Humorist Roy Blount Jr. sits down with Grant for a conversation about the controversy over writers’ rights, the Amazon Kindle 2, Roy’s recent book, Alphabet Juice, “sonicky” words, and noodling for catfish. He also clears up the mystery of whether...
What in the Sam Hill?! It's another newsletter from A Way with Words. Oh, man, when we have fun on the air, we have it in spades, buckets, and buttloads. This past weekend we took a quick look at whether old-fashioned fairy tales are too violent...
Twi-hard n.— «The most recent “Twilight” book sold an astonishing 1.3 million copies in the first 24 hours, and fans—also known as “Twi-hards”—stay up all night to attend the books” midnight release parties at bookstores across the U.S...
repertory grid n.— «Professor Canter’s group conducted a series of interviews with 49 terrorists—people convicted of bombing and killings. The work was done outside of the UK because of the refusal of the British authorities to facilitate the...
Welcome to another newsletter from A Way with Words! This week we kicked off our online-only summer minicasts. There are *two,* one announcing the minicasts and explaining the term "estival," and another digging into the brilliant history...
goldfishing n.— «The day I am in the studio, the report on the opposition’s activities features just one politician talking in an interview. But you don’t hear his words. He is, in TV parlance, goldfishing: you can see his lips move but only hear...