March 17, 2025: Right next door

We’re digging into the past by bringing history up to the present, transcending language barriers and questioning colonization. “Lamentations of Nezahualcoyotl” is a new book of poems translated and retold by Amherst College professor, Restless Books founder and friend of the show Ilan Stavans. We find out where this work resides in the Mesoamerican timeline, the living languages that have kept it alive, the role colonialism has played in its journey and the ways language, written and oral, keeps time of its own.

Since we could always use another star or two in the neighborhood, our resident astronomer, Salman Hameed of Kainaat Studios and Hampshire College, introduces us to our cosmic next door neighbor, Barnard’s star. Will we find those new stars with funding cuts at every juncture? There may be conjectures about that as well...