Malcolm Gladwell, a renowned author and thinker, dives deep into the intricacies of human behavior and societal challenges. He shares insights from his rebellious upbringing and how it shaped his approach to education. The fascinating power of storytelling in journalism is highlighted through anecdotes, including an emotional dog rescue tale. Gladwell also discusses the significance of group dynamics in corporate equity and the emotional nuances of music, particularly sad songs, revealing how they mirror our life experiences.

Judge David S. Tatel, a distinguished former civil rights attorney and judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, shares his compelling journey. He discusses the connections between scientific reasoning and judicial decision-making, and vividly recounts pivotal civil rights battles, including those fought by the NAACP. Tatel opens up about his experience with blindness, the meaningful role of his guide dog, and the importance of impartiality in the judiciary while reflecting on voting rights and personal identity. His insights blend justice with personal growth.

Yuval Noah Harari is a historian, philosopher, and author, and one of the world’s most influential public intellectuals working today. In books like Sapiens, Homo Deus, and 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, Harari examines topics like the future of humanity, and the connections between biology, myth, and power.  His latest book is Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks, from the Stone Age to AI. On October 1, 2024, Yuval Harari appeared at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk to technology journalist, author, and podcaster Kara Swisher. 

Even before her explosively popular Substack Letters from an American, which has grown to more than two million subscribers since it began in 2019, historian Heather Cox Richardson was an important voice in discussions around post-Civil War American history. The author of seven books, Richardson’s writing has focused on race, economics, and political ideology, including the story of the Republican Party and the Wounded Knee Massacre.  Most recently, she published the book Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America, a  deep dive into how a small group of wealthy people pushed the government towards authoritarianism, and how understanding the real history of America’s most marginalized people can help us move back towards a real democracy.  On September 19, 2024, Heather Cox Richardson came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco for an on-stage conversation with Steven Winn. 

This week, we'll hear an encore broadcast of a 2016 appearance by Steve Silberman, a technology reporter whose work helped change the public perception of autism - and popularize the concept of neurodiversity.  Silberman’s 2015 book “Neurotribes - The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity” uncovered a “secret history” of autism.  Silberman also found surprising answers to the crucial question of why the number of diagnoses has soared in recent years. Steve Silberman died on August 29, 2024, at the age of 66. This conversation with Roy Eisenhardt was recorded at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco on March 28, 2016. 

Ketanji Brown Jackson was confirmed as the 116th Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court in 2022. She earned both her undergraduate and law degrees with honors from Harvard University, before serving as a clerk for three federal judges, including Justice Stephen Breyer, whose seat on the Supreme Court she would ultimately go on to take. Jackson's career spans both the private and public sectors, including serving as Vice Chair and Commissioner of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, and as an assistant federal public defender.  On September 10, 2024, Jackson came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk to University of California, Berkeley Professor john a. powell on the occasion of her just-published memoir, Lovely One. The book traces her family’s ascent from segregation to her confirmation as the first Black woman ever to sit on the Supreme Court.

Our guests today are Daniel Handler and Sarah Manguso.Daniel Handler has written dozens of books – from adult novels like “The Basic Eight” and “Why We Broke Up”, to picture books and other collaborations with visual artists. But, he’s best known as the author of “A Series of Unfortunate Events.” Handler wrote the best-selling children’s novels – 13 in total –  under the pen name Lemony Snicket.  On July 24, 2024, Handler came to the KQED Studios in San Francisco to talk to his friend and fellow writer Sarah Manguso. Both Handler and Manguso had recently published new works - Handler's is a memoir titled “And Then? And Then? What Else?” Sarah Manguso’s newest book is a novel called "Liars".

Ann Patchett is best known for her award-winning novel Bel Canto, “a book that works both as a paean to art and beauty and a subtly sly comedy of manners” (New York Times). She is also the author of the novels The Patron Saint of Liars, The Dutch House, Commonwealth, and the non-fiction books Truth and Beauty and This is the Story of a Happy Marriage. Her new novel, Tom Lake, is about the lives parents lead before their children are born, the choices we make that inform who we become, and what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart. Patchett lives in Nashville, Tennessee, where she is co-owner of Parnassus Books, a popular independent bookstore.On September 8, 2023, Ann Patchett came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to be interviewed on stage by writer and critic Steven Winn.  This program was originally broadcast on September 17, 2023. 

This week, our guest is David Brooks. As an Op-Ed contributor to The New York Times, Brooks writes about subjects ranging from politics and foreign affairs, to cultural trends and spirituality. Brooks started as a humorist, penning satires for his college paper, before becoming a film critic and then a reporter at The Wall Street Journal. You can see him regularly on the PBS Newshour. He’s also the author of bestselling books like Bobos in Paradise and The Social Animal. Like several of his more recent books – including The Second Mountain – his newest is more personal in nature. It’s called  How To Know A Person, and it’s a guide to fostering deeper relationships, at home, in the workplace, or elsewhere. On November 18th, 2023, David Brooks came to The Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, to talk to Steven Winn about what it means to really see each other.  This program was originally broadcast on December 23, 2023. 

Long before he directed Wicked, In The Heights, or the groundbreaking film Crazy Rich Asians, Jon M. Chu was a movie-obsessed first-generation Chinese American helping at his parents’ Chinese restaurant in Silicon Valley and forever facing the cultural identity crisis endemic to children of immigrants. Growing up on the cutting edge of twenty-first-century technology gave Chu the tools he needed to make his mark at USC film school and to be discovered by Steven Spielberg, but he soon found himself struggling to understand who he was. In Viewfinder: A Memoir of Seeing and Being Seen, Chu questions what it means when your dreams collide with your circumstances - and how it’s possible to succeed even when the world changes beyond all recognition.Writer, actor, comedian, and rapper Nora Lum, aka “Awkwafina,” is best known for her roles in Crazy Rich Asians (directed by Jon M. Chu), The Farewell, for which she was the first Asian American to win a Golden Globe award for best actress in a musical or comedy, and Ocean’s 8. In 2020, Awkwafina wrote and executive produced the Comedy Central series Awkwafina Is Nora from Queens, in which she plays a fictionalized version of herself.