Journalist Alex Wagner was 12 years old when a line cook in a diner asked her if she was adopted. Wagner was taken aback — her father's family came generations ago from Luxembourg, and her mother came to the U.S. from what was then Burma.
Dorough, who died Monday, spoke with Terry Gross in 1982 and 1996. He told her his career was launched when an advertising executive asked him to put the multiplication tables to music.
The 4 CD compilation of 1957 recordings on Verve showcase Armstrong with a lush studio orchestra and with pianist Oscar Peterson. It also includes a wealth of alternate and incomplete takes, warm-ups and rehearsal sequences.
Jake Tapper talks about his debut novel set in Washington D.C. during the McCarthy era, and about the challenges of interviewing people from the Trump administration when they state falsehoods or evade his questions. And
Rock critic Ken Tucker shares some hits he's listening to, including BlocBoy JB and Drake's upbeat "Look Alive" and the moody sound of Post Malone's "Walk It Talk It."
Historian Kathleen Belew's new book Bring The War Home is about how the white power movement expanded and consolidated when white supremacist and neo Nazi groups came together. They formed an openly anti-government agenda.
Pius IX became head of the Catholic church in 1846 and instituted the doctrine of Papal infallibility. Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Kertzer says his exile led to the emergence of modern Italy.
Gregory Pardlo's new memoir, Air Traffic, chronicles his complicated relationship with his father, a labor organizer who lost his job following the air traffic controllers' 1981 strike.
The Academy Award-winning filmmaker, who died on April 13, spoke to Fresh Air in 1994 about growing up in the former Czechoslovakia, first under the Gestapo, then under communist rule.
A woman with low self-esteem hits her head and suddenly sees herself as madly attractive. Critic David Edelstein says I Feel Pretty suggests the notion of what's "pretty" should be "elasticized."
Anderson, who died April 16, began his career as a street performer specializing in elaborate pranks. He spoke to Fresh Air in 1989 about an illusion in which he pretended to chop off his own hand.
Just who controls the Twitter handle @realDonaldTrump? If you guessed the president, journalist Robert Draper says you might be only partially correct.
Both shows are set in a dystopian near-future where things have gone terribly wrong — and both expand their established environments considerably in their sophomore seasons.
Former first lady Barbara Bush died Tuesday after a series of hospitalizations. She was the wife of former President George H.W. Bush and the mother of former President George W. Bush.
Henry plays Alfred, aka the rapper "Paper Boi," on the FX series Atlanta. As his character becomes more successful, Henry says, he's getting "a little further away from the essence of who [he] is."
Legion began its second season in early April on FX. David Bianculli says the new episode of the series, "Chapter 11," is strange and compelling in a way that reminds him of the original Twin Peaks.
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Lawrence Wright predicts that the largest "red" state in the union will eventually move into the "blue" column — and change the nation's politics in the process.