Kurt Anderson

The World

The Waste Land 2.0

April may be the cruelest month, but June has been good for T.S. Eliot's landmark poem, The Waste Land. Eighty-nine years after it was published, the poem became a runaway hit in the form of a new iPad application that's selling like gangbusters.

The Waste Land 2.0
The World

Studio 360 Redesign: Gay Flag

Studio 360 Redesign: Gay Flag
The World

Rudresh Mahanthappa Finds His Roots

Rudresh Mahanthappa Finds His Roots
The World

Design For the Real World: Pop-Tab

Design For the Real World: Pop-Tab
The World

Kim Burrell's New Gospel of Love

Kim Burrell's New Gospel of Love
The World

Any Last Words?

Last week novelist Timothy Schaffert spoke with Kurt Andersen about his new novel, The Coffins of Little Hope. Inspired, we asked you to provide the first sentence to your own obituary.

Any Last Words?
The World

Laura Cantrell Sings Kitty Wells

At 91 years of age, Kitty Wells is the oldest living member of the Country Music Hall of Fame. And she can still surprise unsuspecting listeners. Despite her demure gingham dresses and sweet plaintive melodies, Wells was a radical.

Laura Cantrell Sings Kitty Wells
The World

Microbial Videogames

Ingmar Riedel-Kruse runs a biophysics lab at Stanford University, but he spends about half his time tinkering with videogames. He's not playing World of Warcraft. Riedel-Kruse creates his own videogames using living microbes.

Microbial Videogames
The World

Timothy Schaffert: Great Plains Gothic

Timothy Schaffert's new book isn't a typical mystery novel. It's got ominous crime set in a small town rife with intrigue but the narrator isn't a hardscrabble detective or noir gumshoe. Schaffert's story is told by an 83-year old grandmother.

Timothy Schaffert: Great Plains Gothic
The World

Apple's Newest Update

Last week, Apple's Steve Jobs made a design presentation – not to masses of swooning tech journalists, but to the Cupertino, California city council. What Jobs unveiled this time was Apple's future corporate headquarters.

Apple's Newest Update
The World

(It's Hard to Ignore Those) Facebook Walls

Studio 360's resident folk singer Scott Blaszak has been spending a little too much Facebook time lately, and he has this lament.

(It's Hard to Ignore Those) Facebook Walls
The World

The Antlers

In the age of the download single, The Antlers had an unlikely hit with their 2009 album Hospice. The storyline is about coming to terms with the death of a friend. But the music isn't what you'd expect – it's not morose and spare, it's big and lush.

The Antlers
The World

Sleep No More

Sleep No More may be the most unusual, fantastical take on Macbeth ever produced. The London-based theater company Punchdrunk has transformed 100,000 square feet of warehouse space into a kind of Macbeth theme park with no signage or maps or instructions.

Sleep No More
The World

Aha Moment: Gentleman's Agreement

Susan Evans grew up in Louisiana during the 1950s-60s. Her first year of high school was the first year of enforced integration. Years later she was able to confront her family's racism. She was inspired by Elia Kazan's film Gentleman's Agreement.

Aha Moment: Gentleman's Agreement
The World

"In My Next Life I Will Be…"

We asked our studio audience to tell us about their dream jobs. Eugene Mirman reads some of the responses, from "astronaut" to "artisan glass blower." What do you want to be in your next life? Leave a comment and let us know.

"In My Next Life I Will Be…"