Orion Magazine Podcast

Editor Hannah Fries talks with Joni Tevis about her November/December essay in Orion, "What the Body Knows." Tevis discusses the intensity and intimacy of her Arctic journey, as well as the process of crafting the essay that came out of it.

Editors Jennifer Sahn and Hannah Fries discuss the contents of the November/December 2013 issue of the magazine, including a piece by Rowan Jacobsen about an innovative solution to infrastructure challenges in local food production; an essay by Belle Boggs calling for an overhaul of science education; a lyrical journey through the Arctic with Joni Tevis; and a new essay by Barbara Kingsolver.

An excerpt from Managing Editor Andrew D. Blechman's discussion with bestselling author Alan Weisman about his new book, Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth? Population projections may be bleak, but solutions to this problem are beneficial in many ways—and within our reach.

Author Hank Lentfer reads aloud from his Coda about how the connectedness of neurons in the brain is a metaphor for the connectedness between people and just about everything else.

Editors Jennifer Sahn and Andrew D. Blechman discuss the September/October 2013 issue of the magazine, including an interview with bestselling author Alan Weisman about his new book, which addresses overpopulation; an essay by Jennifer Lunden about breast cancer and the "pinkwashing" of America; an essay by Joe Donnelly about OR7, the first wild wolf to wander into California in more than eighty years; Orion's first graphic feature; extreme close-ups of whales; and more.

Editor Hannah Fries talks with Ander Monson about his July/August 2013 article for Orion, "Dear Squash." Monson discusses seed libraries, words as seeds, an interesting book project that comes in a box.

All stories are local, but Hollywood rarely does right by them. Too often, when portrayed on the big screen, stereotypes and contrived storylines trump the truth of living in a place. The July/August 2013 issue of Orion discusses the regional films of Jay Craven ("On Location"), whose projects tell such stories, and most importantly, are produced and screened in their home region. Craven was joined in discussion by the founders of a film project that tells the stories of a single town.

Editor Scott Gast speaks with author Richard Lewis about his July/August 2013 article for Orion, “A Wilderness of Thought,” in which he discusses how children naturally connect to the outside world via imagination and poetry.

Editors Andrew Blechman and Hannah Fries discuss the July/August 2013 issue of the magazine, including an article by Cynthia Barnett on homegrown solutions to our nation’s aging water infrastructure; Richard Lewis’s impressive classroom experiments with nature poetry by children; haunting photographs by David Maisel; new fiction from Joe Wilkins; an essay by Barry Lopez; and more.

War has been around for a long time, but how humans fight, and what we fight over, changes in response to new factors like technology and climate change. Christopher Merrill shared his observations on this in his essay "The New Face of War" (May/June 2013), and was joined in discussion by retired Navy Commander Leah Bolger, co-director of Code Pink Jodie Evans, and author Christian Parenti.

We often think of nature as existing only in wild places far from the city, but life abounds even in the cracks of sidewalks—if you know how and when to look. Orion assembled a panel of urban ecologists from across North America—Beatrix Beisner, Liam Heneghan, and Kevin Anderson—for a wide-ranging discussion of urban nature and how this fascinating field of study is evolving.

Edward Abbey wrote that a landscape can be understood best by "poets who have their feet planted in concrete—concrete data—and by scientists whose heads and hearts have not lost the capacity for wonder." Orion's poetry editor was joined by poet-scientists Eva Saulitis, Elizabeth Bradfield, and Fred Swanson for a discussion of how the voice and mind of the artist and scientist form a unique understanding of the land.

Managing Editor Andrew Blechman speaks with Craig Childs, whose book Apocalyptic Planet: Field Guide to the Everending Earth won the 2013 Orion Book Award. Childs discusses the fate of our planet, the fate of humanity, and traveling to some of the harshest, most remote corners of our planet—including a hellacious camping expedition through a massive Iowa GMO cornfield—while exploring the cycles of life and death on a scale most of us rarely think about.

Managing editor Andrew Blechman speaks with author Sandra Steingraber about her latest column for Orion, “The Discontent of Our Winter,” in which she discusses how the seeming loss of winter has affected her young children. Sandra also talks about what it’s like to be a climate crusader who’s also a mom.

Author Luis Alberto Urrea reads his latest Wastelander column—“Barrio Walden”—about his attempts to find Walden Pond as a young student from the barrios of Southern California freshly relocated to New England.