Feb 22, 2026

Marcia Franklin talks with poet Richard Blanco, the first LatinX and gay inaugural poet. Blanco wrote a poem for President Obama’s second inaugural and read it at the ceremony. He discusses the process of writing the inaugural poem, “One Today,” how the piece reflected his life and his philosophy of writing, the...

Feb 15, 2026

Journalist Louisa Thomas talks about her book Louisa: The Extraordinary Life of Mrs. Adams, which examines the life and times of First Lady Louisa Catherine Adams, the wife of President John Quincy Adams and the first foreign-born First Lady of the United States. Thomas illuminates not only the life of this fascinating...

Feb 8, 2026

Dialogue host Marcia Franklin talks with historical novelist Lois Leveen about two of her works: The Secrets of Mary Bowser, about a former slave who was a spy in the Confederate White House, and Juliet's Nurse, which imagines the life of the nurse in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Franklin asks Leveen about how she...

Feb 1, 2026

Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin talks about her book, Team of Rivals, which chronicles the sometimes fraught relationship between Abraham Lincoln and his cabinet members. The book was the basis for the 2012 movie, Lincoln, which was nominated for 12 Academy Awards.

Goodwin talks about the lessons...

Jan 25, 2026

Marcia Franklin talks with Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), the last of the so-called "Big Six" leaders of the African-American civil rights movement. Lewis was the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) from 1963 to 1966, and played a seminal role in some of the 56 most important activities of...