archive
Krulwich Wonders...
120 Giants Found Living With 86-Year-Old Man
May 11, 2012 What inspired 86-year-old Brendon Grimshaw to buy an island in the Indian Ocean, replant it with 16,000 trees, grasses and lure a bunch of giant tortoises to live with him?
Simon Says
A Panda's Inseminal Moment, Tweet By Tweet
May 5, 2012 This week on Twitter, the social media service famed for carrying the messages of pro-democracy dissidents in Iran, Egypt and other places, featured something a little difficult to conceive: live tweeting of the artificial insemination of a giant panda at the National Zoo.
Simon Says
He Mapped The World, And We Saw Ourselves
April 28, 2012 In a time when most people never got to venture much further than the place in which they were born, Gerardus Mercator's maps gave us not only a truer view of our world, but the means to go out and explore it.
Simon Says
Prostitution's Real Casualties Aren't Secret Service
April 21, 2012 I've been curious about a question I haven't heard in the stories about U.S. Secret Service agents misbehaving before President Obama's arrival at the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia. Why were world leaders meeting in a place with legalized prostitution anyway?
Books
On Writing A Best-Seller (Shhh, There's a Formula)
April 17, 2012 To Kill a Mockingbird and Valley of the Dolls have more in common than you think. In his new book Hit Lit, mystery writer James Hall argues that best-sellers from the past century share 12 features.
Essays
The DOJ E-Book Lawsuit: Is It 1934 All Over Again?
April 12, 2012 The Department of Justice's lawsuit against Apple and five major publishers for e-book price fixing sent shivers through the industry — but Jason Boog says this fraught relationship between American publishers, retailers and the DOJ goes back to the Great Depression.
Simon Says
Bosnia Remembers When The World Looked Away
April 7, 2012 A river of 11,541 empty red chairs flowed through the streets of Sarajevo on Friday, honoring those who died in the Siege of Sarajevo 20 years ago. It might remind us today that while getting involved can be costly, there is also a cost for not acting — in lives.
Simon Says
Beef, Tarantula And Gout: Food Critics Suffer, Too
March 31, 2012 Former New York Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni recently revealed he has gout. It's hard for most of us to feel too sorry for people who get paid to eat free meals at posh restaurants, but food professionals will tell you: Eating asks a lot of your body.
Simon Says
Politics Gets Dirtier: Attack Ad Goes After Cat
March 3, 2012 If American politicians are going to quarrel like cats and dogs, why not just elect cats and dogs? Yet even pets can't hide from the political caterwauling; attacks against the candidacy of Hank the Cat may have reached a new low.
Can I Just Tell You?
The Power Of Memoirs, Biographies
February 29, 2012 In her weekly essay, host Michel Martin closes the book on Black History Month and looks ahead to Women's History Month. Tell Me More will bring a series of conversations with the authors of biographies about remarkable women.
Simon Says
Other People's Atrocities: None Of Our Business?
February 25, 2012 Events as disparate as the cruel violence in Syria and the unnerving conditions where Apple's iPads are made in China, raise a recurring question: When do a country's internal affairs become the business of the world? And when do we make that our personal business?
Simon Says
John Glenn, A Hero Well Before Orbiting Earth
February 18, 2012 Fifty years ago, John Glenn was alone on top of a rocket waiting to blast into space and around Earth. In these times, when people can become suddenly famous for doing so little, Glenn's flight is a timeless reminder that the most amazing and marvelous inventions won't work without human skill and daring.
Simon Says
Ralph Nader's $2,680 Airplane Aisle Seat
February 11, 2012 When Americans traveled by stagecoach, they had to worry about rocks, rattlesnakes, robbers and other varmints. But I wonder if there weren't fewer passenger complaints.
Monkey See
Much Ado About Dickens: Why The Bicentennial Hype Matters
February 9, 2012 He's trending on Twitter, inspiring Google Doodles and hawking hoodies. Why Dickens has always inspired such adoration — and why the book business should pay close attention.
Standing In Defense Of Diet Coke
February 4, 2012 Living abroad helped me to see just how obsessed we are in the U.S. about giving each other tips about what not to put in our mouths.
