Culture

a tibetan bell

Choying Drolma didn't want to get married. So, she chose the only option available to a Tibetan girl – she became a Buddhist nun. In this hour of To The Best Of Our Knowledge, how music and the monastic life drew one woman beyond Tibet and into the world. Also, the making of a Western yogi. And...

Tristran Shandy

Laurence Sterne's 18th Century novel "Tristram Shandy" is a staple of college English Literature courses everywhere. The 600-odd page book-within-a-book-within-a-book is filled to the brim with digressions, stunts and frazzled chronology. For many it's unreadable. For sure it's unfilmable. This...

Story of O

"Story of O" scandalized a nation. And a nation not easily scandalized - France! The anonymous tale of complete submission was called vulgar by some, brilliant by others. In any case, what kind of person could write such a book? In this hour of To The Best Of Our Knowledge, we'll find out the...

a record player

What makes a classic?  Well, for one thing, it’s got to have some staying power.  The Bob Dylan song, “Like A Rolling Stone,” certainly fits the bill. It was recorded more than fifty years ago but it’s still considered by many to be the greatest pop single ever made.  In...

Woman on a bike

Linda Ellerbee believes in taking big bites. And she's not just talking about food. Ellerbee likes to take big bites out of elsewhere. In fact, that's the way she defines adventure. In this hour of the Peabody Award-winning program To The Best Of Our Knowledge, journalist Linda Ellerbee tells us...

a man becomes a living cereal bowl

Can white guys be hip? Many have tried but only a few have achieved true hepcat status - Bob Dylan, Lenny Bruce, maybe Jack Kerouac. But compare them to Miles Davis and you have to wonder if they're really just hipster wannabes. We'll dig into the history of hip, and see how it's so often tied...

Chinese flag

Forget the Middle East.  Robert Kaplan says the war in Iraq is just a blip on the radar screen.  The next U.S. military challenge will be in the Pacific - against China.  In this hour of the Peabody Award Winning program To the Best of Our Knowledge we’ll look at a changing China...

A Tale from the Decameron by John William Waterhouse

Middle English isn’t what it used to be.  Add a back-beat, some high-flying rhymes, and you’ve got a hot new version of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales.”  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the madcap transformation of one of literature’s oldest classics from history to hip hop...

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