Borrowed & Returned

When award-winning author Jacqueline Woodson sat down to write her family’s story of the Great Migration, she wanted to make it accessible to all kinds of readers. So she wrote a children’s book called This Is the Rope . In this episode, Woodson talks about the importance of preserving the stories of our ancestors, and of course… her love of Brooklyn.  Show notes: How many books have you read? Che...

Jose Antonio Vargas is a journalist, filmmaker, and author of the book Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen. He came to the US from the Philippines when he was twelve years old, and he didn’t discover he was undocumented until he was sixteen. We talk with him about his unique perspective on America and what it means to be a citizen. Show notes: How many books have you read? Check out BPL...

Today we’re bringing you a really interesting episode from our friends at This Guy Sucked , a podcast hosted by historian and writer Claire Aubin about the worst people in history. Each episode, Claire sits down with an expert to pull back the scholarly curtain on a terrible person from their research. Because, as they say on the show, it’s never too late to have haters, and you can’t libel the de...

Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson is a marine biologist, climate scientist and activist. Recently, she sat down with Jordan Kisner, of the Thresholds podcast, to talk about our climate future. You may have heard clips of their conversation in our last episode about Silent Spring. Today, we're playing the full interview as a partnership with Thresholds, a show about about the messiness, overlap, u-t...

When Silent Spring came out in 1962, it was an instant best-seller and led to the establishment of the EPA, as well as the ban of harmful pesticides such as DDT. But Rachel Carson’s seminal work also shifted our way of thinking about nature. For the first time, the environment was not just something out there that could be tracked and measured, but something that lived inside all of us.  You can r...

Molly Crabapple is an artist and writer who documents the extremes, from nightclubs to war zones. She’s also the author of several books, including Drawing Blood and Brothers of the Gun , a memoir of the Syrian War co-written with Marwan Hisham. We sat down with Crabapple to talk about the difference between words and images, making art in the world, and the power of cartoonists to disrupt fascism...

Art Spiegelman is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the graphic novel Maus, the story of his parents’ experience during the Holocaust. We got to sit down with Spiegelman at Brooklyn Public Library’s recording studio earlier this month to talk about Maus almost forty years after it first came out, about censorship, about the war in Gaza, and about what it means to stand up for others. You can re...

Art Spiegelman’s Maus almost single-handedly elevated comics from throw-away inserts in newspapers to a serious literary art worthy of winning the highest award in book publishing. But it’s not an accident that this book is coming back to us now. Maus was swept once again into the public eye three years ago, when the conservative movement to target marginalized stories took aim at the beloved grap...

This episode comes to us from our friends at Book Riot ! In this segment, you'll hear Book Riot’s Erica Ezeifedi speak with Rodney Freeman, a librarian and producer of the forthcoming documentary, Are You a Librarian? The Untold Story of Black Librarians . This is part of their Reading and Resistance series, which looks at the relationship between reading and the pursuit of freedom in America...

Matt de la Peña is the Newbery Medal-winning author of seven Young Adult novels and five picture books. We talked with him about writing small stories and what it means to write a book that is, as he calls it, “Diversity 2.0.” You can read a transcript of this episode on our website. Check out our booklist with books by Matt de la Peña and more! Learn more about de la Peña on his website, and see...

Meg Medina is an award-winning author of books for kids and young adults, and she was the 2023-2024 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. We talked to her about what it meant to be the first Latinx author in that role, about the need for more diverse kids books, and the importance of reading in families. You can read a transcript of this episode on our website. Check out our booklist...

The Snowy Day wasn’t the first picture book to feature a Black child as its beloved protagonist, but it might be the most visible. When it came out in 1962, it challenged the publishing industry to champion books that depict kids of color. Today, we find ourselves in a moment not so different from the one Ezra Jack Keats was in when he sat down to create The Snowy Day . We are, once again, fightin...

When Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States came out in 1980, it literally rocked the boat. Instead of starting where most histories of the Americas start — on the deck of Columbus’s ship as it approached land — Howard Zinn flipped the script, focusing instead on what the people standing on the shore would have seen. In this episode, we look at the ripple effects of Zinn’s radical t...

Reginald Dwayne Betts is a poet, a lawyer, and the founder and CEO of Freedom Reads, an organization with the goal of bringing a library to every cell block in America. We talked with him about what he read – and wrote – while he was incarcerated, and what it taught him about what it means to be free, to be loved, and to be part of a community. Read a transcript of this episode on our website, and...

There are so many reasons to read – and reread – The Autobiography of Malcolm X. But for this episode, we’re revisiting the book with the perspectives of readers who are, or were, incarcerated. Malcolm X’s story isn’t just radical for its narrative of change and self-improvement; it also encourages readers to think more critically about the prison system itself.  You can read a transcript of this...

N.K. Jemisin is a New York Times-bestselling science fiction and fantasy writer. She’s a Brooklynite, the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, and the first author to win three Best Novel Hugos in a row. We talked to her about Octavia Butler’s influence on her writing, and how she processes the present moment in her own fiction. You can read a transcript of this episode on our website, an...

In these unfathomable moments, when the world seems to be falling apart—we often turn to stories for guidance. For the folks in Southern California earlier this year, that story was Parable of the Sower . Readers are returning to the book today because it shows us how speculation – and Afrofuturism in particular – can help us move through the world with our eyes open.  Read a transcript of this ep...

Borrowed and Returned is a new podcast series that examines what our reading public borrowed in the past, and what we’re all reading now. In conversations with library workers, authors and readers across the country, we’ll return to the books that changed us, and changed America, too.  First episode drops July 8, with new episodes coming out weekly. Spend your summer re-reading with us! 

A new exhibit at BPL's Center for Brooklyn History explores the history and legacy of slavery here in Brooklyn. The team at CBH gathered documents and accounts from people who were touched by slavery in Brooklyn, and traced the descendants of both the enslaved and enslavers.  " Trace/s " is up at the Center for Brooklyn History (128 Pierrepont Street) through August 30, 2025. This a...

As 2024 comes to a close, we wanted to share with you an episode that we produced all the way back in 2020. That year, we went to Coney Island to record the Coney Island Polar Bear Club, the group of swimmers that congregate on Coney Island every Sunday in winter to swim in the frigid ocean as a way to renew themselves. It’s a fun one, and we hope you enjoy! Further resources: Look at historic pho...

Graphic novels, Haitian-American book bingo, and The Power Broker. These are just a few of the book clubs happening at Brooklyn Public Library! This episode, we take a tour around the borough to listen in on our patrons' reading habits and ask why we still read together. Read a transcript of this episode here. Further resources: Check out our book clubs happening across the borough! Want to r...

We're pulling out all the stops for the first annual Freedom to Read Day of Action on Saturday, October 19th! Hear from libraries in Los Angeles, San Diego, Hoboken, NJ and Austin, TX about what they're doing to promote the freedom to read. And, if you're in Brooklyn, meet us on the steps of Central Library this Saturday for a book rally! You can read the transcript here .  Further...

For Banned Books Week this year, we’re returning to our award-winning series, Borrowed and Banned . Because the fight isn’t over. In 2023, the American Library Association documented a 65% increase in the number of book titles challenged across the country. Listen to the first episode of the series about what happened in one Oklahoma town when their freedom to read was challenged. And how one teac...

Bedford-Stuyvesant is perhaps one of Brooklyn’s most iconic neighborhoods. Its tree-lined streets and grand brownstones have been here for over 150 years. This episode, a re-broadcast from 2019, tells the story of Bed-Stuy through the lives of three women who set down roots here in different ways: activist Hattie Carthan, writer Paule Marshall, and novelist Naomi Jackson.  Read a transcript of thi...

Splitting her time between Athens, Georgia and Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, Nicole A. Taylor is a food writer and author of several cookbooks. She sat down with BPL’s Bed-Stuy Tea podcast to discuss finding and preserving her Southern voice, the pleasures of restaurant research, and her favorite local spots to eat and drink. Read a transcript of this episode here . Further resources: Listen to more episode...