Arts

Decade Later And Across An Ocean, A Novel Gets Its Due

NPR Staff — Sun, 19 May 2013 20:09:00 +0000

Sometimes you need some distance to appreciate a classic.

That was certainly the case for John Williams' novel Stoner. When it was originally published in 1965, the only publication to mention the book at all was The New Yorker, in its "Briefly Noted" column. The novel received admiring reviews over the years, but sold just 2,000 copies and was almost immediately forgotten.

Fast forward to today and the book is experiencing a renaissance of sorts.

The Movie Katie Aselton Has 'Seen A Million Times'

editor — Sun, 19 May 2013 20:09:00 +0000

The weekends on All Things Considered series Movies I've Seen A Million Times features filmmakers, actors, writers and directors talking about the movies that they never get tired of watching.

Actor-director Katie Aselton's credits include the TV show The League, and the films Jeff, Who Lives At Home and Black Rock— currently in theaters and on VOD.

Unacceptable Anger From 'The Woman Upstairs'

editor — Sun, 19 May 2013 20:09:00 +0000
The main character of Claire Messud's novel, The Woman Upstairs, is a good woman. Nora is a 37-year-old elementary school teacher — responsible, kind and reliable. She is also very, very angry.
Her dreams of being an artist have been suppressed; she is seething inside with rage and resentment. But she keeps her anger in until she meets another woman who has everything she does not: a husband, a child and a successful art career. And then everything begins to unravel.

Giant Renaissance Food People Descend Upon New York

editor — Sun, 19 May 2013 12:05:00 +0000
It takes a lot of chutzpah to reduce one of the most powerful men on Earth to a pile of fruits and vegetables.
Luckily for art lovers, Giuseppe Arcimboldo had nerve to spare.
Arcimboldo created this unorthodox produce portrait of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II back in 1590. By that time, the Italian artist had been painting for the emperor and his powerful Habsburg family for more than 25 years, so presumably, they'd grown used to his visual jokes.

Ghost Ships, Murders, Bird Attacks: Stories To Keep You Awake

Ethan Rutherford — Sun, 19 May 2013 11:03:00 +0000
Ethan Rutherford is the author of The Peripatetic Coffin and Other Stories.
I'd seen the movies before reading the stories — Nicolas Roeg's masterful version of "Don't Look Now" featuring Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie; and Alfred Hitchcock's strangely flat-footed and clunky version of "The Birds" — so I thought I knew what to expect from Daphne du Maurier's fiction. I was, in fact, a little bored by the prospect of reading these stories, since I'd already seen the movies, but one day a friend insisted, loaned me her copy of Don't Look Now and just said: Trust me.

Three-Minute Fiction: 'Ten Ring Fingers' And 'Ghost Words'

editor — Sun, 19 May 2013 10:54:00 +0000
NPR's Bob Mondello and Susan Stamberg read excerpts of two of the best submissions for Round 11 of our short story contest. They read Ten Ring Fingers by Tamara Breuer of Washington, D.C., and Ghost Words by Matheus Macedo of Winthrop, Mass. You can read their full stories below and find other stories on our Three-Minute Fiction page or on Facebook.

Ten Ring Fingers

Tamara Breuer — Sun, 19 May 2013 10:42:00 +0000
She found the first ring on a night that smelled of body odor and beer. The bar's last customers had finally given up hope of taking her to bed and staggered away, leaving her to clean the stains of their desperation. She mopped the floor as quickly as possible to escape the place that made her feel uncomfortable in her own skin.
A glimmer of gold caught her eye. She bent down and pulled the thin metal band from a pile of grime.

Ghost Words

Matheus Macedo — Sun, 19 May 2013 10:41:00 +0000
The letter smelled of lavender and vanilla, like she couldn't decide which perfume to use so she used both. Her hand-writing had been drawn with the careful precision only seventh-grade girls in love have patience for. Hidden behind the words were indents and scratches, ghosts of words that weren't quite right, rewrites on top of rewrites.

One Couple, Nearly 20 Years, All 'Before Midnight'

NPR Staff — Sun, 19 May 2013 09:41:00 +0000
In 1995, an unintended cult-classic trilogy was born with a film that centered on a simple, romantic premise. Two strangers in their early 20s spend a spontaneous night together in Vienna. The characters, Jesse and Celine, split ways in Before Sunrise, but they reunited nine years later for a sequel, Before Sunset.
In that sequel, Jesse and Celine, played by Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy, find each other in Paris for another brief rendezvous.

Siblings' Separation Haunts In 'Kite Runner' Author's Latest

editor — Sun, 19 May 2013 09:41:00 +0000
There was a time around 2003, before e-books and e-readers, when it seemed that everywhere you turned — in an airport, on a bus or anywhere people read — people were lost in The Kite Runner. An epic tale set in Afghanistan, the book sold more than 7 million copies in the U.S.

Stories Of Hope Amid America's 'Unwinding'

editor — Sun, 19 May 2013 09:41:00 +0000
According to New Yorker writer George Packer, there used to be a kind of deal among Americans — a deal in which everyone had a place.
"People were more constrained than they are today, they had less freedom," he says, "but they had more security and there was a sense in which each generation felt that the next generation would be able to improve itself, to do better."
But over the last generation, that deal has come undone.

Put On Your Thinking Hat

Will Shortz — Sun, 19 May 2013 08:28:00 +0000
On-air challenge: Every answer is a familiar two-word phrase or name in which the first word starts with H-A and the second word starts with T.
Last week's challenge: From listener Al Gori of Cozy Lake, N.J. Name a famous American man — first and last names. Change the first letter of his first name from T to H. The result will sound like a term for an attractive person.

New 'Trek' Goes 'Into Darkness,' But Not Much Deeper

Bob Mondello — Sat, 18 May 2013 22:14:00 +0000
The opening sequence of J.J. Abram's new entry in the Star Trek universe has all the ingredients of the classic franchise.
There's Kirk and his crew bellowing on the bridge, everyone worrying about the prime directive and our favorite Vulcan trapped in a volcano.
OK, I'm in. I may not be a fanboy anymore, but I sure was in my youth, and having these guys in their youths again is just as cool at the outset as it was last time.
Chris Pine's baby-Shatner is spitting his lines while Zachary Quinto channels his inner Nimoy.

Three-Minute Fiction Reading: 'Plum Baby'

editor — Sat, 18 May 2013 20:41:00 +0000
NPR's Susan Stamberg reads an excerpt of one of the best submissions for Round 11 of our short story contest. She reads Plum Baby by Carmiel Banasky of Portland, Ore. You can read the full story below and find other stories on our Three-Minute Fiction page or on Facebook.
Copyright 2013 NPR.

'Waiting To Be Heard' No More, Amanda Knox Speaks Out

editor — Sat, 18 May 2013 20:41:00 +0000
When 20-year-old Amanda Knox left for Italy in August 2007, it was supposed to be a carefree year studying abroad.
No one could have foreseen it ending in her being accused, tried and convicted in the murder of her roommate, Meredith Kercher.
The case, and Knox, became an international media sensation.
"I think that there was a lot of fantasy projected onto me," she tells weekends on All Things Considered host Jacki Lyden.

'Scandal': Preposterous, Unmissable, Important

Gene Demby — Sat, 18 May 2013 15:44:00 +0000
OK, let's get this out of the way: Scandal is a ridiculous show.
The hit ABC drama about a Washington "fixer" named Olivia Pope just wrapped up its second season with one of its trademark cliffhangers.
(Assume spoilers, y'all.)
Scandal's plot arcs aren't really arcs so much as straight vertical lines or curlicues.

Author Elliott Holt says: 'Go West, Young Woman'

Lidia Jean Kott — Sat, 18 May 2013 11:12:00 +0000
In Elliott Holt's beautifully subtle debut novel You Are One of Them, the protagonist, an American in her 20s, moves to Moscow shortly after the Cold War. After a few months, she returns to the U.S. a changed woman.
Holt, who is 39, also lived in Moscow where she worked as a copywriter at an advertising agency, as well as in London and New York. Currently, she resides in Washington, D.C., and writes full time.
I asked Holt to make a list of her favorite books about living abroad and then called her to interview her about her choices.

Plum Baby

Carmiel Banasky — Sat, 18 May 2013 10:24:00 +0000
There isn't enough time in this world to grow your own tree. That tree is a plum baby still, never mind it's tall as the house those men are taking from us. It grew up with me. I say this to Mama Lee as she rests her hand on my shoulder like another shoulder. She nods and nods some more. She's been nodding all day like she's got two weights, one in her chin and the other in back of her skull that can't lie at rest.
We're standing in the yard facing the house in the dewy grass.

Dan Brown: 'Inferno' Is 'The Book That I Would Want To Read'

NPR Staff — Sat, 18 May 2013 09:18:00 +0000
Robert Langdon is back. The Harvard art professor in custom tweeds — and an ever-present Mickey Mouse watch — wakes up in a hospital after getting grazed in the head by a bullet, wondering how he ended up in Florence. He's got a sinister artifact sewn into his coat and just a few hours to keep the world from a grim biological catastrophe.
Dan Brown, whose book The Da Vinci Code — and several Robert Langdon sequels — has sold more than 200 million copies around the world, has written his first new novel in four years.

'That's That': A Memoir Of Loving And Leaving Northern Ireland

NPR Staff — Sat, 18 May 2013 09:13:00 +0000
Colin Broderick's first book, Orangutan, told the story of the 20 years — at least, as he could remember it — of being drunk, drug addicted and often desperate struggling to make his way as an Irish immigrant to New York.
His latest book might have been even harder to write: It's about what got him here to America.

Working Women On Television: A Mixed Bag At Best

Neda Ulaby — Sat, 18 May 2013 09:13:00 +0000
When actress Geena Davis was watching children's shows with her daughter a few years ago, she became so troubled by the lack of female representation, she started a think tank on gender in the media. The Geena Davis Institute recently partnered with University of California, Los Angeles, professors to conduct a study analyzing gender roles and jobs on screen.
The good news?

Not My Job: Three Headless Chicken Questions For Alice Cooper

editor — Sat, 18 May 2013 04:44:21 +0000
When you think about heavy metal — the costumes, the makeup, the outfits, the huge stage shows filled with effects and pyrotechnics — pretty much all of that was invented, or at least perfected, by Alice Cooper. If it weren't for him, bands like Slayer and Megadeth would be playing love songs in identical suits and bowl haircuts.
We've invited Cooper to play a game called "So what if you had bitten the head off that chicken?" We know — or at least, are willing to believe — he didn't really bite the head off a live chicken on stage.

'Venus And Serena': An Extraordinary Story, Told On Film

Elizabeth Blair — Fri, 17 May 2013 21:58:00 +0000
It's Cinderella plus Jackie Robinson times two. When Venus and Serena Williams burst onto the lily-white world of tennis, they changed the game and made history: They were sisters. From a poor neighborhood. Who brought unprecedented power to the game. And both reached No. 1.
Their journey is the subject of a new documentary called Venus and Serena, showing in select theaters around the country.
"It's not just about sports," says co-director Maiken Baird. "I think of it as the great American story. It's rich with family, sisterhood, race, hard work and tenaciousness."

Quinto Turns Inward To Find Spock's Soul

editor — Fri, 17 May 2013 21:18:00 +0000

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPkByAkAdZs

'Picture Cook': Drawings Are The Key Ingredients In These Recipes

Lydia Zuraw — Fri, 17 May 2013 19:47:00 +0000
Back in 2009, Katie Shelly was craving an eggplant Parmesan. Small problem: She'd never made it before. But she remembered that a college roommate used to make it, so she called her up and asked for the recipe.
The friend told her she needed to start with three bowls — one for breadcrumbs, one for egg and one for flour, salt and pepper.

Bill Hader On Sketch Comedy, Classic Hollywood

editor — Fri, 17 May 2013 17:05:00 +0000
This interview was originally broadcast on Aug. 22, 2012.
Comedian Bill Hader is adept onstage and doing live TV. But he's scared to death of standup.
He remembers watching Chris Rock's 1996 HBO special, Bring the Pain, and thinking, "I don't know how people do that."
"I need a character," Hader tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross.

Listener Encourages Hugs And Violins

editor — Fri, 17 May 2013 15:31:00 +0000
Transcript
CELESTE HEADLEE, HOST:
And now, it's time for BackTalk. That's where we lift the curtain on what's happening in the TELL ME MORE blogosphere. Editor Ammad Omar is with us.
So, Ammad, what's going on today?
AMMAD OMAR, BYLINE: Hey, Celeste. Well, earlier in the week, we had a roundtable conversation about sexual abuse in the military.

Pop Culture Happy Hour: Cancellation Blues And Cultural Etiquette

Linda Holmes — Fri, 17 May 2013 14:24:00 +0000
To mark network upfronts week, we talk in this episode about the cancellation of shows, including the ones that came and went that we honestly can hardly remember as well as the ones — like ABC's delightful, hilarious Happy Endings — that break our hearts.

Giving It Away

NPR/TED Staff — Fri, 17 May 2013 13:59:00 +0000

"It feels good to be able to change something. It feels good to give." -- Ron Finley
You can give away almost anything — your time, money, food, your ideas. Giving helps define who we are and helps us connect with others. And thanks to the Internet and a rise in social consciousness, there's been a seismic shift not only in what we're giving, but how. In this hour, stories from TED speakers who are "giving it away" in new and surprising ways, and the things that happen in return.
Copyright 2013 NPR.

How Do You Get People To Pay For Music?

NPR/TED Staff — Fri, 17 May 2013 13:55:00 +0000
Part 4 of the TED Radio Hour episode Giving It Away.
About Amanda Palmer's TEDTalk
Don't make people pay for music, says Amanda Palmer: Let them. In a passionate talk that begins in her days as a street performer, she examines the new relationship between artist and fan.