Library Talks

In 2003, author Jennifer Finney Boylan published She’s Not There, which became the first bestselling work by a transgender American and established Boylan as a go-to source for public conversation about the impact of gender on our lives. More than two decades later, her new memoir, Cleavage, returns with older and wiser eyes to examine the joys and the struggles of being transgender. In this episode of Library Talks, Boylan sits down with bestselling author Roxanne Gay to discuss her latest memoir and her hope for a future in which we all have the freedom to live joyfully as men, as women, and in the space between us.

Writer and scholar David Wright Faladé sits down with Julie Orringer to discuss his latest book, The New Internationals, a stunning historical novel that sets a coming-of-age narrative and cross-cultural romance amidst a vibrant political moment in postwar Paris.

When author and historian Martha Hodes was 12-years-old she was flying unaccompanied on a plane that was hijacked. Nearly half a century later she explores her memories of that event in her book My Hijacking, which draws on deep archival research and extensive interviews both to re-create what happened to her as a child and to understand the larger context of the world-historical event in which she unwittingly participated.

New York State Poet Laureate Patricia Spears Jones is a poet, playwright, educator, and cultural activist. Her most recent book The Beloved Community was released in 2023. Here she is in conversation with Brent Hayes Edwards, professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature and the Center for Jazz Studies at Columbia University. 

Join author and professor Deondra Rose as she discusses her new book The Power of Black Excellence: HBCUs and the Fight for American Democracy with activist Angelo Pinto.

Caoilinn Hughes joins fellow author Brandon Taylor to discuss her latest book, The Alternatives, a story of four brilliant Irish sisters, orphaned in childhood, who scramble to reconnect when the oldest disappears into the Irish countryside.

Josephine Quinn sits down with award-winning poet Ken Chen to discuss her book How the World Made the West. Quinn's book poses a bold challenge to “civilizational thinking” on the origins of Western culture—that is, the idea that civilizations arose separately and distinctly from one another. Rather, she locates the roots of the modern West in everything from the law codes of Babylon, Assyrian irrigation, and the Phoenician art of sail to Indian literature, Arabic scholarship, and the metalworking riders of the Steppe.

Jean Strouse sits down with Pulitzer Prize–winner Hernan Diaz to discuss her latest book Family Romance: John Singer Sargent and the Wertheimers. Strouse's account illuminates a period of tumultuous social change that saw the declining fortunes of the British aristocracy, the dramatic rise of new wealth on both sides of the Atlantic, and the birth of the modern art market.

Dava Sobel, a renowned science writer known for works like Longitude, discusses her latest book on Marie Curie with Angela Saini, an insightful science journalist. They delve into Curie's inspiring life, her Polish roots, and the 45 women who contributed to her groundbreaking research. Sobel highlights the challenges these women faced in a male-dominated field, illuminating Curie's resilience amid personal and professional tribulations. The conversation underscores the importance of recognizing female contributions in science and the art of effective science communication.

Daniel Saldaña París speaks with Chloé Cooper Jones about his latest book Planes Flying over a Monster, which explores the cities where París has lived, each one home to a new iteration of himself. These now diverging, now coalescing selves raise questions: Where can we find authenticity? How do we construct the stories that define us? What if our formative memories are closer to fiction than truth?