COVER STORY
Biology
Kurt Andersen talks with novelist Margaret Atwood about how biology grabs headlines -- and the imagination of artists. They discuss Atwood’s childhood among scientists, and her most recent novel, Oryx and Crake, in which biotech runs amok with catastrophic consequences.

A Number
Kids are prone to asking questions, like “where did I come from?” These become harder to answer when you’ve cloned your son, but no one’s really sure how many of them were made. In Caryl Churchill’s new play, A Number, there are no white coats or labs, just Sam Shepard playing the father, and a single actor playing three of his genetically identical offspring – each supposedly an improvement over the other. WNYC’s Judith Kampfner went to see the play with a psychologist and a medical ethicist.
Go to New York Theatre Workshop’s website
Go to a website with Caryl Churchill's plays
Go to the website for the American Journal of Bioethics with information on human cloning
Go to the website for the Center for Bioethics
Buy Caryl Churchill's play here

Drawing from Life
In the past, we used to rely on artists to bring us into the mysterious world of biology. In the 1500s Leonardo da Vinci revealed the glories of human anatomy. And around 1900, a German biologist named Ernst Haeckel used his incredible drawings of microbes and larger creatures to promote his ideas about evolution. The public loved Haeckel's work, but as Sarah Lilley reports, the artist in Haeckel eventually came into conflict with the scientist.
Go to a website with images from "Artforms in Nature"
Read James Hanken's article on Haeckel in Natural History magazine:
Read David Brody's article on Haeckel in Cabinet magazine
Read more about Ernst Haeckel
Buy Ernst Haeckel’s book here

Future Tense
The painter Alexis Rockman gets worked up by news from the scientific world. He wants his paintings to help people visualize – and get a little freaked out by – big phenomena like genetic engineering and global warming. He doesn’t have a science background, but Rockman consults with so many scientists before he starts to paint, he’s become something of an expert himself. Trey Kay caught up with the artist at his studio and spoke with him about imagining the future.
Go to a Greenpeace article on Alexis Rockman
Buy Alexis Rockman's book here

SPECIAL GUEST
Margaret Atwood
The daughter of an entomologist, Margaret Atwood grew up in the woods of Canada. She is the author of more than 25 books of fiction, poetry, and essays, including Oryx and Crake, The Handmaid's Tale, Alias Grace, and The Blind Assassin, which won the Booker Prize.
Go to the Margaret Atwood reference website
Go to the Margaret Atwood Society website
Buy Margaret Atwood’s book here

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The Ancestor's Tale
History is full of poets who have extolled the wonders of nature. And in his book Unweaving the Rainbow, the brilliant Oxford University biologist Richard Dawkins professes that he is equally amazed at the poetry of the natural world. His latest book on evolution is called The Ancestor's Tale, and is modeled after Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Kurt Andersen spoke with Richard Dawkins about the art of real life.
Read text of Kurt's interview with Richard Dawkins here
Go to a website on Richard Dawkins
Buy Richard Dawkins's book here

Design for the Real World
Old Saint Nick
Graphic designer Stephen Heller looks at how the image of the fat guy in the red and white suit evolved into a global brand called Santa Claus. Produced by Leital Molad.

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