In A Velocity of Being, a collection of letters to young readers, writer Alexander Chee offers reasons as to why he became a reader himself. This is part of a complete episode.
In the early 19th Century, a shy British chemist named Luke Howard self-published a pamphlet called Essay on the Modifications of Clouds, which proposed a taxonomy of cloud formations. To his surprise, the pamphlet captured the public imagination...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s brain teaser involves words and phrases that the late writer Tom Wolfe helped popularize. For example, what phrase is associated with Wolfe’s 1979 book with a title that might be paraphrased as “Just What...
In his collection of essays, A Temple of Texts, writer William Gass observed: “The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words.” This is part of a complete episode.
The dilemma continues over how to spell dilemma! Grant and Martha try to suss out the backstory of why some people spell that word with an “n.” A lot of them, it seems, went to Catholic school. Maybe that’s a clue? Plus, the saying...
In a 1994 interview in the Paris Review, Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe offered some great advice about having faith in your process as a writer based on his own experiences as an undergraduate. This is part of a complete episode.