Exploring our Hunger for Meaning and Experience with Tara Isabella Burton

Air Dates: February 27-March 5, 2023 

In the flush of youth, some of us are prone to great bouts of certainty, seriousness, and risk-taking. Others are more cautious. And some just want to have fun—sometimes at all costs. Tara Isabella Burton is an author whose recent novel explores the timelessness of coming-of-age stories with a very modern tale of her own.  

Burton’s debut novel “Social Creature,” was named book of the year by The Guardian, New York’s Vulture and The New York Times in 2018. In 2022, she published her second novel with Simon & Schuster, titled “The World Cannot Give.” In 2020, she released her first nonfiction book, “Strange Rites: New Religions for a Godless World,” which prominent disability rights activist Tim Shriver celebrated as “the most thoughtful analysis of our current spiritual crisis anywhere.”. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, National Geographic, The Wall Street Journal, Granta, The Washington Post, and much more. In June 2023 her fourth book, Self-Made: Curating Our Image from Da Vinci to the Kardashians” will be published by Public Affairs. 

 On this episode of “Story in the Public Square,” Burton discusses what led her to study theology and how her latest book, “The World Cannot Give,” grapples with the question “how do you love the unlikeable?” 

 “Story in the Public Square” broadcasts each week on public television stations across the United States. A full listing of the national television distribution is available at this link. In Rhode Island and southeastern New England, the show is broadcast on Rhode Island PBS on Sundays at 11 a.m. and is rebroadcast Thursdays at 7:30 p.m. An audio version of the program airs Saturdays at 8:30 a.m., 5:30 p.m. ET, and Sundays at 2:30 a.m. & 2:30 p.m. ET on SiriusXM’s popular P.O.T.U.S. (Politics of the United States), channel 124. “Story in the Public Square” is a partnership between the Pell Center and The Providence Journal. The initiative aims to study, celebrate and tell stories that matter.