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Transatlantic Bookmarks

Transatlantic Bookmarks

By: Ksenija Popović & Sue Graham Johnston
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Welcome to Transatlantic Bookmarks, a weekly podcast for people who enjoy big ideas and good company.

From opposite sides of the Atlantic, European novelist Ksenija Popović (pronounced Xenia Popovich) and American engineer Sue Graham Johnston use books as a starting point to discuss culture, history, psychology, morality, and politics.

Some episodes focus on books themselves, from contemporary fiction and classic literature to international books, literary prize winners, and nonfiction. Most are about the questions hiding between the lines.

New episodes every Saturday.

2026 Ksenija Popović & Sue Graham Johnston
Art Literary History & Criticism Social Sciences
Episodes
  • Can Distance Change Who You Are?
    Jun 27 2026

    What happens when distance changes the way we see the world—and ourselves?

    Inspired by Samantha Harvey’s Orbital, we explore the Overview Effect: the profound shift astronauts describe after seeing Earth from space. From there, the conversation expands into borders, war, loneliness, mortality, perspective, and the relief that can come from stepping back.

    Along the way, we discuss the International Space Station, the former Yugoslavia, Viktor Frankl's Man’s Search for Meaning, climate anxiety, AI and art, social media, body image, and why some books help us see familiar things from a completely different angle.

    📚 BOOKS MENTIONED:
    • Training for the Uphill Athlete by Steve House, Scott Johnston, and Kilian Jornet
    • Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose
    • Orbital by Samantha Harvey
    • In Ascension by Martin MacInnes
    • Awe by Dacher Keltner
    • Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
    • The Living Mountain by Nan Shepherd
    • Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

    💌 Our Substack & Show Notes:
    https://transatlanticbookmarks.substack.com/

    📚 Read Ksenija’s Novels:
    https://transatlanticbookmarks.substack.com/p/publications

    📚 Ksenija on Goodreads:
    https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6449766.Ksenija_Popovi_

    🎙️ ABOUT TRANSATLANTIC BOOKMARKS

    Hosted by European novelist Ksenija Popović and American engineer Sue Graham Johnston, Transatlantic Bookmarks uses books as the starting point for conversations about culture, history, psychology, morality, politics, and the questions hiding between the lines.

    New episodes every Saturday.

    👉🏻 CHAPTERS

    00:00 Intro
    00:25 What We’re Reading
    08:03 The Overview Effect
    19:14 Isolation vs. Connection
    26:09 When Borders Disappear
    33:46 Judging from a Distance
    39:05 Above Situationalists
    48:26 Literature and Human Empathy
    52:39 Literature, Climate, and the Earth
    59:08 Mortality, Meaning, and Daily Life
    01:01:40 Body Image and Beauty Standards
    01:08:08 Book Recommendations

    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 12 mins
  • The War on Books
    Jun 20 2026

    What makes a book dangerous?

    In this episode of Transatlantic Bookmarks, we discuss banned books, censorship, school libraries, Pride Month, LGBTQ literature, free speech, and the role books play in helping us understand lives different from our own. From John Steinbeck and Upton Sinclair to Alice Walker and Andrew Sean Greer, we explore why certain books become cultural battlegrounds and who gets to decide what belongs on the shelf.

    We also discuss book bans in the United States, the difference between age-appropriate reading and censorship, the role of librarians, LGBTQ representation in literature, and why societies often seem more comfortable with violence than with sex. At the center of the conversation is a simple question: what do we lose when access to books becomes restricted?

    📚 BOOKS MENTIONED:
    • No Shortcuts to the Top by Ed Viesturs (with David Roberts)
    • Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
    • White Teeth by Zadie Smith
    • The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
    • Das Kapital by Karl Marx
    • Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
    • The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
    • The Works of Immanuel Kant
    • Less by Andrew Sean Greer
    • The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer
    • The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare
    • Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell
    • The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel
    • Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
    • The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
    • The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes
    • The Color Purple by Alice Walker

    💌 Our Substack & Show Notes:
    https://transatlanticbookmarks.substack.com/

    📚 Read Ksenija’s Novels:
    https://transatlanticbookmarks.substack.com/p/publications

    📚 Ksenija on Goodreads:
    https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6449766.Ksenija_Popovi_

    🎙️ ABOUT TRANSATLANTIC BOOKMARKS

    Hosted by European novelist Ksenija Popović and American engineer Sue Graham Johnston, Transatlantic Bookmarks uses books as the starting point for conversations about culture, history, psychology, morality, politics, and the questions hiding between the lines.

    New episodes every Saturday.

    👉🏻 CHAPTERS

    00:00 Intro
    02:49 What We’re Reading
    05:21 The Fear of a Different Opinion
    08:54 The Role of Literature in Critical Thinking
    09:20 Pride Month and LGBTQ Representation
    16:23 Cultural Divides in America
    21:23 Book Banning in the United States
    25:55 The Case for Censorship
    33:46 The Hypocrisy of Censorship
    38:03 Censoring Socialism
    43:36 LGBTQIA+ in the Balkans
    49:28 Unexpected Events and Personal Stories
    51:13 Pride Marches: Corporate Influence vs. Authenticity
    52:45 The Role of Librarians in Democracy
    56:13 Both Sides Are Banning

    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 2 mins
  • Can You Trust a Translation?
    Jun 13 2026

    What happens to a book when it crosses a border?

    In this episode of Transatlantic Bookmarks, we discuss translation, multilingualism, dialects, cultural context, and whether it is ever possible to experience a book exactly as its author intended. Ksenija shares her experience writing a novel in English rather than her native language, the politics of language in the former Yugoslavia, and the disastrous translation that nearly ruined Steinbeck for her forever.

    Along the way, we explore translated literature, Asian fiction, letter writing, the global dominance of English, the challenge of translating poetry, and the books that helped us understand cultures far beyond our own.

    📚 BOOKS MENTIONED:
    • The Correspondent by Virginia Evans
    • Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler
    • Orbital by Samantha Harvey
    • Fathers Before Sons by Ksenija Popović
    • Commissario Montalbano by Andrea Camilleri
    • Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust
    • The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
    • Journey to the West by Wu Cheng’en
    • Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami
    • Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
    • The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
    • Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
    • The Castle of Crossed Destinies by Italo Calvino
    • The Solitude of Prime Numbers by Paolo Giordano

    💌 Our Substack & Show Notes:
    https://transatlanticbookmarks.substack.com/

    📚 Read Ksenija’s Novels:
    https://transatlanticbookmarks.substack.com/p/publications

    📚 Ksenija on Goodreads:
    https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6449766.Ksenija_Popovi_

    🎙️ ABOUT TRANSATLANTIC BOOKMARKS

    Hosted by European novelist Ksenija Popović and American engineer Sue Graham Johnston, Transatlantic Bookmarks uses books as the starting point for conversations about culture, history, psychology, morality, politics, and the questions hiding between the lines.

    New episodes every Saturday.

    👉🏻 CHAPTERS

    00:00 Intro
    07:57 The Football World Cup
    10:49 What We’re Reading
    12:32 How Many Languages Do Ksenija (and Melania Trump) Speak?
    19:08 The Challenges of Writing in a Foreign Language
    24:57 Accents and Dialects
    34:15 The Woes of Reading in Translation
    41:25 The United States and the Hegemony of English
    49:36 Asian Literature
    55:48 Why Ksenija Talks (a Lot!)
    58:15 Getting a Sense of Place Through Literature
    1:03:05 The Translator from Hell
    1:06:18 Translating Poetry
    1:08:20 Examples of Translation Gems
    1:10:07 Book Banning in the United States
    1:12:44 Book Recommendations
    1:14:29 Setting the Record Straight on Tolstoy

    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 16 mins
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