The Big Idea
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The Big Idea: Bill McKibben
Journalist and environmental activist Bill McKibben discusses whether our environmental crisis can be improved under our new political administration, climate change denial, and manifestations of resistance.
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The Big Idea: Dawn Tripp
Dawn Tripp discusses Georgia, her new novel based on Georgia O’Keeffe’s life, O’Keeffe’s distancing herself from feminism, and balancing biography with fiction.
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The Big Idea: John Freeman
John Freeman, Executive Editor at Lit Hub, talks with Suzanne Koven about his new print-only literary magazine Freeman’s, the difference between between criticism and editing, and his fear of flying.
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The Big Idea: Mark Bittman
Suzanne Koven talks to food journalist, author, and activist Mark Bittman about his “Big Idea”—how food has changed in the last fifty years, and how to teach our children to eat better.
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The Big Idea: Eula Biss
On Immunity author Eula Biss speaks to Suzanne Koven about mythology, personal freedom, and the history of vaccines.
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The Big Idea: Roz Chast
Suzanne Koven talks to Roz Chast about comics, the burdens of elder care, and her new graphic memoir Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?
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The Big Idea: Rebecca Mead
Suzanne Koven sits down with the New Yorker’s Rebecca Mead to discuss My Life in Middlemarch, the way a single great book can illuminate our lives over decades, and how our reading of that book changes as we grow older.
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The Big Idea: Fady Joudah
Suzanne Koven speaks to Palestinian American physician and poet Fady Joudah about poetry and politics, text and context, and the marginalization of the “other” in the literary world.
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The Big Idea: Carl Hart
Suzanne Koven talks to neuroscientist Carl Hart about his recent book, High Price, and how misinformation, emotionalism, and racism have played major roles in our country’s war—and our culture’s views—on drugs.
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The Big Idea: Oliver Sacks
To celebrate his 80th birthday, The Rumpus sits down with neurologist and writer Oliver Sacks to discuss his latest book, Hallucinations, and the relationship between hallucinatory experiences and the imagination and creativity.
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The Big Idea: Eve Ensler
Writer, journalist, activist, and lifelong feminist Eve Ensler talks with Suzanne Koven and explores the body’s relationship to the desecration of the earth, the importance of listening to the “real” in ourselves, and how it feels to be known as…
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The Big Idea: Gish Jen
“The Big Idea” features interviews with people whose lights stay on—writers, artists, scientists, activists, and others who take a long and broad view of an issue, problem, or concept, and pursue it over many years.