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On August 15, 2021, fighters entered Kabul, the capital city of Afghanistan, and the US-backed Islamic Republic of Afghanistan collapsed. Over 100,000 people were evacuated, and among them, locals who had worked for the New York Times. In their book, The Last Free Women, A Daring Escape from Afghanistan. Journalists Rebecca Blumenstein and Diana Capp detailed the New York Times' efforts to get them out and the lives of four of the women after they arrived in the United States.  Blumenstein and Capp came to KQED Studios on August 3, 2026 to talk about the book with journalist Deepa Fernandez.

The legendary restaurateur Danny Meyer’s new book, What Could Go Right, is about the unique culture of his restaurant group, from some of New York's best known fine dining institutions like Union Square Café and Gramercy Tavern to Shake Shack, a burger chain with nearly 400 locations. On October 8, 2026, Meyer came to KQED Studios to talk to Steven Wynn about what he defines as true hospitality and some of the highs and lows of his decades in the business.

Kyle MacLachlan has built a fascinating acting career, performing in everything from David Lynch’s Twin Peaks to the adaptation of the video game Fallout. In the process, he has become a beloved cultural icon. MacLachlan’s 1984 film debut was the starring role in Lynch’s Dune. He would go on to work with the experimental director on multiple projects, including the classic film Blue Velvet. For his performance as Special Agent Dale Cooper in Twin Peaks, MacLachlan won a Golden Globe and gained international fame. More recently, he has gained a new group of fans through his award-winning performance in the show Fallout and the crime comedy show The Lowdown, his podcasts, and social media.   On October 2, 2026, Kyle MacLachlan came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk with Jesse Hawthorne Ficks about his new memoir Fictional Selves.

Leila Slimani

Kristin Hannah’s award-winning, best-selling novels, including the international hit The Nightingale, celebrate the all-too-often forgotten power of women across history. Her newest book, The Women, tells the story of one woman coming of age in the turbulence of 1960s America. In the process, Hannah shines a light on the story of all women who put themselves in harm’s way to help others. An intimate portrait of a turbulent, transformative time in America, the novel explores a generation who were scarred on the battlefields only to return to a divided nation. On September 23, 2026, Kristin Hannah came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to be interviewed on stage by Yangsze Choo, whose novels include The Fox Wife, The Ghost Bride, and The Night Tiger.

Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor, two of today’s most significant intellectuals, examine extremism and other contemporary movements in their new book, End Times Fascism. It’s a scathing investigation of, and strategies for fighting against, the Christian nationalists, Silicon Valley reactionaries, and populist survivalists who define the contemporary, apocalyptic right.  An award-winning journalist, filmmaker, and author, Naomi Klein’s now classic books, including Doppelganger, No Logo, and The Shock Doctrine, have been translated into 35 languages. She is an associate professor of geography and co-director of the Centre for Climate Justice at the University of British Columbia. Astra Taylor is an award-winning writer, activist, and documentarian. She cofounded the Debt Collective, a union fighting to cancel debt, work that has made her an influential critic of late capitalism. She is the author of The People’s Platform, which won the American Book Award; Democracy May Not Exist, But We’ll Miss It When It’s Gone; and The Age of Insecurity.  On September 22, 2026, Astra Taylor and Naomi Klein came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk about End Times Fascism with Poulomi Saha, Chair of the Program in Critical Theory at the University of California, Berkeley.

Our guest this week is Emily St. John Mandel, a writer whose work experiments with literary noir, speculative fiction, and horror.  Her bestselling books include The Glass Hotel and Sea of Tranquility, and her post-apocalyptic novel Station Eleven was adapted into a limited series for HBO. This year, Mandel returns with her new novel Exit Party, diving into a future United States locked in a new civil war. It is within this painful landscape that Mandel explores freedom, surveillance, and the possibility of a better world. On September 18, 2026, Emily St. John Mandel came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk with Daniel Handler, the author of numerous books for all ages – sometimes under the pen name Lemony Snicket.

Civil rights attorney Bryan Stevenson has dedicated his career to helping the poor, defending the incarcerated, and fighting for equality and justice. He is the founder and Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative.  The nonprofit has won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent death row prisoners, confronting abuse of incarcerated people, and ending mandatory life-without-parole sentences for children. His book Just Mercy is a New York Times bestseller, and was made into a film starring Michael B. Jordan. On September 10, 2026, Bryan Stevenson came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk with Lisa Armstrong, a journalist and professor at the UC Berkeley School of Journalism.

This week, we remember the life of writer, poet, farmer, and environmentalist Wendell Berry, by listening back to a 2010 conversation with fellow writer and activist Michael Pollan.  Berry was of America’s most influential voices on agriculture and the environment, and he wrote with a calm and compelling vision about our relationship with the land, our work, and our communities. Among his best-known books: The Unsettling of America, What Are People For?, and The Peace of Wild Things. After studying at the University of Kentucky and Stanford, and teaching at New York University, Berry returned to his native Henry County, Kentucky in the 1960s. There, he and his wife, Tanya, began farming. Berry spent the rest of his life in Kentucky,  farming and writing poems, novels, and essays about tending the land, about community, and the costs of an increasingly industrialized society.  Berry was also an activist, protesting the Vietnam War, mountaintop-removal coal mining, and nuclear power, and he inspired generations of environmentalists, farmers, food activists, and writers.  Berry died on August 31, 2026, at his home in Port Royal, Kentucky. He was 92.

This week, we remember the life of Gloria Steinem – legendary feminist, activist, and journalist, with a rebroadcast of a conversation recorded in San Francisco on November 9, 2015. For more than half a century, Gloria Steinem was one of the most influential voices for women’s rights, equality, and social justice. Steinem began her journalism career in New York, gaining national attention with an undercover investigation of the working conditions at the Playboy Club. In 1971, she co-founded Ms. Magazine, a groundbreaking publication that centered women’s lives in the larger political and cultural conversation.  Steinem was a mentor to generations of women - whether through her writing, her activism, or simply her example, Steinem offered women an invitation to speak out, organize, and imagine a different future.  City Arts & Lectures’ founder, Sydney Goldstein, was one of those women, and Gloria was a guest onstage many times - and lent her advice and support offstage. Gloria Steinem died on September 3, 2026, in New York. She was 92. In this 2015 appearance, Steinem talked with filmmaker, activist and artist Chinaka  Hodge, after the publication of her memoir, My Life On The Road.

Robert Reich, the former Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton, is one of today’s leading voices addressing issues of income inequality.  Reich served in three presidential administrations, and recently retired from teaching at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Policy after nearly 20 years.  His classes were among the most popular on campus, and the end of his teaching career inspired the documentary “The Last Class”.  Reich publishes extensively on social media and is the author of more than 20 books including his 2025 memoir, “Coming Up Short”.  On July 23, 2025, Reich spoke with Monika Bauerlein, the CEO of the Center for Investigative Reporting, a nonprofit multimedia news organization that houses Mother Jones magazine and the radio show and podcast Reveal.

Essayist and novelist Edwidge Danticat moved from Port-au-Prince to the United States at the age of twelve and began writing about Haitian culture and the immigrant experience when she was just 13. Danticat has gone on to write numerous critically acclaimed books, and currently teaches at Columbia University. On August 3, 2026, Danticat talked  about her most recent novel, Dey, with Lisa Armstrong, Associate Dean at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.

Emmy-nominated actress and activist Laverne Cox rose to fame through her role on Orange is the New Black, quickly becoming an important voice for transgender rights. In her debut memoir Transcendent, Cox delves into her traumas, gender identity, transition, and, in the end, her journey to healing. Laverne Cox spent years tirelessly working to make it as an actress before her breakout, Emmy-nominated role in Orange Is the New Black. She studied dance, acted in off-Broadway shows, and worked in restaurants, all while honing her craft. Now, she has appeared in award-winning movies and shows, produced the award-winning documentary The T Word, and become a leading voice advocating for queer and transgender people. In her debut memoir Transcendent, Cox delves into her traumas, gender identity, transition, and, in the end, her journey to healing. On June 11, 2026, Laverne Cox came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco for an on-stage conversation with filmmaker, writer, and actress Cheryl Dunye.

This is an encore presentation of a program originally broadcast in October of 2025. Arundhati Roy’s internationally best-selling novels include The God of Small Things and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness.  Her nonfiction works engage elegantly and passionately with class and power, among other issues.  Roy’s new memoir, Mother Mary Comes to Me, examines her childhood in Kerala, India, and a mother whose commitment to justice and education made her a powerful force in the community – but whose volatility made for a challenging family life that included emotional abuse.  On September 19, 2025, Arundhati Roy came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to read from her memoir and hold an on-stage conversation with journalist Deepa Fernandes.

Dr. Vivek Murthy served as the Surgeon General of the United States under both Presidents Obama and Biden.   In that capacity, Murthy shaped the federal response to the opioid epidemic, the rise of e-cigarettes, the Flint, Michigan water crisis, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Murthy has pushed to reduce access to social media for young children, pointing out the harmful effects of bullying, a lack of in-person interactions, and harassment.  Recently, Murthy has written about and spoken on the negative health effects of loneliness, calling it an “epidemic” that increases the risk of early death and other social problems. On April 16, 2024, Vivek Murthy came to the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco to talk about how to combat loneliness with public radio journalist David Greene.