The singer, songwriter and guitarist was recently inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Prine spoke with Terry Gross in 2018 when his album 'The Tree of Forgiveness' was released. He described how his voice changed after neck cancer: "It dropped down lower and feels friendlier." 

Also, TV critic David Bianculli reviews the final seasons of FX's 'Legion' and Netflix's 'Jessica Jones.'

John Prine

Fresh Air from WHYY, the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues, is one of public radio's most popular programs. Hosted by Terry Gross, the show features intimate conversations with today's biggest luminaries.

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Kathleen Hanna's band Bikini Kill was the epicenter of the riot grrrl feminist punk movement of the '90s. Their song "Rebel Girl" was the anthem. Now Hanna has a memoir (also called Rebel Girl) about her time in the punk scene, her childhood, and finding joy in expressing anger in public. 

Also, book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews Claire Messud's new novel, This Strange Eventful History. 

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Kathleen Hanna's 'Rebel Girl' Life

WNBA star Brittney Griner talks about the physical and emotional hell of her nearly 300 days in Russian prisons. Russian authorities apprehended Griner at the Moscow Airport when she was found carrying a tiny amount of medically prescribed cannabis — then charged her with drug smuggling. Her memoir is Coming Home. 

Jazz historian Kevin Whitehead reviews a 1959 Sonny Rollins reissue. 

And we'll talk about plant intelligence with climate journalist Zoë Schlanger. Her book is The Light Eaters.

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Best Of: Brittney Griner / Discovering Plant Intelligence

Viet Thanh Nguyen's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Sympathizer has been adapted into a series on HBO/MAX. It's set in Vietnam during the last days of the war, and in LA, just after. The narrator becomes a consultant to a Hollywood film about the war. The novel is written from a Vietnamese perspective. "It's my revenge on Francis Ford Coppola, my revenge on Hollywood, to try to get Americans to understand that Vietnam is a country and not a war," he told Terry Gross in 2016. Nguyen's family fled their village in South Vietnam in 1975, when it was taken over by the North. 

Also, David Bianculli reviews Let It Be, the Beatles film restored and rereleased after being shelved for more than 50 years.


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'The Sympathizer' Author Viet Thanh Nguyen

We remember painter and sculptor Frank Stella, whose early work was considered revolutionary. He died last week at age 87. Stella became famous and controversial in the 1950s for his "black paintings," which were a stark contrast to the abstract expressionism of the time, and made him one of the fathers of minimalism. 

Later, we'll feature an interview with one of the most influential early rock and roll guitarists, Duane Eddy. He also died last week. 

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews Long Island, Colm Tóibín's new sequel to his bestselling novel Brooklyn. 

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Remembering Minimalist Painter Frank Stella

#BlackLivesMatter. #OscarsSoWhite. #ICantBreathe. Filmmaker Prentice Penny's docuseries about Black Twitter celebrates the voices and movements that impacted politics and culture. Penny was also the showrunner of the HBO series Insecure. 

Also, John Powers reviews the four-part series Shardlake, based on C.J. Sansom's first novel in a series about a crime-solving lawyer in 16th-century England.

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John Prine

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