Better in Person with Stephen Dubner

12 episodes

How to Be a Double Unicorn, with John Urschel
09/08/2026 | 31 mins.
He was thriving in the N.F.L., but then he decided to focus on mathematics — a subject he now teaches at M.I.T. John walks Stephen Dubner through the whole story, teaches him some blocking techniques, and explains why some infinities are bigger than others.
Amazon Was Supposed to Kill the Bookstore. James Daunt Had Other Plans
09/01/2026 | 31 mins.
He started with one small shop in London. He has since resuscitated both Barnes & Noble and Waterstones. He tells Stephen Dubner exactly how he does it.
How to Run an Institution in an Anti-Institution Era
08/25/2026 | 36 mins.
Anne Pasternak (Brooklyn Museum) and Michael Roth (Wesleyan University) tell Stephen Dubner how they keep the peace in the middle of a culture war.
“I Trust Almost Anyone More Than Myself”
08/18/2026 | 42 mins.
The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jennifer Egan talks about confidence, luck, and why it takes 35 drafts to get to the finish line.
Meet Warren Zanes, the Author and Rocker Behind the Springsteen Movie
08/11/2026 | 53 mins.
When he joined the Del Fuegos, his big brother’s band, all Warren knew how to play was a record player. Things went great for a while — and then it all fell apart. So how did he wind up writing definitive books on Springsteen and Tom Petty?

About Better in Person with Stephen Dubner

Everyone has a public story. Stephen Dubner wants the rest. On Better in Person, Dubner invites remarkable people into his home for a kind of conversation that’s hard to find: curious, free-wheeling, even profound. They talk, play, eat and drink, argue and laugh. The result? Less interview, more shared discovery. This is how a conversation works.

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