Today’s Between the Covers conversation is with the poet Ross Gay about Be Holding, his book-length poem that emerges from a sustained meditation on a mere few seconds of the basketball career of Julius Erving (aka Dr. J). Be Holding is a finalist for this year’s PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, given to a work “which […]
Dec 13
Randa Abdel-Fattah : Discipline
Randa Abdel-Fattah’s new novel Discipline is set in Sydney, Australia in 2021 during Ramadan. Discipline follows two Palestinians there, one in media and one in academia, where each has to confront questions of silence and complicity in their respective fields. As Israel intensif ... Show More
1h 56m
Dec 6
Jazmina Barrera : The Queen of Swords
Jorge Luis Borges called her the “Tolstoy of Mexico” and César Aira the “greatest novelist of the 20th century,” so why is it likely that you haven’t read or even heard of Elena Garro before now? And given that Garro was, like her fantastical stories, not beholden to the truth wh ... Show More
1h 58m
Feb 2024
Inciting joy: Poet Ross Gay on gardening, grief, and basketball
Jonathan Bastian talks with Ross Gay, poet, essayist, and professor of English at Indiana University. Author of “The Book of Delights,” Gay’s latest collection of essays and poems is “Inciting Joy,” in which he ponders sources of joy, from caring for his father, to skateboarding, ... Show More
51m 58s
Nov 2022
Inciting joy with Ross Gay
Nearly every day for a year, American poet Ross Gay sat down and wrote about something that delighted him–from carrying a small tomato plant through an airport to playing a pickup basketball game.The result was his first nonfiction book, “The Book of Delights”, a collection of es ... Show More
33 m
Nov 2022
Inciting joy with Ross Gay
Nearly every day for a year, American poet Ross Gay sat down and wrote about something that delighted him–from carrying a small tomato plant through an airport to playing a pickup basketball game.The result was his first nonfiction book, “The Book of Delights”, a collection of es ... Show More
33 m
Jul 2020
Radical Imagination: Tracy K. Smith, Marilyn Nelson, and Terrance Hayes on Poetry in Our Times
<p>In a special episode of the Poetry Podcast, Tracy K. Smith, Marilyn Nelson, and Terrance Hayes join<span> </span><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/contributors/kevin-young">Kevin Young</a><span> </span>to read their work, and to discuss its relationship to protest and liberat ... Show More
45m 41s
Mar 2018
The Power of Poetry, with William Sieghart, Jeanette Winterson and Helena Bonham Carter
Poetry is the perfect medication against some of life’s challenges, so William Sieghart has found. In this accessible and warming exchange, from tea towel poems to T.S. Eliot, Sieghart brings to life a few of the experiences that inspired his book ‘The poetry pharmacy: Tried-and- ... Show More
1h 26m
<p><em>New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.</em></p> <p><em>---</em></p> <p><br /></p> <p>How rethinking these often twee concepts can change your life and maybe the world. </p> <p><br /></p> <p><a ... Show More
