City Arts & Lectures

Our guest today is Gretchen Sisson, a sociologist at UC San Francisco who studies abortion and adoption. Her new book, “Relinquished”, is the culmination of a decade-long study in which Sisson interviewed mothers from across the country who had given their children up for adoption. Sisson examines the myths and realities associated with these mothers – for example, only 14% are teenagers. But the...

This week, a pair of studio conversations with the authors of recently published books. First, New Yorker writer Nick Romeo talks about his new book "The Alternative: How To Build a Just Economy" with Courtney Martin. It examines how people around the world are reshaping economies and businesses to be more equitable and ethical. Then, poet Kaveh Akbar talks with Corey Antonio Rose about his debut...

This week, we reach into the archives for a 2009 appearance by the late A. S. Byatt.  The author and critic published 11 novels, 6 collections of short stories, and 9 volumes of short stories, as well as editing the Oxford Book of English Short Stories and several other anthologies.  Byatt’s best-known novel, Possession, won the Booker Prize and was made into a film; the book she discusses in this...

This week, we present an encore of our 2016 conversation with songwriter and musician Paul Simon. Simon has been the recipient of many honors and awards including 12 Grammy Awards, three of which (“Bridge Over Troubled Water”, “Still Crazy After All These Years” and “Graceland”) were albums of the year. In 2003 he was given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award for his work as half of the duo Simon...

Pulitzer-Prize winning writer Benjamin Moser is the author of biographies of Susan Sontag and Claire Lispector. He’ll talk to us about his most recent book, The Upside-Down World: Meetings with Dutch Masters. It’s about the lives of artists like Rembrandt and Vermeer, as well as lesser known figures of the Dutch Golden Age. It’s a coming of age story too; Moser spent twenty years working on the bo...

Our guest is Dr. Jen Gunter, an OB-GYN and pain medicine physician.  Gunter’s work both as a clinician and a writer, is aimed at helping women understand and care for their bodies.  That includes countering a large amount of misinformation about women’s health - which she does with great wit on social media.  Her books include “The Vagina Bible”, “The Menopause Manifesto” and her newest, “Blood: T...

Our guest is renowned neuroscientist and primatologist Robert Sapolsky.  He’s spent his career investigating behavior across the animal kingdom, including humans.  In books like The Trouble With Testosterone and Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers, Sapolsky translates decades of research into fascinating stories and lessons accessible to non-scientific audiences. His latest book, Determined: A Science of...

Tracy K. Smith is the author of five acclaimed poetry collections, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Life on Mar s. Her memoir, Ordinary Light , was a finalist for the National Book Award. From 2017 to 2019, she served as the 22nd Poet Laureate of the United States. In 2020, heartsick from constant assaults on Black life, Smith found herself soul-searching, and digging into the historical archi...

This week, an encore of one of last year’s most popular programs - a conversation between two unconventional artists, director, visual artist and author, John Waters and Aubrey Plaza, actor, comedian and producer. For nearly 50 years, John Waters has been making subversive films that playfully push all sorts of boundaries - movies like “Pink Flamingos”, “Hairspray”, and “Serial Mom”. Actor and com...

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 t...

NOTE: This program was not broadcast, because as you’ll hear, it contains a lot of explicit language and content - so much that we felt it would be hard to listen to with all the bleeps and edits that would be necessary for the radio. The language in this podcast has NOT been edited or bleeped, so please listen to it with that in mind. Leslie Jones  is a three-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee as...

Viet Thanh Nguyen's debut novel, The Sympathizer, earned him the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Now he’s written A Man of Two Faces. It’s a memoir about his family, as well as larger stories of refugeehood, colonization, and ideas about Viet Nam and America. On November 9, 2023, Nguyen came to The Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk to Shereen Marisol Meraji to talk about the new b...

Since 1978, when her very first cartoon appeared in The New Yorker Magazine, Roz Chast has been chronicling modern life’s anxieties and absurdities. Neurotic characters with frizzy hair and mouths agape sit on sofas or walk along New York sidewalks worrying, observing, and making us laugh. Her more than a dozen books include Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant?, a memoir about her parents...

This week, legendary filmmaker Werner Herzog. He’s made over 70 movies – most of them documentaries like Fitzcarraldo, Aguirre, the Wrath of God, and Grizzly Man. Herzog’s style is so distinctive that his films are recognizable practically from the moment they start. His techniques can be controversial too, when it comes to his unusual casting, and his own presence in the stories he’s telling. On...

This week, comedian Maria Bamford. She’s been called one of the most unusual – and bizarre – comedians performing today - addressing her own mental health struggles including obsessive-compulsive disorder and depression. You can see her semi-autobiographical television series, Lady Dynamite, on Netflix. On October 14th, 2023, Bamford came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk to...

This week, we’ll hear from journalist Michael Lewis about a year in the life of crypto-currency king Sam Bankman-Fried. The FTX founder became the world’s youngest billionaire. Now, he’s been convicted of taking billions of dollars in customer deposits to fund political donations, luxury real estate and his own personal investments. It’s the subject of Lewis’ newest book, Going Infinite. On Novemb...

This week, a conversation about global aid efforts, and another one about the power of art to address humans’ relationships with animals. In the first part of the program, Dr. Raj Shah, president of The Rockefeller Foundation, talks about his work addressing global health crises and economic challenges both within the private sector and government. It’s the topic of his new book, Big Bets: How Lar...

Our guest this week is writer Jhumpa Lahiri. Her debut short story collection, Interpreter of Maladies, earned Lahiri a Pulitzer Prize in 2000. Many short story collections followed, as well as novels like The Namesake, which was the basis of a 2006 film directed by Mira Nair. Lahiri now translates and produces her own work in Italian too. On October 13, 2023, Jhumpa Lahiri came to the Sydney Gold...

Comedian Keegan-Michael Key is best known for his work with Jordan Peele, performing in numerous skits as half of the comedy duo “Key & Peele.” One of his most famous roles was President Obama’s anger translator, a part he played at the 2015 White House Correspondents’ Dinner with Obama himself. Now, alongside wife and collaborator Elle Key, he’s written a book – The History of Sketch Comedy.”...

This week, George Saunders, a wildly inventive writer with an equally colorful background: Saunders worked as a geophysical prospector in Indonesia, a roofer in Chicago, and a doorman in Beverly Hills. Saunders’ short stories are often funny and frequently take place in a slightly futuristic, dystopian America. His novel “Lincoln in the Bardo” earned him the prestigious Man Booker Prize. On Octobe...

This week, Sir Patrick Stewart, best known for the role of Captain Jean-Luc Picard on Star Trek. After a working-class childhood in Yorkshire, Stewart trained as a classical actor at England’s Royal Shakespeare Company, where he appeared on stage for more than two decades. In 1986, he was invited to star in the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation. No one could predict the success of the...

It doesn’t feel so long ago that Zadie Smith exploded onto the literary scene with her stunning debut novel, “White Teeth.” Twenty-three years later, she has cemented her reputation as one of the most important voices of her generation, whether in the form of fiction, criticism, or cultural observation. Her many novels include “Swing Time” and “On Beauty” - and her new book - “The Fraud. ” It’s a...

This week, Dr. Bettina Love… Professor at Teachers College, Columbia University and author of “We Want to Do More Than Survive.”  Her writing, research, teaching, and educational advocacy focus on abolitionist teaching, antiracism, Black joy, and educational reparations. Love’s new book “Punished for Dreaming: How School Reform Harms Black Children and How We Heal” is an unflinching reckoning with...

Bobby Berk is the interior designer on the hit Netflix series Queer Eye . It’s a reality makeover show in which Berk and 4 other hosts, each an expert in a different category, transform peoples homes, wardrobes, and cultural tastes. The series has won two Emmys. On September 16th, 2023, Berk came to one of the San Francisco locations of independent bookstore Books Inc., to talk to writer Rebecca H...

Our guest is writer, bookstore owner, and literary evangelist Ann Patchett. She’s the author of several novels including the best-selling  Bel Canto, about a hostage situation at a lavish opera-themed birthday party. Patchett’s other books include The Patron Saint of Liars, and Commonwealth; and her newest novel, Tom Lake . It’s the story of three sisters in their 20s as they return home to Michig...