Randall Kennedy on 'Say It Loud!'

<p>Literature isn’t a horse race. Taste is subjective, and artistic value can’t be measured in terms of “winners" and “losers.”</p><p>That doesn’t mean it’s not fun to try.</p><p>The book world’s awards season officially kicked off on Oct. 9, when the Hungarian novelist Laszlo Kr ... Show More

<p>Nicholas Boggs’s “Baldwin: A Love Story,” is many things at once. It’s a comprehensive biography of James Baldwin. It’s a nimble excavation of Baldwin’s work, filled with astute literary analysis of his books and prose. And, most pressingly, it’s an argument for a new critical ... Show More

<p>On Nov. 10, 1975, during a calamitous storm, the Edmund Fitzgerald sunk below the waves of Lake Superior. All 29 men aboard went down with the vessel. With no survivors and no eyewitnesses, there’s always been a sense of mystery to what is arguably the most famous shipwreck in ... Show More

This week’s episode in our series on the great political essays is about David Foster Wallace’s ‘Up, Simba!’, which describes his experiences following the doomed campaign of John McCain for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000. Wallace believed that McCain’s distinctiv ... Show More

In the year of a Presidential election, Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode investigate the murky world of American Elections on screen.Donald Trump's victory in the 2016 Presidential election, inspired many film lovers to reconnect with two films - John Frankenheimer’s 1962 political ... Show More

<p>What was it about the Kennedy's that attracted so much tragedy, that many believed them to be cursed?</p><br><p>From plane disasters in World War 2, to drug overdoses and of course, assassinations - it has to be said, they had their fair share.</p><br><p>Is there something sin ... Show More

<p>Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett faced tough questions from Democrats last week over her positions on abortion, religion, and how she interprets the Constitution. But Judge Barrett’s stances on race deserve attention too. </p><p>Beyond acknowledging that racism exists, ... Show More

<p>Presidential libraries are tributes to greatness, "[a] self-congratulatory, almost fictional account of someone's achievements, where all the blemishes are hidden," explains one New York architect.  But they're also a "weird mix of a historical repository of records and things ... Show More

<p>Over the past few weeks, we've been exploring the psychology of partisanship, and how to effectively handle disagreements with those around us. This week, we conclude our US 2.0 series by turning to the past. We talk with journalist <a href="https://www.npr.org/people/4080709/ ... Show More

“There were a lot of people who wanted Kennedy dead, a lot of powerful people. There are secrets still being held and I never bought for a minute that Oswald operated alone.” The assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas on 22nd November 1963 is one of history’s most ... Show More

<p><span>For twenty-some years, Naomi Klein has been a leading thinker on the left. She’s especially known for the idea of disaster capitalism: an analysis that the forces of big business will exploit any severe disruption to take over more space in our lives. She was often confu ... Show More