Listening to America

Clay Jenkinson gives four or five lectures annually for the Smithsonian Associates. In his most recent talk, he analyzed three notorious 20th-century censorship cases, all involving books once regarded as obscene. First, the case against James Joyce's novel Ulysses, thought by some to be the greatest novel of the century, went to trial in 1933. Second, the trial of D.H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover in 1960, banned in England not just for its explicit sex scenes, but because the adulterous affair was between an aristocratic woman and a mere working-class gardener. And finally, Allen Ginsberg's Beat Generation poem Howl, published by City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco, was tried in 1957. Each case was full of dramatic twists, irony, and humor, and in each case a judge or jury decided these amazing works of literature were not legally obscene. This episode was recorded on August 15, 2026.  

Author and explorer Denis Belliveau talks with Clay about his epic journey along the entire Silk Road in the footsteps of Marco Polo. Polo (ca. 1254-1324) traveled from Venice to the far end of China between 1271 and 1295 AD. He visited Kublai Khan in the legendary Xanadu. Denis Belliveau and his traveling companion, Francis O'Donnell, needed 70 visas to make the immense journey, none of it by airplane, much of it on foot, horse, camel, and such fortunate rides they could cadge along the way. They traveled with what Belliveau calls "reckless bravado and a lot of testosterone," through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, India, Tibet, and China, among other nations. They were, so far as anyone knows, the first people ever to retrace the entire Marco Polo journey. The result was a PBS documentary and excellent book, In the Footsteps of Marco Polo. You can also learn more at his website: In the Footsteps. This episode was recorded on April 8, 2026.  

Host David Horton asks Clay Jenkinson what we have learned from the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and all that has transpired since 2001. Clay offers six lessons — beware of overreacting; avoid endless wars that have little to do with the terror attack; keep your eye on the geopolitical ball and don't be distracted by temporary sex scandals; work harder to sustain the national unity that follows a catastrophe; Islam is not our enemy, and it is not the problem; and accept some responsibility for how American actions in the world frustrate and enrage others. Clay argues that America's isolation from Europe and the rest of the world has made us complacent about how our actions and policies inspire violent reactions. This episode was recorded on September 11, 2026.  

Clay's conversation with historian Jim Rasenberger, the author of "A Perfect Coincidence: The Extraordinary Friendship and Astonishing Deaths of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson." Jefferson and Adams collaborated on the Declaration of Independence in 1776, served together as diplomats in France for the United States in the 1780s, and cherished each other's friendship. Then the heated politics of their time came between them, until by 1800, they were enemies. Fortunately, they patched their friendship back together when they were safely retired from public life and died on the same day, the Fourth of July 1826, in lovely harmony, one in Virginia, the other in Massachusetts. This episode was recorded on May 22, 2026.

Host David Horton interviews the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, about the days and weeks following the Fourth of July 1776. How quickly did the printed texts of the Declaration circulate? What was the information network of the time that enabled most Americans to read the Declaration (or hear it read in public) within a few weeks? The final copy had to go to an engraver to become the beautiful presentation document we still revere today. At the time, the Founders did not know that the Declaration would become the most important document in the history of human liberty. Meanwhile, George Washington came very close to losing the war — and perhaps the independence movement — after getting bottled up by the British on Manhattan. This episode was recorded on August 14, 2026.