The Free Library Podcast is an easy way to participate in the author events and lectures that take place at the Central Library. Visit Author Events to find upcoming events.
Subscribe via iTunes or grab the RSS feed.
Get Started With PodcastingSubscribing to this podcast is free and easy... More...
Browse by Date | Browse by Author
Edmund White | Jack Holmes and His Friend with Christopher Bram | Eminent Outlaws: The Gay Writers Who Changed AmericaRecorded 2/16/2012Listen to MP3 audioCalled a literary lion of the gay world, Edmund White is best known for his autobiographical novels in which unabashed h... More...
Chris Ware | The ACME Novelty Library with Charles Burns | Black Hole and Chip Kidd | Book One: Work: 1986-2006 Recorded 10/20/2005Listen to MP3 audioCartoonist Chris Ware is a professional colorist, award-winning letterer, and author of Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest ... More...
Philadelphia DA Candidates Debate the IssuesRecorded 4/22/2009Listen to MP3 audioOn Wednesday, April 22, 2009 at 7:30 pm, candidates for Philadelphia District Attorney debate the issues. Come out and m... More...
Frans de Waal | The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates Recorded 4/11/2013Listen to MP3 audioDrawing on a wealth of pioneering research, esteemed primatologist Frans de Waal traces the biological roots of human mo... More...
Dave Eggers | What Is the What AND Mary Williams | Brothers in Hope: The Story of the Lost Boys of Sudan with Valentino Achak DengRecorded 3/20/2008Listen to MP3 audioPart of the 2008 One Book, One Philadelphia program, featured authors Dave Eggers and Mary Williams, with special guest ... More...
Joseph J. Ellis | His Excellency: George WashingtonRecorded 11/4/2004Listen to MP3 audioJoseph J. Ellis is a best-selling author and distinguished chronicler of early American history. His book The Passion... More...
Mary Gordon | Pearl with Meg Wolitzer | The PositionRecorded 3/29/2005Listen to MP3 audioMary Gordon is the author of the acclaimed novels Final Payments, The Other Side, and Spending. Her... More...
Ada Louise Huxtable | Frank Lloyd WrightRecorded 12/9/2004Listen to MP3 audioAda Louise Huxtable, the doyenne of American architecture critics, became the first newspaper architecture critic when s... More...
Street Lit Panel Featuring Teri Woods, Shannon Holmes, and Solomon Jones - Moderated by Vanessa MorrisionRecorded 12/4/2007Listen to MP3 audioNative Philadelphian and bestselling author, Teri Woods began selling hand-made copies of her first novel on the street ... More...
Editorial Cartoons: How Far Is Too Far? - Talk About It!Recorded 2/27/2006Listen to MP3 audioAn international outcry followed the publication of a Danish newspaper cartoon satirirzing the Muslim prophet Mohammed. ... More...
OED 80th Anniversary with Jesse Sheidlower, Barbara Wallraff & Ammon Shea Recorded 11/18/2008Listen to MP3 audioThis recording contains explicit content. Jesse Sheidlower, Editor-at-large of the Oxford Engli... More...
Middle East Panel with Trudy Rubin, Michael Scheuer and Robin WrightRecorded 5/17/2008Listen to MP3 audioA foreign correspondent for the Philadelphia Inquirer, Trudy Rubin writes the paper’s “Worldview” column and has ... More...
Karen Russell | Vampires in the Lemon Grove with Claire Vaye Watkins | Battleborn and Amity Gaige | SchroderRecorded 2/12/2013Listen to MP3 audioKaren Russell's debut novel Swamplandia!, a lushly imagined narrative of a dilapidated, family-run amusement park... More...
Sisters Tenth Anniversary Celebration with Carol Saline and Sharon J. WohlmuthRecorded 11/18/2004Listen to MP3 audioBring your sister and a story to share. In 1994, co-authors Carol Saline and Sharon J. Wohlmuth launched a lite... More...
Cornel West and Tavis Smiley | The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty ManifestoRecorded 4/27/2012Listen to MP3 audioEducator and philosopher, Dr. Cornel West is one of America’s most provocative and gifted public intellectuals. Professo... More...
William T. Vollmann | Argall | with James Welch | The Heartsong of Charging ElkRecorded 10/11/2001Listen to MP3 audioWilliam T. Vollmann is the author of the Seven Dreams series, a symbolic history in novel form of the European se... More...
Derek Walcott Recorded 4/10/2003Listen to MP3 audioBorn in Saint Lucia in 1930, Derek Walcott is the author of more than twenty collections of poems and plays, and is the ... More...
Alice Walker | An Evening with Alice Walker Recorded 5/28/1998Listen to MP3 audioWinner of the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award for her novel, The Color Purple, Alice Walker reads from... More...
David Foster Wallace | OblivionRecorded 6/22/2004Listen to MP3 audioThe urge to properly classify David Foster Wallace within an artistic continuum has prompted comparisons with everyone f... More...
Eli Wallach | The Good, the Bad, and MeRecorded 5/25/2005Listen to MP3 audioThe sparkling memoir of a movie icon's life in the footlights and on camera, The Good, the Bad, and Me tells the extraor... More...
Jim Wallis | God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It Recorded 10/11/2005Listen to MP3 audioA Christian leader for social change, Jim Wallis is the founder and editor-in-chief of Sojourners magazine and th... More...
Jim Wallis | The Great Awakening: Reviving Faith & Politics in a Post-Religious Right AmericaRecorded 2/14/2008Listen to MP3 audioA Christian leader for social change, Jim Wallis is the editor-in-chief and chief executive officer of Sojourners ... More...
Jeannette Walls | Half Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel Recorded 10/23/2009Listen to MP3 audioThe Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls's memoir of growing up in an impoverished and nomadic family, is one of the b... More...
Barbara Walters | Audition: A MemoirRecorded 5/18/2008Listen to MP3 audioBarbara Walters was the first woman ever to host a network news program, and the rest, as they say, is “herstory.” Writt... More...
Chris Ware | Building Stories with Charles Burns | The Hive moderated by Chip KiddRecorded 10/9/2012Listen to MP3 audioChris Ware's graphic novel Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth won the Guardian First Book Award, the first... More...
Wendy Wasserstein | On WritingRecorded 6/7/2002Listen to MP3 audioFrom the Archive: Award-winning playwright of the Heidi Chronicles, Wendy Wasserstein gave a private... More...
John Waters | Role ModelsRecorded 6/1/2010Listen to MP3 audioOn Role Models, the new memoir from legendary American filmmaker, actor, and writer John Waters, author Augusten ... More...
James Watson | Girls, Genes and GamowRecorded 2/12/2002Listen to MP3 audioJames D. Watson is best known for his discovery of the structure of DNA, for which he shared the 1962 Nobel Prize in Phy... More...
Jennifer Weiner | Fly Away HomeRecorded 7/14/2010Listen to MP3 audioPhiladelphian Jennifer Weiner is the author of seven books, including the New York Times bestseller Good in Be... More...
Jennifer Weiner | Then Came YouRecorded 7/13/2011Listen to MP3 audioIn her novels, Jennifer Weiner plumbs life's messiness with witty, honest characters who face real issues—relationships,... More...
Jennifer Weiner | The Next Best ThingRecorded 7/11/2012Listen to MP3 audio(This podcast contains explicit content.) Crafted with humor and heart, Jennifer Weiner's novels feature relatable chara... More...
Jennifer Weiner | Certain Girls Recorded 4/13/2008Listen to MP3 audio (This recording contains explicit content.) Philadelphia author Jennifer Weiner writes novels and stories full of wit,... More...
Jennifer Weiner | Best Friends ForeverRecorded 7/15/2009Listen to MP3 audio(This recording contains extensive use of potty language.) Philadelphian Jennifer Weiner is the author of the witty, sma... More...
Motherhood Panel with Jennifer Weiner, Vicki Glembocki, Rachel Pastan and Amy RichardsRecorded 5/17/2008Listen to MP3 audioJennifer Weiner’s novels are full of wit, spunk, and spot-on insights into human nature. Kirkus Reviews calls her... More...
Irvine Welsh | Skagboys with Lisa Zeidner | Love BombRecorded 9/21/2012Listen to MP3 audio(This recording contains explicit content) "Not for the fainthearted" (Sunday Times), Irvine Welsh's subterranean... More...
Irvine Welsh | The Bedroom Secrets of Master ChefsRecorded 8/15/2006Listen to MP3 audio(This recording contains explicit content.) Scottish novelist Irvine Welsh gained international acclaim with his ... More...
Beth S. Wenger | The Jewish Americans: Three Centuries of Jewish Voices in AmericaRecorded 11/27/2007Listen to MP3 audioThe forthcoming PBS series The Jewish Americans is a comprehensive look at the trials and accomplishments of the ... More...
Cornel West | Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against ImperialismRecorded 10/7/2004Listen to MP3 audioCornel West is one of America's most provocative public intellectuals and Professor of Religion and African American Stu... More...
Cornel West | Race MattersRecorded 5/15/1997Listen to MP3 audioCornel West discusses Race Matters in this 1997 recording from our archive.... More...
Ronald C. White, Jr. | A. Lincoln: A BiographyRecorded 2/5/2009Listen to MP3 audioBased on research of the newly completed Lincoln Legal Papers and recently discovered letters and photographs, A. Lin... More...
A "Night of the Living Dead" with Colson Whitehead | Zone OneRecorded 10/31/2011Listen to MP3 audioColson Whitehead's multilayered second novel, John Henry Days, was a Pulitzer Prize Finalist, a National Book Cri... More...
Christine Todd Whitman | It's My Party, TooRecorded 1/28/2005Listen to MP3 audioTired of ideological battles in Washington and ready for some R & R at home in New Jersey, Christine Todd Whitman retire... More...
Judy Wicks | Good Morning, Beautiful Business: The Unexpected Journey of an Activist Entrepreneur and Local-Economy PioneerRecorded 4/8/2013Listen to MP3 audioWhen Judy Wicks founded the White Dog Café in the first floor of her University City row home in 1983, she did not plan ... More...
John Edgar Wideman | Hoop RootsRecorded 10/25/2001Listen to MP3 audioFrom the first author to win two PEN/Faulkner Awards comes an eloquent, multilayered memoir of basketball, family and ra... More...
John Edgar Wideman | FanonRecorded 2/26/2008Listen to MP3 audioJohn Edgar Wideman was the first two-time winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for his novels Sent for You Yesterday ... More...
Elie Wiesel | A Mad Desire to DanceRecorded 3/30/2009Listen to MP3 audioElie Wiesel was Chairman of the President’s Commission on the Holocaust until 1986, the year he won the Nobel Peace Priz... More...
Isabel Wilkerson | The Warmth of Other SunsRecorded 10/18/2011Listen to MP3 audioIn 1994, Isabel Wilkerson became the first African American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize, for her feature writing as ... More...
George F. Will | With a Happy Eye But...Recorded 10/3/2002Listen to MP3 audioThe Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Newsweek columnist and political commentator shares his vision of America befo... More...
Wendy Williams | Wendy's Got the HeatRecorded 8/12/2003Listen to MP3 audioShock jock. Big mouth. Abrasive. Confrontational. Those are just some of the ways people describe Wendy Williams, form... More...
Juan Williams | Muzzled: The Assault on Honest DebateRecorded 8/2/2011Listen to MP3 audioWhen NPR fired longtime news analyst Juan Williams for stating on The O'Reilly Factor that seeing people in “Musl... More...
