Vartan Gregorian, the academic, philanthropist, and indefatigable fundraiser, raised millions to support the New York Public Library, and eloquently described why libraries are an indispensable, inspiring part of any community. This is part of a...
A Velocity of Being: Letters to a Young Reader is a lavishly illustrated anthology edited by Maria Popova of Brainpickings and Claudia Bedrick. It contains a particularly inspiring letter from writer Anne Lamott. This is part of a complete episode...
Summer reading recommendations! Martha loves A Velocity of Being: Letters to a Young Reader, a beautifully illustrated anthology of letters from well-known writers and others celebrating reading. The book is edited by Maria Popovic of Brainpickings...
The longer the description of an item on a menu, the more expensive it’ll likely be. In The Language of Food: A Linguist Reads the Menu, Stanford University linguist Dan Jurafsky shows that with each extra letter in a menu description, the...
Whatever the amount might be, “as much food as one’s hand can hold” is how Samuel Johnson defined the luncheon in his 1755 dictionary entry. Over the two centuries since, we’ve seen more than a handful of takes on lunch, and it’s the subject of a...

