Month: December 2015

This year, many of us were consuming the same big songs at the same time. On The Gist, music writer Chris Molanphy explains how 2015 continues a modern trend toward a shared pop music monoculture. Chris writes Slate’s Why Is This Song No. 1 column, and for more 2015 analysis you can check out his contribution to The Music Club, 2015. For the Spiel, favorite ideas and sentences of the year.  Join Slate Plus! Members get bonus segments, exclusive member-only podcasts, and more. Sign up for a free trial today at slate.com/gistplus.  

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On The Gist, Gretchen Rubin explains what self-knowledge has to do with forming lasting habits. To identify your core tendency, try filling out her quiz here. She’s the author of Better Than Before and hosts the Happier Podcast, a fellow member of the Panoply network. For the Spiel, please indulge our host in a particularly self-indulgent meditation on simplicity. Join Slate Plus! Members get bonus segments, exclusive member-only podcasts, and more. Sign up for a free trial today at slate.com/gistplus.

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On The Gist, Dan Pashman from The Sporkful podcast explains the food science behind why we’re more in the mood for a lemony Blood Mary this week instead of a creamy glass of eggnog. If you’re going to serve eggnog anyway, there’s a great recipe for Puerto Rican eggnog from The Sporkful here. For the Spiel, an issue in American life that is terrorizing us. Spoiler—it’s terrorism.

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Andrew Marr presents a special edition of Start the Week, celebrating the later life and works of William Shakespeare. Recorded at the Globe's candle-lit Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, the actor Simon Russell Beale and Artistic Director Dominic Dromgoole discuss the late romances. The writer Jeanette Winterson explores her personal connection to The Winter's Tale, and the academic Katherine Duncan-Jones questions whether Shakespeare ever gave up on life in London to retire to Stratford-upon-Avon, and the relevance of his will that left his wife their 'second-best bed'. Producer: Katy Hickman.