Library Talks

The host and co-creator of Studio 360 discusses his new book, Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire, a 500-Year History. He spoke with NYU professor Kwame Anthony Appiah. Andersen argues that the roots of our post-truth, alternative facts present can be discovered in America's "promiscuous devotion to the untrue" and its instinct to believe in make believe, evident across four centuries of magical thinkers and true believers, hucksters and suckers, who have embedded an appetite for believe-whatever-you-want fantasy into our national DNA.

The filmmaker speaks about his groundbreaking documentary I Am Not Your Negro at the Schomburg Center with the Schomburg's Director, Kevin Young and LIVE from the NYPl's Paul Holdengräber.

The Nigerian writer discusses her debut novel, Stay With Me, the haunting tale of a young couple whose childless marriage threatens to tear them apart. It was shortlisted for the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction and hailed by Michiko Kakutani as "powerfully magnetic and heartbreaking."

Kendi discussed his National Book Award–winning work on the history of racist ideas in America with Khalil Gibran Muhammad, the Director Emeritus of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

MIT linguist, philosopher, and political theorist Noam Chomsky, in conversation with actor Wallace Shawn.

Grammy-winning singer, songwriter, and best-selling author Judy Collins came to the Library back in February, to celebrate the publication of her most recent book, Cravings. "As an active, working alcoholic with an eating disorder," she writes, "I yearned for serenity and was tormented for much of my life by longings, addictions, and painful crises over food: bingeing, bulimia, weight loss and gain." Collins spoke with William Kelly, who is NYPL's Andrew W. Mellon Director of the Research Libraries. Learn more at nypl.org/podcasts.

The Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright was joined in May by members of the Broadway cast of Sweat to talk about the play and the issues behind it at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

Best-selling novelist Min Jin Lee on her latest book, the ups and downs of her career, the history of Koreans in Japan, and the treatment of Asians in America.

Philip Glass is a giant of twentieth-century American music, arguably of the most influential composers of his time. He spoke with LIVE from the NYPL's Paul Holdengräber last June about his memoir "Words Without Music." It is a riveting record of a life very well lived, and a fascinating conversation with a legendary artist.

Writer, activist, and podcast host Janet Mock joins for a discussion of her second memoir, Surpassing Certainty. She's interviewed by Lisa Lucas, the Executive Director of the National Book Foundation. The two talked about everything from Mock's time in the publishing industry to her work in a Honolulu strip club, from spam recipes and Zara dresses to the influence of writers like Maya Angelou and Zora Neale Hurston.