Library Talks

This week we're bringing you a conversation with songwriter and guitarist Robbie Robertson. As an original member of the seminal music group the Band, Robertson has helped shape American music and culture profoundly. He's joined by Stevie Van Zandt of the E Street Band for reflective conversation on the history of rock and roll and the way it continues to shape their lives.

For this week's episode we're bringing you a conversation between two Nigerian authors whose works include plays, novels, poetry, essays and more. Chris Abani is known as an international voice on humanitarianism, art, ethics and our shared political responsibility. Wole Soyinka won of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986 and has received accolades for his work in writing and advocating for human rights. The two recently sat down at the Library for a on the intersections between art, writing, activism, and politics.

For this week's episode, we're bringing you a conversation between two public intellectuals who have contributed immensely to our understanding of history, literature, cultural criticism, and politics, Macarthur Fellow Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Pulitzer Prize winner Margo Jefferson. In 2006, Gates and Jefferson sat down at the Library for a special event on Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin co-presented with The Studio Museum in Harlem.

This week we're joined by two legendary women from very different artistic backgrounds, performance artist Marina Abramović and rock singer Debbie Harry of Blondie. The two share stories and insights from their lives and art as they discuss Abramovic's new memoir, Walk Through Walls.

This week, we're bringing you a conversation with author and policy advisor Tim Wu. In his new book The Attention Merchants, Wu makes the case truly paying attention is both incredibly rare and incredibly valuable. He's joined in conversation by conversation by writer, documentarian, and Professor of Media Theory and Digital Economics at CUNY/Queens, Douglas Rushkoff.

Four hundred years after William Shakespeare's death, Margaret Atwood retells one of his most beloved plays, The Tempest, with a dark and fantastical interpretation in her new book, Hag-Seed. This week on the podcast, Atwood is joined in conversation by celebrated actress Fiona Shaw for a discussion of the Bard and his influence on their work.

The original Antigone may be from antiquity, but our current era abounds with women fighting unabashedly for what they believe. This week on the podcast, we welcome journalist, feminist, and author of Headscarves and Hymens: Why the Middle East Needs a Sexual Revolution, Mony Eltahawy. As you'll hear is a force to be reckoned with and an embodiment of this spirit. She is joined by yet another fierce and powerful author and journalist, Yasmine El Rashidi.

Perhaps the most permanent - and essential - character in Sally Mann's work is that of place: the American South. Her home of Lexington, VA is not just the set for her most powerful work; it is also the place where she met fellow artist and friend, Cy Twombly. The photographs from her new book, Remembered Light: Cy Twombly in Lexington, are featured in an exhibition at Gagosian Gallery; and she had many stories to tell when she sat down for a conversation NYPL's Paul Holdengräber.

Yanis Varoufakis considers himself a politician by necessity, not by choice. An economist and academic by training, he became Greece's finance minister amidst the country's financial crisis, creating an image for himself both beloved and reviled. He came to the Library last April to discuss this complicated role and his recent book, And the Weak Suffer What They Must?: Europe's Crisis and America's Economic Future. He was joined in conversation by renowned academic and theorist Noam Chomsky.

He enthralls audiences with his colorful roles, but Alan Cumming's real-life adventures pack just as much punch. This week we're bringing you the first event from our Fall LIVE series as Paul Holdengräber and the award-winning actor in a conversation as whimsical and mischievous as Cumming's new book of photographs and essays, You Gotta Get Bigger Dreams: My Life in Stories and Pictures.