Curated playlist

20th-century American non-fiction writers

John F. KennedyJohn F. Kennedy spent hours in the water towing a burned crewman after a destroyer cut his boat in half.
Donald TrumpDonald Trump was a millionaire in inflation-adjusted terms by age eight.
George H. W. BushAfter being shot down in 1944, George H. W. Bush asked why he alone had been spared. Both of his crewmates died.
Barack ObamaObama rejected a plan to bomb a compound in Pakistan and sent Navy SEALs instead. The 2011 raid killed Osama bin Laden.
Theodore RooseveltTheodore Roosevelt was shot in the chest, then gave a 90-minute speech. It happened in Milwaukee in October 1912.
Jon ParelesJon Pareles played the Harkness Tower carillon while still a Yale student. He also DJed and wrote for campus papers.
John SteinbeckJohn Steinbeck once stole bacon from a produce market to survive. He later won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Stephen ColbertAt a 2006 dinner, Stephen Colbert roasted President Bush to a cold room. His show's ratings jumped 37% the next week.
Langston HughesLangston Hughes's ashes rest beneath the floor of a Harlem research center.
Roger EbertRoger Ebert typed his last blog post two days before he died. He signed off with "I'll see you at the movies."
Ralph BakshiRalph Bakshi sold CBS a show it already owned. CBS had acquired the Terrytoons library in 1955 and forgotten it.
Henry KissingerHenry Kissinger made a secret trip to China in July 1971. It helped end 23 years of diplomatic isolation.
Joseph StiglitzJoseph Stiglitz explained why wages stay high in recessions even when workers are desperate for jobs.
Tom ShoneTom Shone argued the summer blockbuster deserved serious study, not scorn.
Herbert MarcuseHerbert Marcuse analyzed Nazi ideology for American spies before students made him a hero.
Linda McCartneyLinda McCartney was the first woman to put a photograph on the cover of Rolling Stone.
Stanley TucciStanley Tucci Jr. gave a college classmate a nickname that the man has carried ever since. The classmate was Irving Rhames, and the nickname was Ving. Tucci handed it over while the two of them studied acting together at a state university…
Tupac ShakurTupac Shakur wrote and recorded the album The Don Killuminati in three days. Mixing took four more.
Milton FriedmanMilton Friedman argued the Federal Reserve let the money supply shrink by one-third between 1929 and 1933.
Arthur MendelColleagues recognized Arthur Mendel as the foremost American Bach scholar of his day.
Joseph CampbellGeorge Lucas said Joseph Campbell's book helped shape Star Wars. They met only in 1984.
Arnold SchwarzeneggerArnold Schwarzenegger broke into a locked gym on weekends as a teenager. He later became California's governor.
Edmund WilsonCritic Edmund Wilson mailed strangers a postcard listing over two dozen things he would not do.
Joseph HellerJoseph Heller's novel Catch-22 was first called Catch-18. It was renamed to avoid confusion with Mila 18.
Paul SamuelsonPaul Samuelson said he was born as an economist at age sixteen. It happened in a 1932 Chicago lecture on Malthus.
Charles A. BeardCharles A. Beard argued that money, not philosophy, drove the men who wrote the Constitution.
Daniel YerginDaniel Yergin started his energy research firm with a two-dollar file cabinet.
Charles LindberghCharles Lindbergh stared at a huge field of glowing lights near Paris in May 1927 and took it for a giant industrial complex. He had just flown alone across the Atlantic, and the airfield he was hunting was not on his map. All he knew was…
W. E. B. Du BoisW. E. B. Du Bois died in Ghana the day before the March on Washington. He was 95 and had renounced his U.S. citizenship.
George Dyson (science historian)From 1972 to 1975, George Dyson lived in a treehouse he built 30 meters above Burrard Inlet.
Daniel KahnemanDaniel Kahneman won the 2002 economics Nobel without ever taking an economics course.
James M. BuchananEconomist James M. Buchanan argued that politicians act from self-interest like everyone else.
George SorosAt 14, George Soros posed as the Christian godson of a government official to survive the Nazi occupation of Hungary.
Ambrose BierceAmbrose Bierce's last known letter said he was leaving for an unknown destination. He then vanished at age 71.
Michael CrichtonMichael Crichton once submitted a George Orwell essay as his own and got a B-minus.
Dennis Kennedy (author)Dennis Kennedy went from a Navy communications post to the Samuel Beckett chair of drama.
Marilyn MansonMarilyn Manson is the stage name of Brian Hugh Warner, an American rock singer whose band has sold over 50 million records worldwide. Few musicians have been argued over in so many rooms. Politicians condemned his lyrics, critics fought…
Pope Leo XIVBefore the 2025 conclave, the future Pope Leo XIV, Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, explained his chances to a friend by text message. "I'm an American, I can't be elected," he wrote. He was elected anyway. This documentary follows a path…
David ByrneDavid Byrne was turned away from his middle school choir, which judged him "off-key and too withdrawn". That boy grew up to be an American musician, writer, visual artist and filmmaker. Over his career he has received an Academy Award, a…
Fletcher PrattFletcher Pratt was arrested at eighteen for robbing cash drawers. He became a noted military historian.
B. F. SkinnerB. F. Skinner proposed steering missiles with pigeons. The birds pecked at a screen showing the target.
Ernest BeckerErnest Becker won a Pulitzer Prize two months after he died. He never knew he had won for The Denial of Death.
Wilhelm ReichIn 1956, a United States court ordered six tons of Wilhelm Reich's books and papers burned.
Elliot ForbesElliot Forbes, known to those around him as "El", was an American conductor and musicologist who lived from the 20th of August 1917 to the 9th of January 2006. Late in life, he made a habit of turning up at undergraduate performances.…
Kareem Abdul-JabbarKareem Abdul-Jabbar broke Wilt Chamberlain's career scoring record with a skyhook over a 7-foot-4 defender.
Phil JacksonPhil Jackson convinced Michael Jordan to trust his teammates. In 1991 the Bulls swept the Pistons and won the title.
Deepak ChopraDeepak Chopra sold 137,000 copies of one book within 24 hours of appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show in July 1993. That figure comes from the physician and author Paul Offit, who adds that sales reached 400,000 by the end of the week.…
Richard D. WolffRichard D. Wolff's father was a lawyer in Cologne, but his degree was worthless in America.
Elinor OstromUCLA rejected Elinor Ostrom's economics application for lacking math. She later won a Nobel Prize in economics.
Roger LowensteinA financial journalist won a Lincoln prize for a book on paying for the Civil War. Roger Lowenstein won it in 2022.