Books

The feminist scholar looks at how women in dual-career partnerships are often responsible for most of the unpaid domestic work. Hochschild joins Fresh Air to discuss why men don't share this labor equally with their partners, and the toll this inequity takes on working women.

Book critic John Leonard reviews the German author's new book, about his travels to Calcutta. Frustrated with the industrial revival of the two Germanies, Grass goes abroad to learn about other models of national identity.

Maureen Corrigan reviews the new novel by feminist author Marge Piercy. The book focuses on a love triangle between a woman and a married couple, as well as the nature of art, and living in Cape Cod year round.

Author Philip Roth was in part responsible for getting the Czech novelists Life with a Star translated into English and published stateside. Book critic John Leonard says it stands out among the myriad, Kafka-esque books about the Holocaust.

Book critic John Leonard says Barry Hannah's southern, hard-drinking life echoes that of William Faulkner. Hannah's novel Boomerang also evokes the author's sometimes scary, creeping spirit.

China expert Orville Schell says that students in that country are fighting for American-style democracy and greater freedom of expression. In light of the recent Tiananmen Square protests, Schell joins Fresh Air to discuss the history and future of anti-establishment movements.

Turkish-born writer Alev Lytle Croutier has a new book about harems. Contrary to their popular associations with polygamy, these spaces were most commonly used to isolate women slaves and family members from the outside world. Croutier herself grew up in a harem with her mother.

Baker's new memoir, a sequel to his book Growing Up, chronicles his career as a reporter during his twenties and thirties. Book critic John Leonard says that the story, like Baker's New York Times columns, twists and turns to explore the fraught inner workings of journalism.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan is no fan of minimalist literature, which she derides for its familiar, navel-gazing themes. By contrast, she admires T. Coraghesson's expansive, political, and historical fiction. Unfortunately, his approach is better suited to the novel, rather than the short stories in his latest collection, If the River Was Whiskey.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Halberstam usually covers international affairs. Book critic John Leonard says the writer's new book reveals a boyish fandom for a bygone era of baseball.