Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Pl...
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Wesleyan University President Michael S. Roth discusses free speech on campus. (8/23/19) from 2019-08-23T20:47:46
Wesleyan University President Michael S. Roth’s new book Safe Enough Spaces: A Pragmatist’s Approach to Inclusion, Free Speech, and Political Correctness on College Campuses stakes out a pragmatist...
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Josh Wesson on the economics of wine (8/22/19) from 2019-08-22T21:40:28
Have you ever wondered what goes into pricing a bottle of wine? Is an $100 bottle of pinot noir really five times better than a $20 bottle? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, w...
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Sue Roe on Montparnasse: The Emergence of Surrealism in Paris, from Duchamp to Dali (8/21/19) from 2019-08-21T22:46:30
The artists and writers that invented Dadaism and later surrealism in the early 20th century had a simple goal. They wanted to produce art that extended beyond the limits of realism, juxtaposing el...
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Ryan Swanson on Theodore Roosevelt and his role in shaping America's love of athletics (8/20/19) from 2019-08-20T21:30:20
Plagued by such ailments as rippling asthma and grossly myopic eyesight as a child, Theodore Roosevelt was told to give up exercise completely by a doctor while he was attending Harvard. If he didn...
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David Kirp talks about his book The College Dropout Scandal. (8/19/19) from 2019-08-19T22:15:51
While there has been a great deal of discussion recently about increasing college access—who gets admitted and what they pay—little attention is given to the fewer than 60 percent of college freshm...
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Rowan Jacobsen on his Huffington Post article Are We Handling The Bee Crisis All Wrong? (8/16/19) from 2019-08-16T21:41:56
“Wild bees are our best pollinators, yet pesticides, pathogens and industrial farming are devastating their numbers,” reads the subheading of Rowan Jacobsen’s recent Huffington Post article, Are We...
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Thom Hartmann talks about his book The Hidden History of Guns in front of a live audience. (8/15/19) from 2019-08-15T17:14:18
In addition to hosting the program that airs directly after ours on WBAI, Thom Hartmann is also a bestselling author. His latest book “The Hidden History of Guns and the Second Amendment examines t...
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call-in special: What are you boycotting right now? (8/14/19) from 2019-08-15T00:53:44
In a special all-calls edition of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we open the phones so you can tell us about a particular boycott movement you find interesting or think more people should know ...
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Jay Cocks talks about his new series with Martin Scorsese at Film Forum. (8/13/19) from 2019-08-13T19:42:13
Marty and Jay’s Double Features is a three-week, 50-film festival of 25 classic combos selected by iconic director and film preservationist Martin Scorsese and critic/screenwriter Jay Cocks running...
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Brenda Wineapple talks about her latest book The Impeachers. (8/8/19) from 2019-08-08T18:50:30
The year 1865, after Abraham Lincoln was assassinated and Vice President Andrew Johnson became the original “accidental President,” was a dangerous time in America. Devastated by war and resorting ...
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Natalie Wexler on her book The Knowledge Gap which looks at the US education system (8/6/19) from 2019-08-06T21:06:12
It was just a few years into the education reform movement that journalist Natalie Wexler stumbled across the real explanation for our country's frustrating lack of progress on ensuring every child...
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Marjorie Kelly and Ted Howard on The Making of a Democratic Economy (8/2/19) from 2019-08-03T00:03:14
Our economy is designed by the 1 percent, for the 1 percent, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Marjorie Kelly and Ted Howard’s new book “The Making of a Democratic Economy: How to Build Prosperit...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell take your questions on summer home repair projects. (8/1/19) from 2019-08-01T20:55:34
Get your questions ready for our favorite handymen, Alvin and Laurence Ubell. In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we’ll open the phones so that Al and Larry Ubell can answer w...
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Chris Formant talks about his novel Saving Washington. (7/31/19) from 2019-07-31T20:40:10
On a marshy Brooklyn battlefield on August 27, 1776, four hundred men from Baltimore, Maryland assembled to do battle against a vastly superior British army. Seemingly overnight, these young soldie...
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Robert Hennelly on the effect of the ridesharing economy on New York City taxi drivers (7/30/19) from 2019-07-30T23:03:02
Before he became a familiar journalistic voice at WNYC or WBAI’s former general manger, Robert Hennelly was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica Network News. His writing has appeared in the...
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Legendary photographer Jay Maisel and director Stephen Wilkes on their new doc Jay Myself (7/29/19) from 2019-07-29T23:45:43
Acclaimed photographer Jay Maisel bought a six-story, 72-room building on the Bowery in 1966. Ever since, the site has served as his home, studio and repository for a breathtaking collection of ite...
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Waad Al-Kateab, Dr. Hamza al-Kateab & Edward Watts talk about their new doc For Sama (7/26/19) from 2019-07-29T17:21:03
The new documentary For Sama is an intimate feature documentary detailing the story of Syrian filmmaker, Waad Al-Kateab, who filmed her extraordinary journey through love, war and motherhood across...
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Matthew Shaer of the New York Times Magazine on the latest in brain science (7/23/19) from 2019-07-24T00:05:30
“In recent years, some scientists have moved from the study of the organic tissue to the wholesale creation of artificial brain matter,” reports Matthew Shaer in his New York Times Magazine cover s...
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Aaron Lake Smith of Harper's on the greatness of underread Russian writer Vasily Grossman (7/22/19) from 2019-07-22T22:02:54
A celebrated Russian journalist and author during WWII, after Vasily Grossman completed his masterpiece “Life and Fate” which sharply criticized the Soviet system, the KGB confiscated his manuscrip...
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Romanian director Radu Jude discusses I Do Not Care If We Go Down In History As Barbarians (7/19/19) from 2019-07-19T22:00:57
“I do not care if we go down in history as barbarians!” These were the words spoken by Romania’s military dictator Marshal Ion Antonescu in the Council of Ministers in the summer of 1941 that start...
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Dr. Michael E. Webber talks about his book Power Trip: The Story of Energy. (7/16/19) from 2019-07-16T19:36:23
In his book “Power Trip: The Story of Energy,” professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, Dr. Michael E. Webber describes how the rise of the world’s most successful ...
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David Corn and Dr. Kim Cobb on the difficulties of being a climate scientist (7/15/19) from 2019-07-15T22:18:02
“Are scientists…canaries in a psychological coal mine?” asks Mother Jones Washington Bureau Chief David Corn in his article “It’s the End of the World as They Know It: The distinct burden of being ...
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Ty Jones, Tiffany Rea-Fisher and Carl Cofield of the Classical Theatre of Harlem (7/12/19) from 2019-07-12T23:09
The Classical Theatre of Harlem (CTH) is a critically acclaimed, New York City-based theater company currently in its 20th season. The company was founded in 1999 with the goal of retelling theatri...
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Fraser MacDonald on his book Escape from Earth: A Secret History of the Space Rocket (7/11/19) from 2019-07-11T22:47:20
The setting is 1930s Los Angeles. Everybody knows that rockets are just toys, the stuff of cranks and pulp magazines. Nevertheless, a young engineering student named Frank Malina sets out to prove ...
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Dr. Sarah Parcak on her book Archaeology from Space: How the Future Shapes Our Past (7/10/19) from 2019-07-10T22:53:05
In her new book “Archaeology from Space: How the Future Shapes Our Past” National Geographic Explorer and TED Prize-winner Dr. Sarah Parcak shows the evolution, major discoveries and future potenti...
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Helen Wussow talks about her new introduction to Virginia Woolf's The Hours. (7/9/19) from 2019-07-09T21:01:19
Virginia Woolf re-worked and edited her novel “The Hours,” working in ink, pencil and crayon, and occasionally upside down, before finally publishing it under the title “Mrs. Dalloway.” The author ...
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William Dameron on The Lie: A Memoir of Two Marriages, Catfishing & Coming Out (7/8/19) from 2019-07-08T21:50:52
“Do you know me?” the email began, sparking tremors of fear that turned into a full quake of panic when William Dameron discovered that his selfie had been stolen by strangers. On social networks a...
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Dr. Neeraj Kaushal on Blaming Immigrants: Nationalism and the Economics of Global Movement (7/4/19) from 2019-07-05T18:17:56
In her book “Blaming Immigrants: Nationalism and the Economics of Global Movement” economist Dr. Neeraj Kaushal, professor of social policy at Columbia School of Social Work and research associate ...
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former New York Review of Books editor Ann Kjellberg on how to find out what to read (7/3/19) from 2019-07-03T20:18:36
Are you having a hard time figuring what to read this summer? Maybe longtime contributing editor for the New York Review of Books Ann Kjellberg, whose new endeavor Book Post she calls a "bite-sized...
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Lore Segal on her new book The Journal I Did Not Keep: New and Selected Writing (7/2/19) from 2019-07-02T23:10:30
From her very first story—which appeared in The New Yorker in 1961—to today, Lore Segal’s voice has been unique in contemporary American literature, hilarious and urbane, heartbreaking and profound...
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Rick Atkinson on The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton (7/1/19) from 2019-07-01T22:54:28
From the battles at Lexington and Concord in spring 1775 to those at Trenton and Princeton in winter 1777, Rick Atkinson’s new book “The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Prince...
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Julie Satow on her book The Plaza: The Secret Life of America’s Most Famous Hotel (6/27/19) from 2019-06-27T23:38:45
Julie Satow’s new book “The Plaza: The Secret Life of America’s Most Famous Hotel” is a definitive look at a New York City icon. This deeply researched history demonstrates how one illustrious hote...
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Michael Patrick MacDonald on the current political situation in Ireland and the UK (7/26/19) from 2019-06-26T20:22:29
Michael Patrick MacDonald is the author of the New York Times Bestselling memoir, "All Souls: A Family Story From Southie" and the acclaimed "Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion." He has...
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environmental expert Monona Rossol on the potential dangers of drinking tap water (6/25/19) from 2019-06-25T22:35:58
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. She was born into a theatrical family and worked as a professional entertainer from age 3 to 17. Currently, she is the president of Art...
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Minor Sinclair, director of Oxfam’s US Regional Office on the Puerto Rico relief effort (6/24/19) from 2019-06-24T21:54:36
Though it has all but vanished from the front pages of most major newspapers, the Puerto Rico relief effort that began after Hurricane Maria devastated the island in September of 2017 continues to ...
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Russell Shorto and Stephen McErleane on the days when New York City was New Amsterdam (6/21/19) from 2019-06-21T22:43:24
For over 40 years in the 17th century, the Dutch controlled the settlement that is now called New York City. And their influence didn’t stop there. Newly translated documents from that era indicate...
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Nadja Popovich and Kendra Pierre-Louis on environmental rules being rolled back under Trump(6/20/19) from 2019-06-20T19:06:25
“President Trump has made eliminating federal regulations a priority,” reads the opening line of Nadja Popovich, Livia Albreck-Ripka and Kendra Pierre-Louis’s New York Times article “83 Environment...
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Edward L. Widmer discusses a new Walt Whitman exhibit he curated at the Morgan Museum. (6/18/19) from 2019-06-18T22:56:33
“Comrades! I am the bard of Democracy,” iconic American poet Walt Whitman wrote in his notebook in 1859. Over his 73 years (1819–1892) he made good on that claim. As Whitman bore witness to the ris...
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Kathryn and Ross Petras take your word usage and pronunciation questions. (6/14/19) from 2019-06-14T20:38:09
Have you ever wondered about the correct pronunciation of a word you use all the time. Are there words that you think you’re hearing people mispronounce or misuse all the time? In this installment ...
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Shane Bauer discusses his Mother Jones cover story Behind The Lines In Syria. (6/13/19) from 2019-06-13T20:28:22
“I went to Syria to understand America’s role in one of the 21st century’s greatest tragedies,” writes Shane Bauer in his cover article for the current issue of Mother Jones. In “Behind The Lines I...
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Colin Davey on the history of the American Museum of Natural History (6/12/19) from 2019-06-12T19:45:40
The American Museum of Natural History is one of New York City’s most beloved institutions, and one of the largest, most celebrated museums in the world. Located across from Central Park, the spraw...
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Dr. Matt McCarthy discusses his book Superbugs: The Race to Stop an Epidemic. (6/11/19) from 2019-06-11T23:08:38
In his new book “Superbugs: The Race to Stop an Epidemic,” Dr. Matt McCarthy explores the history of bacteria and antibiotics, from Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin, to obscure sources o...
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Dr. Tia Powell talks about her book Dementia Reimagined. (6/10/19) from 2019-06-10T23:08:46
Despite being a physician and a bioethicist, Tia Powell wasn't prepared to address the challenges she faced when her grandmother, and then her mother, were diagnosed with dementia. The statistical ...
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Josh Howard talks about his documentary The Lavender Scare. (6/7/19) from 2019-06-07T22:56:08
With the United States gripped in the panic of the 1950s Cold War, President Dwight D. Eisenhower deemed homosexuals to be “security risks” and vowed to rid the federal government of all employees ...
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Pete Muroski takes your gardening questions as we head into summer. (6/6/19) from 2019-06-06T22:06:55
In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we open the phones so that gardening expert Pete Muroski can take your questions on all things botanical. In this installment of “Leonard L...
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Catherine Whitlock on her book Ten Women Who Changed Science and the World (6/5/19) from 2019-06-05T22:40:10
It’s only been a little over a century since the Nobel Prize in science was first awarded to a woman. However, after Marie Curie’s 1911 accolade, 17 other women?including two in 2018?have been so h...
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Phillip Lopate on the greatest essays the world has ever known (6/3/19) from 2019-06-03T22:24:33
Novelist, critic, poet and essayist Phillip Lopate has received a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a New York Public Library Center for Scholars and Writers Fellowship, two National Endowment for ...
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George Packer on his book Our Man: Richard Holbrooke and the End of the American Century (5/31/19) from 2019-05-31T18:46:03
Former US Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke was brilliant, utterly self-absorbed, and possessed of almost inhuman energy and appetites. From his days as a young adviser in Vietnam to h...
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Thomas Doherty on his book Show Trial: Hollywood, HUAC, and the Birth of the Blacklist (5/30/19) from 2019-05-30T22:01:59
In 1947, the Cold War came to Hollywood. Over nine tumultuous days in October, the House Un-American Activities Committee held a notorious round of hearings into alleged Communist subversion in the...
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Graham Hancock on his book America Before: The Key to Earth's Lost Civilization (5/28/19) from 2019-05-28T21:53:55
Was an advanced civilization lost to history in the global cataclysm that ended the last Ice Age? In his book “America Before: The Key to Earth's Lost Civilization,” Graham Hancock, the internation...
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Home repair experts Alvin and Lawrence Ubell help you get ready for summer. (5/22/19) from 2019-05-22T22:23:45
When something breaks around the house, there’s no one better to tell you what do and how to do it than Alvin and Lawrence Ubell. In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we open t...
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Robert Bahar discusses his documentary The Silence of Others. (5/20/19) from 2019-05-20T20:34:28
Robert Bahar and Almudena Carracedo’s documentary “The Silence of Others” asks the question—what if in the 1960s you were sadistically tortured for your political beliefs – and the man responsible ...
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Paul Stirton & Steven Heller on the influential typography done between the two world wars (5/17/19) from 2019-05-17T21:21:46
Tracing the revolution in graphic design in the 1920s, the exhibition Jan Tschichold and the New Typography: Graphic Design Between the World Wars, on display at the Bard Graduate Center gallery un...
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David Weinberger discusses his book Everyday Chaos. (5/16/19) from 2019-05-17T00:10:34
Artificial intelligence, big data, modern science, and the Internet are all revealing a fundamental truth—the world is vastly more complex and unpredictable than we've allowed ourselves to see. Thr...
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Frederic Martel on his book In the Closet of the Vatican: Power, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy (5/14/19) from 2019-05-14T21:03:20
Frederic Martel’s best-selling book “In the Closet of the Vatican: Power, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy” exposes the vast array of controversial issues facing the Roman Catholic Church today. Based on f...
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Daniel Castro of Harper's on a failed truce between two El Salvador gangs (5/13/19) from 2019-05-13T22:57:10
“San Salvador has become one of the most violent cities in the world,” reports Daniel Castro in article for Harper’s Magazine entitled “The Truce: How the United States helped spoil a plan to end g...
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Rachel Louise Snyder discusses her book No Visible Bruises about domestic violence.(5/10/19) from 2019-05-10T23:14:57
We call it domestic violence. We call it private violence. Sometimes we call it intimate terrorism. But whatever we call it, we generally do not believe it has anything at all to do with us, despit...
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Segment producers Barbara Cahn and Kate Gwon-Allison interview Leonard. (5/9/19) from 2019-05-09T19:57:14
In this special installment of "Leonard Lopate at Large" on WBAI, our segment producers Barbara Cahn and Kate Gwon Allison talk to Leonard about how he prepares for an interview, how the show gets ...
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Bee Wilson discusses her book The Way We Eat Now on the effects of the food revolution.(5/8/19) from 2019-05-09T00:41:37
Food is one of life's great joys. So why has eating become such a source of anxiety and confusion? In her new book “The Way We Eat Now: How the Food Revolution Has Transformed Our Lives, Our Bodies...
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Fleurine performs live with accordionist Vitor Goncalves and bassist Eduardo Belo. (5/6/19) from 2019-05-06T18:55:38
Guitarist and vocalist Fleurine has gained a devoted international following for what the Los Angeles Times describes as her “warm, enveloping sound and gentle rhythmic drive.” A Dutch native, she ...
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John Glover, Stephen Unwin & William Spencer Reilly on their production of All Our Children (5/2/19) from 2019-05-02T21:00:38
It is Germany, 1941. A terrible crime is taking place in a clinic for disabled children. The perpetrators argue that it will help struggling parents and lift the financial burden on the mighty Germ...
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Dr. Laurie Helgoe on her book Fragile Bully exploring narcissism in the age of Trump (4/30/19) from 2019-04-30T22:02:18
Even before Donald Trump entered America’s highest office, an international survey revealed that narcissism is part of the assumed “national character” of Americans. In her book “Fragile Bully: Und...
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Dr. Lisa Mosconi talks about her book Brain Food on the way diet affects the mind. (4/29/19) from 2019-04-29T21:36:15
Though it may seem like common sense, like our bodies, our brains have very specific food requirements. In Dr. Lisa Mosconi’s book “Brain Food: The Surprising Science of Eating for Cognitive Power,...
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Leonard plays his favorite Easter gospel songs for Good Friday. (4/19/19) from 2019-04-19T18:37:55
On April 10, 1977, Leonard Lopate was heard through the airwaves on WBAI for the first time. He was playing gospel records for Easter. With the Easter holiday weekend upon us, we thought the timing...
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George Papadopoulos on the Trump campaign and being a target of the Mueller probe (4/16/19) from 2019-04-16T21:04:08
On Sept. 7, George Papadopoulos became the first Donald Trump adviser to be sentenced in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian collusion in the 2016 election, as reported by t...
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Greg Grandin on The End of the Myth, a book how US perceptions of immigration have changed (4/15/19) from 2019-04-15T21:14:36
Ever since this nation’s inception, the idea of an open and ever-expanding frontier has been central to American identity. Today however, America has a new symbol to contend with—the border wall. I...
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Alvin and Lawrence Ubell take your calls on spring home repair issues. (4/12/19) from 2019-04-12T21:56:42
With spring bringing higher temperatures and a whole host of potential home repair issues, we figured now is the perfect time to welcome back our favorite handymen, Alvin and Laurence Ubell. In th...
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Corrine Hunt & Aaron Glass on pioneering early anthropologists Franz Boas & George Hunt (4/11/19) from 2019-04-11T21:12:08
A new exhibition at the Bard Graduate Center entitled The Story Box: Franz Boas, George Hunt and the Making of Anthropology explores the hidden histories and complex legacies of one of the most inf...
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Andy Statman and Larry Eagle perform live in the WBAI studio.(4/10/19) from 2019-04-10T18:57:52
Mandolin player and composer Andy Statman’s live performances defy all attempts at categorization. A Grammy nominee and recipient of grants from the NEA Fellowship and NY Council of the Arts, Andy ...
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Carrie Gibson on her book El Norte: The Epic and Forgotten Story of Hispanic North America (4/9/19) from 2019-04-09T22:27:54
Because of our shared English language along with the celebrated origin tales of the Mayflower and the rebellion of the British colonies, the US has always prized its Anglo heritage above all other...
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Jonathan Krohn talks about his feature article for Mother Jones magazine Boy Meets Hate.(4/8/19) from 2019-04-08T21:49:17
On January 12, 2018, Sam Woodward was arrested and charged with the murder of a former classmate, 19-year-old Blaze Bernstein.Police had found a knife stained with Blaze’s blood in Sam’s room, alon...
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Sandy Hanna talks about her memoir The Ignorance of Bliss: An American Kid in Saigon. (4/5/19) from 2019-04-05T19:45:41
Sandy Hanna’s autobiography “The Ignorance of Bliss: An American Kid in Saigon” recounts her experience of moving to Saigon, Vietnam when she was 10 years old, where her father served as a military...
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Antonio Espree and Samantha Michaels of Mother Jones on Life After Life. (4/4/19) from 2019-04-04T22:11:10
“When Antonio Espree was 16, he fatally shot an innocent bystander during a drug turf war near Detroit,” reads a passage from Samantha Michaels feature article in the latest issue of Mother Jones m...
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Mark Alan Stamaty talks about turning his Macdoodle St. comic strip into a graphic novel. (4/3/19) from 2019-04-03T20:04:19
Every week, from 1978–1979, The Village Voice brought a new installment of Mark Alan Stamaty’s uproarious, endlessly inventive strip “MacDoodle St.” Centering more or less on Malcolm Frazzle, a blo...
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Marcus Chown talks about his book Infinity in the Palm of Your Hand. (4/2/19) from 2019-04-02T21:02:40
Did you know that you could fit the whole human race in the volume of a sugar cube? Or, that the electrical energy in a single mosquito is enough to cause a global mass extinction? Or that out ther...
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Monona Rossol talks about the hazards of vaping and tattoos and takes your calls. (4/1/19) from 2019-04-01T22:06:36
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. She was born into a theatrical family and worked as a professional entertainer from age 3 to 17. Currently, she is the president of Art...
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Marianne Preger-Simon, Bettijane Sills and Elizabeth McPherson on dancing for a genius (3/29/19) from 2019-03-29T22:27:34
In this edition of “Leonard Lopate” on WBAI, we explore what it’s like to dance for a master choreographer. Bettijane Sills and Elizabeth McPherson are the authors of “Broadway, Balanchine, and Bey...
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Michael Smith, Mara Verheyden-Hilliard and Glen Ford on Lawyers For The Left (3/28/19) from 2019-03-28T21:17:12
Michael Smith’s new book “Lawyers for the Left: In The Courts In the Streets And On The Air”profiles a range of lawyers who, as radicals and socialists, devoted their careers to representing victim...
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Julia Lurie of Mother Jones on how rehab recruiters are luring addicts into a deadly cycle (3/27/19) from 2019-03-27T22:40:42
“The offer was too good to resist: Go to rehab for a week, get $1,000 in cash. It was early 2017, and Brianne, a 20-year-old from a woody Atlanta suburb, had come to South Florida to leave her hero...
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Alison Klayman and Marie Therese Guirgis on making the Steve Bannon documentary The Brink (3/26/19) from 2019-03-26T18:43:36
“The Brink” is a startling new documentary directed and filmed by Alison Klayman (“Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry,” “Take Your Pills”) that follows former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon as he ta...
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Peter Campus, Cristin Tierney and Noam M. Elcott discuss the rise of video art. (3/25/19) from 2019-03-25T22:58:11
Born in 1937 in New York City, Peter Campus is a seminal artist in the fields of new media and video art. Peter’s work is a part of the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitne...
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Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic on his book Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders? (3/22/19) from 2019-03-22T18:59:29
Look around your office. Turn on the TV. Incompetent leadership is everywhere, and there's no denying that most of these leaders are men. In his timely and provocative new book “Why Do So Many Inco...
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Randy Shaw on his book Generation Priced Out: Who Gets To Live in the New Urban America (3/21/19) from 2019-03-21T20:45:48
In cities across the country, skyrocketing rents and home values are forcing the young, the non-rich, and the non-white out of cities—or pricing them out before they move in—leaving urban America l...
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Pete Muroski takes your spring gardening questions. (3/20/19) from 2019-03-20T21:48:10
In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we celebrate the first day of spring by opening the phones for gardening expert Pete Muroski to take your questions on all things botanical...
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John Murphy and Michael Reiter discuss their documentary Agents Unknown. (3/19/19) from 2019-03-19T20:27:05
John Murphy has a story to tell. An elite adviser, analyst, and operative for the Army, CIA and South Vietnamese intelligence services, John experienced the Vietnam War up close and behind close do...
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Hugh Ryan discusses his book When Brooklyn Was Queer about the LGBTQ history of Brooklyn. (3/18/19) from 2019-03-18T21:32:36
Hugh Ryan’s “When Brooklyn Was Queer” is a groundbreaking exploration of the LGBT history of Brooklyn, from the early days of Walt Whitman in the 1850s up through the queer women who worked at the ...
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Jonathan H. Marks talks about the dangers of public-private partnerships. (3/15/19) from 2019-03-15T19:58:27
According to the CDC, between 1999 and 2017 over 218,000 Americans died due to overdoses from prescription opioids--more than 3 times the number of Americans killed in Vietnam. A current Massachuse...
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Lewis H. Lapham on his career as a writer, editor and founder of Lapham's Quarterly (3/14/19) from 2019-03-14T23:28:16
Lewis H. Lapham has been the editor of Lapham’s Quarterly since founding it in 2007. The literary magazine uses material throughout history to explore a different theme in each issue. The editor of...
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Blake J. Harris on his book The History Of The Future about the virtual reality revolution (3/13/19) from 2019-03-13T18:30:17
Blake J. Harris’s 2019 book “The History Of The Future: Oculus, Facebook, and the Revolution That Swept Virtual Reality” takes readers behind the scenes of Oculus, the upstart VR company founded in...
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Kartik Hosanagar talks about his book A Human’s Guide To Machine Intelligence. (3/12/19) from 2019-03-12T21:42:28
Do you always hear the same few songs on Spotify? See the same few genres of movies queued for Netflix? Constantly get turned off by the same three people popping up on your dating app? Aside from ...
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pioneering video journalist Michael Rosenblum on how to produce your own content (3/11/19) from 2019-03-11T18:05:08
Michael Rosenblum is a television producer, video journalist and author who created the first major correspondent-driven local TV news operation with the station NY1. Michael later went on to train...
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Nora Armani, M.A. Taylor and Cady McClain discuss the Socially Relevant Film Festival. (3/7/19) from 2019-03-07T22:19:28
Actress and filmmaker Nora Armani founded The Socially Relevant Film Festival New York in 2013 in response to the amount of violent stories she was seeing told across most mainstream entertainment ...
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Iconic New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast on her latest book Going Into Town (3/6/19) from 2019-03-06T22:19:16
Beloved New Yorker cartoonist and New York Times bestselling author Roz Chast has always been intensely alive to the glorious spectacle that is Manhattan—the daily clash of sidewalk racers and dawd...
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Bret Wood talks about his Film Forum series on expolitation cinema entitled Forbidden Fruit.(3/4/19) from 2019-03-04T21:33:20
In the years when Hollywood was under the tight control of the Production Code Authority, a new breed of movie mercenary-impresario brazenly broke every rule on depicting taboo subjects (primarily ...
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Emily Barnett, Thomas Smith, Chris Wright, Cagla Orpen & Barbara Bowen on NYC adjunct pay (2/28/19) from 2019-02-28T22:38:56
According to the National Center for Education Statistics, in the last year recorded, fall of 2016, of 1.5 million college faculty members, 47 percent were part time workers. Yet for many adjunct p...
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Joe Strupp on how greed, laziness (and Donald Trump) are destroying news (2/26/19) from 2019-02-26T22:15:31
For 20 years, Joe Strupp reported on the journalism industry for Media Matters and Editor & Publisher magazine. Now, in “Killing Journalism: How Greed, Laziness (and Donald Trump) Are Destroying Ne...
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Katherine S. Newman on Downhill from Here: Retirement Insecurity in the Age of Inequality (2/25/19) from 2019-02-25T22:19:18
As millions of Baby Boomers reach their golden years, the state of retirement in America is nothing short of a disaster. Nearly half the households with people aged 55 and older have no retirement ...
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Diana Senechal talks about her book Mind Over Memes. (2/22/19) from 2019-02-22T20:15:20
It’s hard to deny that the English language has become more lazy and frivolous in recent years. We rely on clichés to communicate feelings that are far removed from any deeper meaning. In a culture...
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Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept on Amazon's surveillance technology (2/21/19) from 2019-02-21T23:45:08
“Amazon, the company that has made Jeff Bezos the planet’s richest human being, is a critical partner for the U.S. Government in building an ever-more invasive, militarized and sprawling surveillan...
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Frank Beacham and George Demas on their play Maverick about the late life of Orson Welles (2/20/19) from 2019-02-21T00:35
In 1985, video production company owner Frank Beacham embarked on a creative journey with what was then the latest technology—the Betacam recorder—and a film legend, Orson Welles. With the first ha...
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Lawrence and Alvin Ubell take your home renovation and repair questions. (2/19/19) from 2019-02-19T23:04:43
When something breaks around the house, there’s no one better to tell you what do and how to do it than Alvin and Laurence Ubell. In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we open t...
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sociologist Gregory Smithsimon on his book Cause…And How It Doesn't Always Equal Effect (2/18/19) from 2019-02-18T19:23:49
When we try to understand our world, we often ask why a specific event occurred. Yet, according to sociologist Gregory Smithsimon this basic analysis often leads us astray. In his book “Cause…And H...
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Carmen Gentile on the experiences that he chronicles in 'Blindsided by the Taliban' (2/13/19) from 2019-02-13T23:08:16
On September 9, 2010, while embedded with an Army unit and talking with locals in a small village in eastern Afghanistan, journalist Carmen Gentile was struck in the face by a rocket-propelled gren...
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John McQuillen talks about the history behind a new Tolkien show at the Morgan Museum. (2/12/19) from 2019-02-12T23:27:47
“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” With these 10 words, the Oxford professor J.R.R. Tolkien ignited a fervid spark in generations of readers. From the children’s classic “The Hobbit” t...
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David J. Goodwin on his book 'Left Bank of the Hudson' about the Jersey City art scene (2/11/19) from 2019-02-11T21:20:32
David J. Goodwin’s book “Left Bank of the Hudson: Jersey City and the Artists of 111 1st Street” is a window into the demographic, political, and socio-economic changes experienced in Jersey City o...
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Kevin Cunningham, executive artistic director of 3-Legged Dog, on his latest undertaking (2/8/19) from 2019-02-08T22:12:47
It would be difficult to deny that Kevin Cunningham, the executive artistic director of 3-Legged Dog in New York, has been on the cutting edge of merging technology and performance. He finds himse...
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James Mustich talks about writing '1,000 Books To Read Before You Die.' (2/7/19) from 2019-02-07T20:21:32
Covering fiction, poetry, science and science fiction, memoir, travel writing, biography, children’s books, history, and more James Mustich’s book “1,000 Books to Read Before You Die” ranges across...
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Julio Martinez and Alejandro Bendana on Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega (2/6/19) from 2019-02-07T00:09:30
Dr. Alejandro Bendaña is a Nicaraguan historian. During the first Sandinista government between the years of 1979 and 1990, he served as ambassador to the UN and secretary general to the Nicaraguan...
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Kishore Mahbubani discusses his cover story for Harper’s Magazine 'What China Threat?' (2/5/18) from 2019-02-05T23:37:32
“Within about 15 years, China’s economy will surpass America’s and become the largest in the world,” reads the opening line of Kishore Mahbubani’s cover story for this month’s Harper’s Magazine ent...
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John Dear and director Jack Cummings III discuss 'The Trial of the Catonsville Nine.' (2/4/19) from 2019-02-04T23:50:16
Daniel Berrigan’s play “The Trial of the Catonsville Nine,” based on the court transcripts from the trial of nine Vietnam War peace activists, tells the story of a break-in at the Maryland draft of...
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Michael Greenberg discusses his two-part series on California politics for NYRB. (1/31/19) from 2019-01-31T23:07:38
“A kindling sense of apocalypse is business as usual for Californians, who live almost nonchalantly with impending doom,” read the opening lines of “California: The State of Resistance” the second ...
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Antoinette Hunt, Clint Hunt and Sarah Yetter of Abracadabra on how to roast coffee (1/30/19) from 2019-01-30T20:47:50
What is it about coffee that is just so great? Though there has always been debate about whether it’s good or bad for you (or really bad), for the devout believers, nothing can top a steaming or ic...
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Tonya Pinkins and Anne Hamburger on their show 'Truth and Reconciliation of Women' (1/29/18) from 2019-01-29T22:59:42
Tonya Pinkins is probably best known for her portrayal of Livia Frye on the soap opera “All My Children” but she is a familiar face to Broadway audiences. A Tony Award-winner, Tonya has won the Obi...
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Toby Talbot, Norma Levy and Gary Palmucci on the history of Lincoln Plaza Cinema (1/28/19) from 2019-01-28T23:55:53
When Lincoln Plaza Cinema closed almost exactly a year ago, the screen had gone dark on a New York City cultural institution that had introduced audiences to art-house pictures for decades. New Pla...
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Pete Muroski takes your questions on gardening through the winter months. (1/25/19) from 2019-01-25T22:26:54
Have you ever wondered what to do with your outdoor plants when the wintertime comes? Are there plants that you aren’t sure if you can leave outside for the colder months? With snowy weather hittin...
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David Rothenberg discusses his career in broadcasting, theater and activism. (1/24/19) from 2019-01-24T19:54:07
In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, we welcome a familiar voice for any regular weekend WBAI listener, David Rothenberg—the host of “Any Saturday,” Saturdays from 8 to 10 a.m....
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Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly discusses his latest work on union pay equity. (1/23/19) from 2019-01-23T21:00:34
Bob Hennelly has always had a keen interest in the role of immigration in the evolution of the United States historically. Before working at WNYC he was national affairs correspondent for Pacifica ...
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Michael Patrick MacDonald discusses the current political situation in Ireland and the UK. (1/22/19) from 2019-01-22T22:03:12
Michael Patrick MacDonald is the author of the New York Times best-selling memoir, "All Souls: A Family Story From Southie" and the acclaimed "Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion." He ha...
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Abby Ellin on "Duped: Double Lives, False Identities, and the Con Man I Almost Married" (1/21/19) from 2019-01-21T22:09:15
From Abby Ellin's first date with the Commander, she was caught up in a whirlwind. Within six months he'd proposed, and they'd moved in together. But soon, his exotic stories of international espio...
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Ed Asner and Tovah Feldshuh talk about their production of "The Soap Myth." (1/18/19) from 2019-01-19T00:38:19
The recipient of seven Emmys and five Tony Awards, Ed Asner is beloved for roles ranging from Lou Grant in “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” Santa Claus in the Will Farrell-comedy Elf and his starring r...
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Andrew Roberts talks about his new definitive biography "Churchill: Walking with Destiny."(1/17/19) from 2019-01-17T23:03:13
Few world leaders have had the steely reserve of Winston Churchill. Impervious to the consensus of the day, the iconic British Prime Minister is known for standing firmly on his beliefs when nearly...
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Trumpeter and composer Wadada Leo Smith talks about his long career and performs live. (1/16/19) from 2019-01-17T00:53:51
Trumpeter, multi-instrumentalist, composer, and improviser Wadada Leo Smith has been a member of Chicago's legendary AACM collective for the past five decades. A finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Priz...
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NYU professor Mark Crispin Miller on his Forbidden Bookshelf series of banned books (1/15/19) from 2019-01-15T22:03:04
The Forbidden Bookshelf is a series of formerly banned books with the stated aim of “filling in the blanks of America’s repressed history by resurrecting books that focused on issues and events tha...
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Dr. Gabrielle Bendiner-Viani discusses her book “Contested City.” (1/14/19) from 2019-01-14T21:54:11
Dr. Gabrielle Bendiner-Viani is an urbanist, curator and artist known for her pioneering work in public arts and urban research for community engagement. Her recent public art and dialogue project,...
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Andrew F. Smith, Judith Weinraub and Ken Albala discuss their Edible Series of books. (1/11/19) from 2019-01-11T20:48:05
Judith Weinraub is a former reporter and section editor for the Washington Post and the winner of two James Beard Awards. Andrew F. Smith is editor of the Edible Series of books. He teaches culina...
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Arlene Corsano talks about Brill Building songwriter Rose Marie McCoy. (1/10/19) from 2019-01-10T22:04:10
On today’s “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, Leonard talks biographer Arlene Corsano about Rose Marie McCoy, one of the only African-American women to be part of the legendary Brill Building songw...
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Prof. Edward Bullmore on his book “The Inflamed Mind: A Radical New Approach to Depression” (1/9/19) from 2019-01-09T23:41:30
Scientists predict that depression will be the largest cause of disability worldwide in the next 20 years. But treatment for it hasn’t changed much in the last three decades. In his new book “The I...
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Kathryn and Ross Petras take your questions on commonly mispronounced words. (1/8/19) from 2019-01-08T21:50:03
Have you ever wondered about the correct pronunciation of a word you use all the time. Are there words that you think you’re hearing people mispronounce all the time? In this installment of “Leonar...
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Cello virtuoso Amit Peled talks about music and performs live in our studio. (1/7/19) from 2019-01-07T22:49:28
Israeli-American cellist Amit Peled’s latest album, “Bach Suites Volume 1” is slated for release on February 1 on the CTM Classics imprint. Recorded on a Goffriller cello from the year 1733 formerl...
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Paul Kiel and Jesse Eisinger of ProPublica report that the IRS is targeting poor people. (1/4/19) from 2019-01-04T23:50:41
“Budget cuts have crippled the IRS over the past eight years. Enforcement staff has dropped by a third. But while the number of audits has fallen across the board, the impact has been different for...
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Leonard takes listener suggestions for shows with producers Barbara Cahn and Jesse Lent. (1/3/19) from 2019-01-03T22:11:18
What topics would would you like to see us tackle on "Leonard Lopate at Large" in the coming year? We asked our listeners just that on today's show and were thrilled with the responses we got. You ...
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Joshua Goldstein and Staffan Qvist discuss their book "A Bright Future." (1/2/19) from 2019-01-02T20:05:44
Climate change may be nearing a catastrophic tipping point, but it is not too late to work towards a solution. In their new book "A Bright Future: How Some Countries Have Solved Climate Change and ...
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Leonard plays his favorite holiday gospel classics. (12/25/18) from 2018-12-26T19:03:21
Christmas music is everywhere you turn these days, but you probably haven't heard it done quite like this before. As our holiday gift for Leonard Lopate at Large listeners, we present for you Leona...
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Composer Leonard Lehrman and vocalists Helene Williams and Thomas Smith discuss his work. (12/21/18) from 2018-12-21T23:27:15
Leonard Lehrman is the protégé of Elie Siegmeister, who called him his “Continuator.” His 232 compositions have been heard on six continents. His other teachers included Nadia Boulanger, Olga Heife...
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Essayist and critic Phillip Lopate on his picks for the best films of 2018 (12/20/18) from 2018-12-20T22:41:53
Novelist, critic, poet and essayist Phillip Lopate has received a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a New York Public Library Center for Scholars and Writers Fellowship, two National Endowment for ...
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Industrial hygienist Monona Rossol takes your calls on the hazards of lead. (12/19/18) from 2018-12-19T23:38:39
Monona Rossol is a chemist, artist, and industrial hygienist. She was born into a theatrical family and worked as a professional entertainer from age 3 to 17. Currently, she is the president of Art...
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Home repair experts Alvin and Lawrence Ubell answer your how-to questions. (12/18/18) from 2018-12-19T00:06:08
From frozen pipes to faulty window seals, no one knows how to fix a problem around the house like Alvin and Lawrence Ubell. On Tuesday’s “Leonard Lopate at Large,” we’ll open the phones so that Al ...
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Stephen Schwartz and biographer Carol de Giere discuss his blockbuster Broadway career. (12/17/18) from 2018-12-17T21:45:13
Musical theatre lyricist and composer Stephen Schwartz wrote the hit musicals “Godspell,” “Pippin” and “Wicked” and contributed lyrics for the films “Pocahontas,” “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” and ...
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Kenny Werner talks about Effortless Mastery and performs live on the show. (12/14/18) from 2018-12-14T22:49:14
Kenny Werner has been a world-class pianist and composer for over 40 years. His prolific collection of recordings, both as a bandleader and a sideman performing with jazz luminaries like Lee Koonit...
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Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (12/13/18) from 2018-12-13T21:06:51
Paul Rieckhoff is the founder and executive director of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a non-partisan non-profit group started in 2004. With tens of thousands of members in all 50 US...
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Darrell Hammond of SNL and director Michelle Esrick on their documentary "Cracked Up." (12/12/18) from 2018-12-12T21:07:21
"Cracked Up" is a new documentary from filmmaker Michelle Esrick that recounts the incredible story of actor, comedian, master impressionist and "Saturday Night Live" veteran, Darrell Hammond. A vi...
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Brooke Jarvis, Arthur Shapiro and David Wagner discuss the insect apocalypse. (12/11/18) from 2018-12-11T20:35:26
“Because insects are legion, inconspicuous and hard to meaningfully track, the fear that there might be far fewer than before was more felt than documented,” writes New York Times reporter Brooke J...
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Elizabeth Mann, Alexander Schierle and James Wilson talk about Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. (12/10/18) from 2018-12-10T21:43:49
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra was founded in 1972 by a group of like-minded young musicians determined to combine the intimacy and warmth of a chamber ensemble with the richness of an orchestra. The en...
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Twyla Tharp looks back at her legendary 50-year career as a dancer and choreographer.(12/6/18) from 2018-12-06T22:15:20
One of the most important dancers and choreographers of the last century, Twyla Tharp has been pushing modern dance forward for more than 50 years. With her latest show, “Minimalism and Me,” curren...
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Christopher Kimball tells Leonard his philosophies on food and cooking.(12/5/18) from 2018-12-06T00:46:17
Renowned chef and cookbook author Christopher Kimball is the founder of Milk Street and the host of “Christopher Kimball's Milk Street Television” and “Christopher Kimball's Milk Street Radio,” a w...
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Mary Hogan Camp of the Morgan Museum tells Leonard about the artist Pontormo. (12/4/18) from 2018-12-04T21:43:30
Jacopo Carucci, called Pontormo after the Tuscan town he came from, was a leader of the Mannerist movement that dominated Italian painting in the 16th century. Michelangelo once predicted that a 19...
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H. Bruce Franklin discusses his book "Crash Course: From the Good War to the Forever War."(12/3/18) from 2018-12-03T20:38:09
Growing up during the Second World War, H. Bruce Franklin believed what he was told: that America’s victory would lead to a new era of world peace. But once he joined the Air Force and began flying...
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Maxim Pozdorovkin tells Leonard about his HBO documentary “The Truth About Killer Robots.”(11/30/18) from 2018-11-30T22:05:12
When a robot kills a human, who takes the blame? An eerie, eye-opening work of science nonfiction, the new HBO documentary “The Truth About Killer Robots” considers three automation cases, raising ...
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Ronnie Marmo and Joe Mantegna talk about their play "I’m Not A Comedian…I’m Lenny Bruce." (11/29/18) from 2018-11-29T21:36:29
Directed by multi Award-winning actor and director Joe Mantegna, the Off-Broadway production of “I’m Not A Comedian…I’m Lenny Bruce” stars Ronnie Marmo brilliantly chronicling the life and death of...
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Jenny Murray talks about her documentary 'Las Sandinistas!' (11/28/18) from 2018-11-28T20:07:41
“The documentary “‘¡Las Sandinistas!” compiles the reminiscences of women who fought with the Sandinistas, the revolutionary group in Nicaragua that toppled the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza Deb...
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Derrick Hamilton and Lonnie Soury talk about the wrongfully accused. (11/27/18) from 2018-11-27T21:06:12
Lonnie Soury has managed media relations and public policy strategies for prominent wrongful conviction cases like Damien Echols and Marty Tankleff. One of his clients is Derrick Hamilton, who ser...
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Photographer Barbara Mensch tells Leonard about the history of the Brooklyn Bridge (11/26/18) from 2018-11-26T20:02:20
“‘In the Shadow of Genius: The Brooklyn Bridge and Its Creators” is the latest book by photographer and author Barbara Mensch. In it, Mensch combines her striking photographs with a powerful first-...
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Andrew Cockburn of Harper's magazine talks about the policing of America.(11/21/18) from 2018-11-21T22:00:05
Andrew Cockburn writes the Letters From Washington column for Harper’s magazine. His most recent column “Blood Money: Taxpayers pick up the tab for police brutality” takes a hard look at the way lo...
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author of "Tiber: Eternal River of Rome" Bruce Ware Allen on this storied waterway (11/20/18) from 2018-11-20T21:47:40
In his rich history of Italy’s Tiber River, "Tiber: Eternal River of Rome," Bruce Ware Allen charts the main currents, mythic headwaters and hidden tributaries of one of the world’s most renowned w...
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Leonard talks to former U.S. Ambassador to Romania Alfred H. Moses about his new book. (11/19/18) from 2018-11-19T20:35:06
Former U.S. Ambassador to Romania Alfred H. Moses has had a distinguished career in public service spanning more than three decades. After serving as Special Advisor and Special Counsel to Presiden...
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Jonathan Taplin on why he thinks states’ rights can save us from a second civil war. (11/16/18) from 2018-11-16T20:31
“The national security expert Keith Mines estimates, as he told Foreign Policy, that the United States faces, over the next 10 to 15 years, a 60 percent chance of civil war—some variety of violent ...
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Acclaimed novelist Caryl Phillips talks about the early life and work of Jean Rhys.(11/14/18) from 2018-11-14T22:15:11
In his novel “A View of the Empire at Sunset,” about the Dominican-born, British writer Jean Rhys, author Caryl Phillips wrote “there was something terribly illicit about her own waiflike presence ...
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Shraysi Tandon talks about her documentary Invisible Hands on child trafficking. (11/12/18) from 2018-11-12T22:40:56
Produced by Oscar-winning filmmaker Charles Ferguson, “Invisible Hands” is the first feature documentary to expose child labor and trafficking within the supply chains of the world's biggest compan...
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Susannah Drake and Leonard discuss local park projects addressing climate change (11/8/18) from 2018-11-08T19:02
Since founding DLANDstudio in 2005, Susannah Drake has worked on projects ranging in scale from intimate gardens to large-scale urban planning initiatives. Her design for QueensWay transforms a 3.5...
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Edward Watts tells Leonard about his book "Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny" (11/7/18) from 2018-11-07T23:04:30
“Readers will find many parallels to today’s fraught political environment,” reads the Publishers Weekly review of “Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny” by Wednesday’s guest on “Leonard Lop...
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Eileen Rivers on her book “Beyond the Call: Three Women on the Front Lines in Afghanistan”(11/6/18) from 2018-11-06T21:50:45
Susan Page, Washington Bureau Chief, for USA TODAY called “Beyond the Call: Three Women on the Front Lines in Afghanistan” by Tuesday’s guest on “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, Eileen Rivers, a ...
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Deborah Eisenberg discusses her collection of stories “Your Duck Is My Duck." (11/5/18) from 2018-11-05T21:23:07
Parul Sehgal of the New York Times Book Review called Deborah Eisenberg “a writer of legendary exactitude, and slowness." Her new collection of six stories, “Your Duck Is My Duck,” is the first boo...
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Jay Aronson and Sally Regenhard discuss the ethics of who controls a crisis site.(11/1/18) from 2018-11-01T19:00:26
Who should control the space where a tragedy occurs? From what becomes of human remains to what an onsite memorial should look like, resolving this question often pits the family members of victims...
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Author, illustrator and witch Mickie Mueller talks about the history of Halloween. (10/31/18) from 2018-10-31T19:29:26
Have you ever wondered about the story behind this strange holiday we call Halloween? Wednesday, on a special October 31 installment of "Leonard Lopate at Large" on WBAI, author, artist and practic...
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Director Frances Causey talks about her documentary on slavery "The Long Shadow."(10/30/18) from 2018-10-30T19:38:44
Of all the divisions in America, none is as insidious and destructive as racism. The documentary “The Long Shadow” takes an uncompromising look at America’s original sin—slavery—and traces its hist...
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Dan Klores tells Leonard about his 20-part ESPN series "Basketball: A Love Story." (10/29/18) from 2018-10-29T21:12:40
“‘Basketball: A Love Story’ — directed by filmmaker Dan Klores, who made the 30 for 30 doc ‘Winning Time: Reggie Miller vs. the New York Knicks’ — has been structured in a way to make it consumable...
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Alexandria Bombach and Elizabeth Schaeffer Brown discuss their doc “On Her Shoulders.” (10/26/18) from 2018-10-26T20:57:53
“On Her Shoulders” is Alexandria Bombach’s deeply moving portrait of Yazidi genocide survivor-turned-global advocate Nadia Murad. Winner of the Sundance Film Festival’s U.S. Documentary Directing A...
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Frederick Wiseman tells Leonard about his new documentary "Monrovia, Indiana." (10/25/18) from 2018-10-25T18:52:02
Located in mid-America, Monrovia, Indiana is primarily a farming community. Frederick Wiseman’s film “Monrovia, Indiana” is about the day-to-day experiences living and working in the town, with emp...
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Harlow Giles Unger joins Leonard for a discussion of founding father Dr. Benjamin Rush. (10/22/18) from 2018-10-22T18:51:59
Remembered primarily as America's leading, most influential physician, Dr. Benjamin Rush led the Founding Fathers in calling for abolition of slavery, equal rights for women, improved medical care ...
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Richard Clarke tells Leonard about his book "Warnings." (10/19/18) from 2018-10-19T20:50:09
"'Warnings: Finding Cassandras To Stop Catastrophes’ by Richard Clarke and R.P. Eddy is an important book for many sectors and fields of study…Cassandra [is] a Greek myth of a prophet whose dogged ...
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Andrew J. Muscato talks about his documentary on Anthony "The Mooch" Scaramucci (10/18/18) from 2018-10-18T19:34:54
As is often the case when a documentary filmmaker chooses to present their story in an unbiased way, the director must be prepared for unexpected events to take their project in a completely differ...
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D. D. Guttenplan tells Leonard about his book "The Next Republic."(10/17/18) from 2018-10-17T18:44:01
“D.D. Guttenplan’s new book, “The Next Republic: The Rise of a New Radical Majority,” is about how the fledgling progressive grassroots movement can achieve lasting change in Trump’s America…[the b...
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Dr. Dawn Wright and Christine Arena talk about the short film series Let Science Speak. (10/16/18) from 2018-10-16T19:14:47
The six-part series of short documentary films entitled “Let Science Speak” was made in direct response to escalating efforts to suppress environmental science and silence scientists. “More than an...
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Lisa Brennan-Jobs talks about growing up as the estranged daughter of Steve Jobs. (10/15/18) from 2018-10-15T17:36:57
“We had lunch on a large covered balcony overlooking the sea. Bono asked my father about the beginning of Apple. Did the team feel alive? Did they sense it was something big and they were going to ...
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Director Ruth Beckermann discusses her documentary "Waldheim Waltz" (10/12/18) from 2018-10-12T19:47:42
“With Austria currently the only West European nation since World War II governed by the far right, it’s time (heck, it’s long past time) that someone of Ruth Beckermann’s intelligence made a film ...
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Anne Diebel and Tyler Maroney tell Leonard about paper terrorism. (10/11/18) from 2018-10-11T19:14:01
Mark Pitcavage, a senior research fellow with the Anti-Defamation League, defines paper terrorism as “the use of bogus legal documents and filings, or the misuse of legitimate ones, to intimidate, ...
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Dr. Henry Marsh on what it's like to be a brain surgeon. (10/10/18) from 2018-10-10T18:58:11
“Henry Marsh is in the business of admitting his mistakes. It’s right there in the title of his second memoir — ‘Admissions: Life as a Brain Surgeon’ — and it was the central theme of his first, ‘D...
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Susan Silver talks about writing iconic '70s sitcoms like "The Mary Tyler Moore Show." (10/9/18) from 2018-10-09T20:31:17
“With the recent unsavory revelations coming out of the entertainment industry, Susan Silver’s new book, Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms, has a timely quality not always enjoyed by t...
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Kathryn and Ross Petras talk about commonly misused words. (10/8/18) from 2018-10-08T18:49:34
“ENGLISH-speakers are sure their language is especially perplexing. But while it has its quirks, so does every other language (aside from planned ones like Esperanto). In one way, though, English r...
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Sam Shire, Kelly Taylor and Anthony Accardi tell Leonard about microbrewing. (10/5/18) from 2018-10-05T20:29:24
From saisons to sours, from farmhouse ales to New England IPAs, there’s no denying that New York City’s local beer is a good as it’s ever been. This week, in a special Food Friday installment of “L...
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Idrees Kahloon and Ben Freeman on the swampy business of lobbying for foreign governments. (10/4/18) from 2018-10-04T22:01
“Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s disgraced former campaign-manager, pleaded guilty to on September 14th. Many have focused on what Mr Manafort, who was convicted on eight counts of financia...
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Leonard talks to Carter Strickland about parks, present and future (10/3/18) from 2018-10-03T19:36:49
The Trust for Public Land has been working in New York since 1981 and protected more than 123,000 acres across the state. In New York City, the organization has preserved more than 100 community g...
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Leonard talks to Stephanie Welch and Andrew Kimbrell about their film 'A Dangerous Idea.'(10/2/18) from 2018-10-02T19:29:36
The documentary “A Dangerous Idea: Eugenics, Genetics and the American Dream” reveals how biologically determined politics has disenfranchised women and people of color, provided a rationale for st...
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Hannah Howard talks about her book "Feast" on her life in food and romance. (10/1/18) from 2018-10-01T19:25:33
In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large” on WBAI, author Hannah Howard discusses her book “FEAST: True Love in and out of the Kitchen” and the life experiences that inspired it. From her li...
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Tama Matsuoka Wong and John Gottfried talk to Leonard about foraging (9/28/18) from 2018-09-28T21:31:19
Have you ever wondered how to forage for food? Have you ever encountered mushrooms while walking through the forest and been curious which ones are okay to eat? On this special Food Friday edition ...
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Alexander Newley tells Leonard about what it was like growing up with famous parents. (9/26/18) from 2018-09-26T18:40:07
In this installment of "Leonard Lopate at Large" Alexander Newley—the British artist best known for his ‘portrait of a portrait’ type paintings of some of the world’s most well-known faces across t...
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Historian Miriam Pawel talks to Leonard about "The Browns of California." (9/25/18) from 2018-09-25T21:40:04
"Miriam Pawel’s fascinating book 'The Browns of California' charts four generations of the Brown family, focusing on the political careers of Edmund (Pat) Brown — the two-term California governor f...
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Immigration attorney and former Mayor Michael Wildes tells Leonard about his new book. (9/21/18) from 2018-09-21T18:11:17
Michael Wildes can justifiably claim that immigration law is in his blood – his father Leon attained international fame defending John Lennon from deportation during the 1970s. Inspired to join his...
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Christian De Luca and Tom Crawford talk about performing music on period instruments (9/20/18) from 2018-09-20T21:32:46
On Thursday’s show we take a musical journey into the past when Christian De Luca and Tom Crawford of the the American Classical Orchestra describe what it’s like to perform classical compositions ...
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Adrian Benepe talks parks with Leonard. (9/19/18) from 2018-09-19T18:26:24
A senior vice president and director of city park development for The Trust for Public Land, Adrian Benepe is an expert on public, private, and nonprofit public-space development and management. Bo...
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George Pakenham describes his one-man crusade to reduce emissions from idling vehicles. (9/18/18) from 2018-09-18T20:34:41
Idling engines consume more than 6 billion gallons of gasoline annually in the U.S., a significant but little-known contributor to local air pollution, respiratory disease and global climate change...
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Scott Sayare and Richard Manning tell Leonard about global warming and forest fires. (9/17/18) from 2018-09-17T22:20:43
“If it seems as though the world’s on fire, that’s because it is,” reads the introduction to last month’s issue of Harper’s. “Wildfires are starting earlier in the dry season and burning for longer...
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Jim Lahey explains the origins of his reknowned no-knead bread to Leonard. (September 14, 2018) from 2018-09-14T20:04:34
James Beard Award-winning baker Jim Lahey thought he was going to be a sculptor. After noticing he couldn't find bread in New York like the beautiful, crusty loaves he ate in Italy while traveling ...
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Craig Unger tells Leonard about Trump's connection to the Russian mafia. (September 13, 2018) from 2018-09-13T19:25:39
“On November 9, 2016, just a few minutes after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, a man named Vyacheslav Nikonov approached a microphone in the Russian State Duma (their equiv...
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Michele Gelfand discusses her book "Rule Makers, Rule Breakers." (September 12, 2018) from 2018-09-12T18:48:25
Why, wonders University of Maryland psychology professor Michele Gelfand, are the clocks in Brazil so often wrong, while in Germany the clocks can be counted on? What explains the difference betwee...
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Authors Kathleen Hill and Steven Gaines tell Leonard about memoir writing. (September 11, 2018) from 2018-09-11T20:54:47
Beginning with a Best American award-winning narrative, Kathleen Hill’s memoir “She Read To Us In The Late Afternoons” explores defining moments of a life illuminated by novels, read in Nigeria and...
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Maxine Rosaler tells Leonard about her novel “Queen for a Day.” (September 10, 2018) from 2018-09-10T19:34:47
In her novel “Queen for a Day,” Maxine Rosaler tells the stories of mothers of children with autism. DeWitt Henry compared Queen for a Day to Tim O'Brien's “The Things They Carried.” “Like O’Brien,...
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James Irsay talks to Leonard about his storied career in music and radio. (August 31, 2018) from 2018-08-31T19:51:15
James Irsay, celebrated concert pianist and the host of the classical music program “Morning Irsay” Friday mornings from 10am to noon on WBAI, has been a fixture of New York City’s FM dial for deca...
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Michael D’Antonio and Peter Eisner tell Leonard about their book on Mike Pence. (August 30, 2018) from 2018-08-30T19:30:06
Little-known outside his home state until Donald Trump made him his running mate, Mike Pence—who proclaims himself a Christian first, a conservative second, and a Republican third—has long worn a c...
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Braden Allenby and Joel Garreau explain the weaponized narrative to Leonard. (August 29, 2018) from 2018-08-29T19:19:17
In this installment of “Leonard Lopate at Large,” the two co-directors of Arizona State University’s new Weaponized Narrative Initiative, Braden Allenby and Joel Garreau will join Leonard to talk a...
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Brian Abrams tells Leonard about his new oral history of the Obama presidency. (August 28, 2018) from 2018-08-28T19:16:24
Brian Abrams’s new book “OBAMA: An Oral History 2009-2017” is the first comprehensive look into President Barack Obama’s White House. Featuring on-the-record conversations with over 100 West Wing s...
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Ann Beattie on the short stories of Jean Stafford for our Underread Book Club (August 27, 2018) from 2018-08-27T20:29:13
In this installment of "Leonard Lopate at Large" on WBAI, revered author Ann Beattie joins Leonard for the second installment in our Underread Book Club, the short stories of Jean Stafford. Though ...
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Dr. James A. Parrott tells Leonard about his new study of ride-hailing apps. (August 24, 2018) from 2018-08-24T18:38:18
Uber, Lyft and other ride-hailing services have become a ubiquitous presence in the five boroughs over the past several years, but their popularity has raised questions about whether drivers can ac...
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Khalil Cumberbatch and Leonard discuss immigrants rights. (August 23, 2018) from 2018-08-23T18:59:45
“I had successfully completed parole, started a family, began a business, was working hard, and was one week away from completing a Master’s Degree in Social Work – at the top of my class in CUNY L...
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Edwin Frank tells Leonard about what goes into reissuing a classic book. (August 22, 2018) from 2018-08-22T18:50:03
“In 1999, Edwin Frank founded New York Review Books to reintroduce out-of-print works—many in first translations from around the world—to the reading public. In the last seventeen years, you’ve lik...
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Leonard does his own personal tribute to the great Aretha Franklin. (August 21, 2018) from 2018-08-21T22:00:08
When Aretha Franklin died on August 16, 2018 at the age of 76, she left behind a body of work that will stand the test of time as some of the greatest music ever recorded. Yet, many fans of her sem...
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Work and business historian Louis Hyman joins Leonard for a discussion of economics. (Aug. 20, 2018) from 2018-08-20T18:00:08
Louis Hyman is a historian of work and business at the ILR School of Cornell University, where he also directs the Institute for Workplace Studies in New York City. He is a founding editor of the C...
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Food maven Arthur Schwartz joins Leonard for a freewheeling culinary conversation.(Aug. 17, 2018) from 2018-08-17T19:04:40
Arthur Schwartz was the restaurant critic and executive food editor of the New York Daily News for 18 years. Having found success with his seemingly unending wealth of food knowledge in radio, prin...
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Dr. Richard Ostfeld and Dr. Shannon LaDeau tell Leonard about ticks and mosquitoes.(Aug. 16, 2018) from 2018-08-16T18:08:15
Are you afraid to take a walk in the woods because of ticks, mosquitoes and other disease carriers that bite? In this installment of "Leonard Lopate At Large" on WBAI, two scientists from the Cary ...
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Brooke Allen and Peter Allen tell Leonard about documenting Syria before the war. (August 15, 2018) from 2018-08-15T19:02:54
In 2009, Peter Aaron, an architectural photographer, and Brooke Allen, author and professor, went on vacation with their children to Syria. Brooke wrote a book about their experience called “The Ot...
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Wayne Kramer of The MC5 talks to Leonard about his legendary career. (August 14, 2018) from 2018-08-14T19:19:20
For this show, Leonard is joined in the studio by a bona fide rock icon, lead guitarist and founding member of the MC5, Wayne Kramer. From his genre-defining wall of feedback on the band’s seminal ...
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Michael Patrick MacDonald gives Leonard a report on Ireland today. (August 13, 2018) from 2018-08-13T19:20:38
Michael Patrick MacDonald grew up in the Old Colony Housing Project in South Boston, a neighborhood that held the highest concentration of white poverty in the United States. After losing four of h...
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Lou Di Palo gives Leonard a history lesson on Italian cuisine.(August 10, 2018) from 2018-08-10T18:38:13
On Friday’s show, Leonard talks to Italian food expert Lou Di Palo, the owner of his favorite cheese shop, Di Palo's Fine Foods in Little Italy. The food blog Serious Eats described Di Palo's Fine ...
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Dr. Ted Rueter and Leonard talk about about motorcycle noise in the city.(August 9, 2018) from 2018-08-09T18:46:35
Dr. Ted Rueter started Noise Free America: A Coalition to Promote Quiet while he was a political science professor at UCLA. “I found UCLA to be the loudest campus I had ever been to and Los Angeles...
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Itamar Kubovy of Pilobolus tells Leonard about the dance company's festival.(August 8, 2018) from 2018-08-08T18:26:10
On Wednesday’s show, Leonard speaks to Itamar Kubovy, the executive producer for Pilobolus dance company. The company describes its mission as being to “create, perform, and preserve dances, applyi...
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Wendy Brawer and Charles Krezell tell Leonard about local environmental projects.(August 7, 2018) from 2018-08-07T18:26:21
Eco-designer and public educator Wendy Brawer created the Green Map System, the first resource of its kind back in 1992, to raise local awareness of environmental issues in the New York area. In th...
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The filmmakers of “BURNED: Are Trees the New Coal?" tell Leonard about it. (August 6, 2018) from 2018-08-06T18:45:28
On Monday’s show Leonard talks to the filmmakers of “BURNED: Are Trees the New Coal?” a new documentary which takes an unwavering look at the latest energy industry solution to climate change. Wood...
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Isaac Shapiro tells Leonard about growing up in WWII-era Japan.(August 3, 2018) from 2018-08-03T18:24:05
Isaac "Ike" Shapiro was in his early teenage years when he experienced the American fireboming of Japan firsthand in the early 1940s, as he describes in his autobiography “Edokko: Growing Up a Fore...
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Leonard discusses environmental regulation in the US with Monona Rossol.(August 2, 2018) from 2018-08-02T18:24:50
“Democracy Now” co-host Juan Gonzales has called Monona Rossol a hero for her work in helping to cope with the environmental disaster that arose in lower Manhattan following the tragic events of Se...
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Jonathan Berman tells Leonard about his new documentary "Calling All Earthlings" (August 1, 2018) from 2018-08-01T18:01:50
Michael Rechtshaffen of the Los Angeles Times recently wrote "for those who have ever wondered about that domed white, flying saucer-shaped structure perched on a particularly sparse patch of Lande...
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Phillip Lopate for Leonard's 1st Underread Book Club, Turgenev’s “Virgin Soil.” (July 31, 2018) from 2018-07-31T17:41:39
On Tuesday's "Leonard Lopate at Large," critic, essayist, fiction writer, poet and professor of writing at Columbia University Phillip Lopate (who also happens to be Leonard's brother) joins us for...
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Seymour Hersh tells Leonard about his legendary career in investigative reporting. (July 30, 2018) from 2018-07-30T21:16:13
On Monday’s show, Leonard talks to one of America’s premier investigative journalists, Seymour “Sy” Hersh. Perhaps best known for exposing what came to be known as the My Lai Massacre and its cover...
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Rory Chase and Jonathan White give Leonard a masterclass in artisanal cheesemaking. (July 27, 2018) from 2018-07-27T18:58:30
Chaseholm Farm Creamery is a grass-based dairy farm nestled in a 350-acre patchwork of pastures, crop land, woods and waterways located just outside of Pine Plains, NY. The Creamery was founded in ...
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New York Times Bureau Chief Alissa Rubin talks European politics with Leonard. (July 26, 2018) from 2018-07-26T18:51:53
Few journalists have a resume as formidable as Alissa Rubin. The Paris bureau chief for the New York Times initially joined the paper in January of 2007 as a correspondent in Baghdad. In the fall o...
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Elizabeth Anderson and Leonard discuss the American workforce. (July 25, 2018) from 2018-07-25T23:59:39
Are we under authoritarian rule at work?
In her book “Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (And Why We Don’t Talk About It),” Elizabeth Anderson explores the deplorable workin...
Cristin Tierney and Nina del Rio tell Leonard about the art scene. (July 24, 2018) from 2018-07-24T23:10:14
Have you ever wondered what it’s like to own your own gallery? Maybe you’re mystified about what drives the constantly fluctuating value of artwork. On Tuesday’s “Leonard Lopate at Large” two giant...
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Edmund White tells Leonard about his new book “The Unpunished Vice” (July 23, 2018) from 2018-07-23T21:42:43
From 1977’s “The Joy of Gay Sex” to his trio of autobiographic novels, “A Boy's Own Story” (1982), “The Beautiful Room Is Empty” (1988) and “The Farewell Symphony” (1997), to his revered biography ...
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Ed Schoenfeld gives Leonard his take on what makes great Chinese food (July 20, 2018) from 2018-07-20T20:56:06
In today's show, Leonard talks to Ed Schoenfeld, the owner-operator of Decoy (Zagat’s top-rated Chinese restaurant in New York) and Red Farm. A pioneer in the 1970s movement to bring authentic regi...
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Malachy McCourt relects on his fascinatingly diverse life. (July 19, 2018) from 2018-07-19T21:05:18
Malachy McCourt has led many lives. From growing up in the hardscrabble childhood surroundings brought to life in his brother Frank McCourt’s books “Angela’s Ashes” and “‘Tis” and his own memoirs “...
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Christian Viveros-Faune talks to Leonard about political art. (July 18, 2018) from 2018-07-18T20:59:48
For more than 20 years, Christian Viveros-Fauné has been an outspoken voice in the New York City art scene. The prolific critic, curator and former art dealer has had his writing published in Art i...
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Aaron Neville and Sarah Friedman tell Leonard about their farm. (July 17, 2018) from 2018-07-17T20:00:14
Sarah Friedman and legendary New Orleans vocalist Aaron Neville (The Neville Brothers, Linda Ronstadt) are the proprietors of Freville Farm in Pawling, NY. Besides discussing farming in the Hudson ...
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Leonard welcomes Clyde Haberman of the New York Times. (July 16, 2018) from 2018-07-16T21:20:56
In this episode, Leonard Lopate makes his WBAI debut by welcoming Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times editorial board member and revered longtime columnist Clyde Haberman. Author of the book “The...
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