Scott Simon

When Alan Ginsberg wrote, "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked" in 1955, his poem "Howl" wasn't immediately acclaimed a masterpiece. Some people read the explicit parts and said it was mere porn.

Shig Murao, a clerk at City Lights Bookstore, was arrested ...

Satire is a tricky business. The punch lines quickly get stale. The same people who laugh at one joke can get offended by the next.

But this week, with the targeted killings of the cartoon satirists of Charlie Hebdo in Paris, we were reminded how dangerous people with no sense ...

I've always had a good time in Cuba. The people are friendly and funny, the rum is smooth, the music intoxicating and the beaches wide, white and soft.

But you're accompanied everywhere by government minders. They call them responsables. Any Cuban you interview knows your microphone might as well run ...

"There's a Harvard man on the wrong side of every question," and this week that man may have been Ben Edelman, an associate professor at Harvard Business School.

Edelman, a Harvard Ph.D and lawyer, has been called the Sheriff of the Internet for pursuing companies he believes have committed ...

This just in: Kirk Douglas is not dead.

"The announcement of my death is premature," he told USA Today, after People Magazine's website ran an obituary this week for Mr. Douglas, who looks vigorous, says he feels strong, has just published a book of poetry, and will turn 98 ...

Australian cricket player Phillip Hughes died this week in Sydney after he was struck on the back of the neck by a bounced pitch that's an ordinary and routine part of cricket.

Mr. Hughes was 25, an accomplished and admired player. There's been an outpouring of grief in Australia and ...

If you looked at Earth from far off in the solar system, would it look like it's run by humans — or chickens? There are about three times as many chickens as people on this planet. And while horses and dogs are often celebrated as humankind's partner in spreading civilization, ...

There are just a few words in the last four minutes of Mike Nichols' 1967 film, The Graduate.

"Elaine! Ben! It's too late! Not for me..."

A lot of directors would have ended the film on the two young lovers in the back of the bus, giddy, giggly and ...

Everyone has days in which we wonder if much of anything works. Websites crash. Screens blink, go blank, or taunt: I'm sorry. Try later. We have an unusually high volume of calls. Download to update. Click here if you've forgotten your password.

But for a couple of hours on an ...

We can turn back time tonight. Well, at least our clocks, for an hour, as Daylight Saving Time ends and Standard Time returns.

There's been debate as to whether we really should flip time back and forth a couple of times a year. The hour of light we gain each ...

I think Ben Bradlee and Frank Mankiewicz knew the news business enough to realize that if two old lions die within a couple days of each other, they'll wind up sharing space in the same recollection on a weekly show.

I knew Frank when he was president of NPR, and ...

Dr. Doug Butzier died on duty this week. He was 59 and crashed in his own small plane flying home to Dubuque, Iowa.

Doug Butzier was a former paramedic who put himself through medical school and became chief of the emergency room and medical staff at Mercy Medical Center and ...

Mahatma Gandhi never won the Nobel Peace Prize. A lot of people who have dropped bombs, launched missiles and made war have won the Nobel, but not the man whose very silhouette — bald-headed, wrapped in cloth, and walking in sandals across a perilous world — is taken to be ...

Every now and then you can see a short story come to life right in front of you.

We were on a train this week while a man in a seat nearby spoke in a voice loud enough to carry above the whoosh of the rails to a man whose ...

The head of the Federal Aviation Administration is trying to deflect criticism over an arson fire at an air traffic control center that shut down Chicago's airports last week.

Administrator Michael Huerta toured the fire-damaged Chicago air traffic control center in suburban Aurora on Friday with members of the Illinois ...

The U.S. may have added jobs to its payroll last month, but the losses are still huge in Atlantic City, N.J., where four casinos have closed this year. A fifth teeters, and more than 7,000 people — dealers, greeters, cooks and maids — have been laid off.

The job losses ...