Weekend Edition Saturday

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88.5-1

Saturday

8:00 am

88.3

Saturday

8:00 am

From civil wars in Bosnia and El Salvador, to hospital rooms, police stations, and America's backyards, National Public Radio's Peabody Award-winning correspondent Scott Simon brings a well-traveled perspective to his role as host of Weekend Edition Saturday.

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Saturday, October 5, 2013

NYC Cockroaches Stick To Their Neighborhoods

Cockroaches, it just so happens, actually resemble humans, forming distinct groups and neighborhoods. Host Scott Simon talks to Mark Stoeckle of Rockefeller University, whose research uncovered this roach behavior.

At 300, Encyclopedia Pioneer May Yet Get A Hero's Burial

French philosopher Denis Diderot was the driving force behind one of the first compendiums of human knowledge, but his contributions have been largely lost to history. Now, the anniversary of his birth has prompted calls to reinter his remains in Paris' Pantheon, alongside the likes of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

Syria Expected To Spar With Inspectors As Weapons Hunt Begins

An team of experts entered the country on Tuesday to find and destroy Syria's chemical weapons stockpile. The Assad regime has agreed to allow access, but the United Nations resolution and the Chemical Weapons Convention also give the country some rights in the process. Weapons expert Amy Smithson fears he will exploit that.

Spies And Novelists Both 'Accomplished Liars,' Says New Bond Author

Acclaimed British author William Boyd was tapped last year to write the latest James Bond novel. The new book, called Solo, takes 007 on his first trip to Africa. Boyd says the Bond of the novels is quite different from the Bond on the screen — and that he sees a definite overlap between spies and novelists.

Nothing Raises Cash Like A Crisis

Some lawmakers canceled fundraising events with the government shutdown this week. But for outside groups, controversy is always a good reason to ask small donors for cash.

Does Capitalism Work? A True/False Quiz In Times Square

"Starting a conversation about capitalism is like walking up to a stranger and asking, 'Can I talk to you about Jesus?'" says artist Steve Lambert. The best way to talk about the C-word, he says, is to make it personal. His giant art installation in New York challenges passers-by to weigh in.

Saturday, September 28, 2013

With Government Shutdown Looming, All Eyes Turn To House GOP

The Senate passed a bill Friday to keep the government open without stripping any funding from the president's health care law. Now the action returns to the House, where Republicans are tying the measure to defunding the Affordable Care Act.

In Washington's Fiscal Tango, Obama's Lacking A Dance Partner

The division in the Republican Party means there's no one leader on the other side that President Obama can cut a deal with — or even high-profile adversary to vilify. That's a stark contrast from other recent fiscal standoffs.

News From Lake Wobegon: Garrison Keillor Has A New Book Of Poetry

The host of A Prairie Home Companion and The Writer's Almanac has published his first poetry collection called O, What a Luxury: Verses Lyrical, Vulgar, Pathetic and Profound. "I love rhymes," Keillor says. "I love to write a poem about New York and rhyme 'oysters' with 'The Cloisters.'"

'If It Swings': An Asian-American Jazzman's Pioneering Career

Saxophonist Gabe Baltazar is one of the last living links to an era when Asian-Americans began to make a name for themselves in jazz. Now, at the age of 83, he's sharing his story in an autobiography.

I, Spy: Valerie Plame Makes Her Fiction Debut In CIA Thriller

In Blowback, Plame channels her expertise in nuclear counterproliferation into a "realistic portrait" of a female covert agent. Plame confesses that there's a lot of downtime in the life of a spy, but still, the CIA is "the world's biggest dating agency."

On Eliot's 125th, His 'Waste Land' Hasn't Lost Its Glamour

This year marks the 125th birthday of Nobel Prize-winning poet T.S. Eliot. To celebrate, a re-issue of the first edition of his seminal poem has just been published, with an introduction by New Yorker poetry editor Paul Muldoon. NPR's Scott Simon speaks with Muldoon about the poem's lasting influence.

Dr. Seuss Suited For The Senate; Shakespeare, Not So Much

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas held the Senate floor for 21 hours, and during that time, he read from Green Eggs and Ham. NPR's Scott Simon reflects on the quotes and texts politicians turn to, and the ones they avoid.

Rangers, Reds, Indians Battle For AL Wild Card Spot

On the last weekend of regular-season baseball, Howard Bryant of ESPN joins host Scott Simon to talk about the playoff possibilities, plus big changes afoot in how college athletes get paid for their likenesses.

Sense Of Foreboding Lingers After Mall Bombing

Kenyans are feeling helpless a week after gunmen stormed a Nairobi mall in a carefully orchestrated terrorist attack. NPR's Gregory Warner looks at what we now know about those terrorists, including claims that a British woman was among the attackers.

Pages

Arts & Culture

WAMU 88.5

Art Beat With Lauren Landau, October 7

You can explore one calligrapher's modern take on Korean handwriting, or see two shows that require a little help from the audience.

Food

NPR

Labor-Starved Pear Farmers Buckle Under Bumper Crop

The Pacific Northwest grows the majority of the nation's pears, and this year's harvest is predicted to be the third-largest in history. But farmers are facing a shortfall that's been plaguing many agricultural industries: not enough workers to pick the fruit.

Politics

NPR

No End In Sight: Shutdown Showdown Enters Week Two

Hundreds of thousands of Defense Department civilian employees will go back to work on Monday, but many government operations remain suspended.

Technology

NPR

Wanted: A New Generation Of High-Tech Aviation Workers

Millions of U.S. factory jobs have been lost in the past decade. Now, in North Carolina, high school students are being encouraged to think about taking manufacturing jobs. But this isn't the furniture-making or textile labor of generations past — it's a new kind of highly technical work in aviation.

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Weekend Edition Saturday

Arts & Culture

Art Beat With Lauren Landau, October 7

Food

Labor-Starved Pear Farmers Buckle Under Bumper Crop

Politics

No End In Sight: Shutdown Showdown Enters Week Two

Technology

Wanted: A New Generation Of High-Tech Aviation Workers

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