Jack was studying vocal performance when he met Seigen at the local Zen center. They became good friends. They took walks, stopping to look at every tree. Then Seigen asked Jack to drive him to an execution.

Abra Bush, the new dean of the Jacobs School of Music, says conservatories are going to have to go beyond the Western canon to stay relevant to up-and-coming musicians in the twenty-first century.

Malcolm Mobutu Smith on comic books, collecting, and the exhibit he just put together based on that collection. Then, Bill Carroll uses the quantitative skills he developed as a chemist to analyze the billboard charts of the 1960s and 70s.

Writer and teacher Michael Martone on fiction without narrative, teaching without grades, and writing about Indiana beyond corn, basketball, and sugar cream pie.

First, a conversation with artist Honey Hodges about collages, immigrating to the U.S., and the opportunity to care for someone who has always taken care of you. Then, naturalist Jim Eagleman reminds us why we should go outside in the winter, and at night.

Three stories. One about the challenges of accessing books in prison. One about how overlooking a neighborhood’s history has affected the place. One about a comic book artist who has yet to experience writers’ block.

The graphic novel Headland is about a woman in a hospital, the wilderness she visits in her mind, and the tortoise she meets there. It’s also about the medicalization of death and dying. This week, we talk with the author, Kate Schneider. Plus, Midwestern Movies, with Alicia Kozma.

A conversation with novelist Jacinda Townsend about her new novel, which tackles the subject of motherhood from two perspectives on different sides of the world.

Scholar and writer Ava Tomasula y Garcia tells the story of the Calumet Region, how the gas boom started with a bang, brought major industry and new racial dynamics, and why “the Rust Belt” is a bit of a misnomer.

In 1980, the Indonesian fiction writer Budi Darma published a book of short stories called People from Bloomington. The English translation came out this month. This week on Inner States, translator Tiffany Tsao on Indonesian literature, Budi Darma, and Twitter.