Q&A with Sarah Vowell

Did I mention how cool my job is? I got to interview Sarah Vowell! I love her stuff on NPR's This American Life, and her books, the latest of which contains intriguing reflections about the Puritans:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Sarah-Vowell-Puritans-Legacy.html

The "Blue Rider" artists

My favorite artists, Franz Marc and Wassily Kandinsky, were part of something called the Blaue Reiter (Blue Rider) group in early 20th-century Germany. And since they happened to be based in Munich, the city starring in the latest feature I fact-checked for Smithsonian, it seemed a good excuse to write something about them as an "online extra"...

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/blue_rider.html

Adventures of a Portuguese Poet

For Smithsonian.com, a short story about Luis Vaz de Camoes, who I personally hadn't heard of until I started fact-checking a feature on Macau. He had kind of a crazy life!

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/portuguese-poet.html

Winslow Homer's long face

Poor Homer.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/no-more-long-faces.html

A Brief History of Chocolate

I'm so grateful that those pre-Columbian cultures figured out the cacao tree's potential...

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/brief-history-of-chocolate.html

Cixi, the "woman behind the throne" in China

Sometimes I feel like this new job of mine isn't even really a job; I'm getting paid to be a student, and I feel incredibly lucky. As usual, I learned a lot in the process of fact-checking an article about Beijing's Forbidden City for the magazine. I was particularly drawn to the mysterious, powerful character of Cixi, so I wrote a little something about her for the website:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/da-cixi.html