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Arts and People

  • Chicago Friends, Richard Wright and Nelson Algren: Writers Nelson Algren and Richard Wright tangled with their city as young unknowns and forged a writing friendship that explored race, reality and new voices. In American Scholar.
  • Perspectives on Puerto Rico: Photographers Jack Delano and Edwin Rosskam dodged U boats to reach Puerto Rico on the eve of World War II. The images they took for the U.S. government show an intriguing light on Puerto Rican life. This is the story of how they each fell in love with the island. In Américas magazine.
  • Ode to an Artist: Outsider artist James Harold Jennings lived on a school bus in rural North Carolina and opened a door to creative freedom for those who visited him there. In Oxford American.
  • In the StoryCorps Booth: A place to record your story, in Grand Central. In Smithsonian.
  • Monk on a Mission: In Thailand, an unorthodox Buddhist monk shows abandoned children the power of kick-boxing and their own choices. In Tricycle.
  • Crafter of Memory in Film: Thai filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul, winner of the 2010 Cannes Palme d’Or, shows the roots of his films in his native northeastern Thailand. In Tricycle.
  • Being Silent Sometimes: A 2010 follow-up interview with Apichatpong is here.
  • Machado de Assis, Brazil’s Wry Modernist: With the centennial of the death of the Father of Brazilian literature, Machado is gaining new fans. Brazilian musician Tom Zé weighs in. From Américas magazine, under Downloads.
  • Pet Detectives: A sting operation in Maryland nets wildlife criminals. In Baltimore magazine.
  • The Guitar Lab near Galax, Virginia: Guitar-maker Wayne Henderson, national treasure, has a studio in the mountains. In The Washington Post.
  • Paderewski’s Piano: Smithsonian