A Word in Your Ear – Disquiet

Texas-based Bulgarian writer Miroslav Penkov wasn’t sure if anyone would pay attention to his first English-language novel, Stork Mountain. However, when the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative paired him with The English Patient author Michael Ondaatje, it gave him the boos ...  Show more

Colombian writer Antonio García Ángel was just 33 years old when the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative paired him with the great Peruvian novelist – and later Nobel literature laureate – Mario Vargas Llosa. A dozen books followed. For the latest episode of A Word in Your E ...  Show more

In this episode, Jacke talks to author David Denby about his new book, Eminent Jews: Bernstein, Brooks, Friedan, Mailer, a group biography (loosely inspired by Lytton Strachey's Eminent Victorians) that describes how four larger-than-life figures upended the restrained culture of ...  Show more

After discussing Emily Dickinson's Poem #259 ("A Clock stopped -"), Jacke talks to author David Sterling Brown about his new book Shakespeare's White Others. PLUS novelist Shilpi Suneja (House of Caravans) selects the last book she will ever read. Help support the show at patreo ...  Show more

Born in the pandemic lockdown of 2020, when Britain’s restaurants had closed their doors, Jonathan Nunn founded the online newsletter Vittles, which rapidly established itself as the premier platform for exploring food cultures in Britain and around the world. Out of Vittles was ...  Show more

The year is 1816, and 18-year-old Mary Shelley has fled London with her lover, Percy Shelley, and her sister, Claire. They're on their way to visit Lord Byron's villa in Lake Geneva, Switzerland - and to change the course of literary history. In this episode, Jacke talks to Carol ...  Show more