About this episode

Maggie Smith and Faith Salie discuss poetry and parenting with Peter Sagal and Stephanie Burt.

In this second episode of You Could Make This Beautiful , hosts Maggie Smith and Faith Salie talk to Peter Sagal , host of the NPR news quiz show Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! about a prophetic reading at his first wedding, the poem that has haunted him throughout his life, and about the poetry he's found in the kindness and grace of his children. They also hear from poet and Harvard professor Stephanie Burt about how she found her way to poetry by way of science fiction, and how she's used the work of Taylor Swift to introduce her students to poets of centuries past like Alexander Pope. Show Notes (in chronological order): Maggie Smith on Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! Cartoonist Tom Tomorrow " Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven " by W. B. Yeats " Ithaka " by C. P. Cavafy " The Illusion " by Tony Kushner " Most Like an Arch This Marriage " by John Ciardi Adrienne Rich's poems are " like dreams " quote Poet William Corbett " The Postmoderns: The New American Poetry Revised " by Donald M. Allen " The Crystal Lithium " by James Schuyler " The Elephant Man " on Broadway " Les Liaisons Dangereuses " with Alan Rickman " Angels in America, Part One: Millennium Approaches " by Tony Kushner…

People in this episode

Hosts: Maggie Smith, Faith Salie

Guests: Peter Sagal, Stephanie Burt

Topics covered

• poetry
• parenting
• literature
• science fiction
• NPR
• Taylor Swift

Keywords

• poetry
• Peter Sagal
• Stephanie Burt
• NPR
• literature
• parenting
• Taylor Swift

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: NPR

Books & works: Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!, Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven, Ithaka, The Illusion, Most Like an Arch This Marriage, The Postmoderns: The New American Poetry Revised, The Crystal Lithium, The Elephant Man, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Angels in America, Part One: Millennium Approaches

More episodes of Dear Sugars

• Rewind: The Stepchild's Dilemma · August 29, 2026 · 45 min
• You Could Make This Beautiful: Henry Winkler & Saeed Jones · August 7, 2026 · 46 min
• You Could Make This Beautiful: Mike Birbiglia, J. Hope Stein, & Peter Kessler · August 7, 2026 · 45 min
• Coming soon... 'You Could Make This Beautiful' · July 24, 2026 · 3 min

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