Liane Hansen
Liane Hansen has been the host of NPR's award-winning Weekend Edition Sunday for 20 years. She brings to her position an extensive background in broadcast journalism, including work as a radio producer, reporter, and on-air host at both the local and national level. The program has covered such breaking news stories as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the capture of Saddam Hussein, the deaths of Princess Diana and John F. Kennedy, Jr., and the Columbia shuttle tragedy. In 2004, Liane was granted an exclusive interview with former weapons inspector David Kay prior to his report on the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The show also won the James Beard award for best radio program on food for a report on SPAM.
Before joining Weekend Edition Sunday in November 1989, Hansen hosted Performance Today, NPR's award-winning daily two-hour classical music and arts information program; and was a regular guest-host for NPR's newsmagazines as well as Fresh Air with Terry Gross. Hansen's association with Fresh Air goes back to 1976, when she was a production assistant and substitute host for the program. In the early 1980s, Hansen was the host of NPR's Weekend All Things Considered. She came to NPR as a production assistant for All Things Considered in 1979 after contributing stories to "Voices in the Wind" and "Options in Education." Her career in public broadcasting began at WSKG in Binghamton, New York, where she co-hosted the daily newsmagazine For Your Information.
In 2001, Hansen received the National News and Documentary Emmy Award for "She Says/Women in News" (narrator) directed by Barbara Ricks. Hansen was also part of NPR's coverage of Sept. 11, which received the 2001 Peabody Award. She represented Marian High School with honor in Newscasting in the Massachusetts Speech Festival and Debate Tourney (1968-9).
In the mid-eighties, Hansen worked as an archivist in London, England, at the acclaimed Maybox Theatres, where other duties included babysitting Princess Margaret's coat and serving coffee to Sir Richard Attenborough.
A native of Worcester, Massachusetts, Hansen received the key to the city in November of 1980. She attended the University of Hartford in Connecticut, and acted with the Worcester Childrens Theater, Entr'Actors Guild, Footlights Theater Company, and the Fenwick Theater Company at Holy Cross College where she was an assistant to the director of the Theater Division. She made $26 dollars in the professional theater as April in Company at Caesars Monticello in Framingham, Massachusetts. Hansen's voice can be heard on the Emmy-Award-winning TV documentary, "Women In News," as well as the film In Their Footsteps: Lewis and Clark, and many audio books. Her current passions are figure skating, baseball, The Food Channel and tap dancing.
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As a debate over the firing of eight U.S. attorneys unfolds, White House officials may be subpoenaed by Congress, and more e-mail related to the case is likely to be made public.
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The news from Africa includes a presidential election in Senegal on Sunday featuring an octogenarian incumbent and 14 challengers. And violence from Sudan's Darfur region continues to spill into neighboring Chad.
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Community and food are the central topics of Bonny Wolf's new book, a collection of essays called Talking with My Mouth Full. Wolf shares her thoughts on the recent shift in U.S. attitudes toward food. -
Steven Carter's new book, Famous Writers School: A Novel may show that anyone can write but it also shows, through the fumbling of the protagonist, that not everyone can, or should, teach. -
Host Liane Hansen interviews Tom Mullen, author of The Last Town on Earth, a historical novel set in the town of Commonwealth in Washington. The story takes place in 1918 at the height of the flu epidemic and a community gripped by fear tries to prevent an outbreak of the disease by keeping anyone from entering or leaving the town. -
Pope Benedict XVI's comments about the prophet Muhammad, made in an academic speech earlier this week, continue to inflame the Muslim world. Islamist leaders have demanded an apology and the pontiff has expressed his regrets -- but also his confusion over the uproar.
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Andrea Lee's latest novel, Lost Hearts in Italy, builds on the classic love triangle. Eighteen years after the affair began, Mira, Nick and Zenin the billionaire are still trying to put their lives back together. Lee tells Liane Hansen about the book.
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P.F. Sloan virtually disappeared off the music radar screen after writing "Eve of Destruction" in 1965. Now, 30 years later, he's back with Sailover. -
Dealing with the country's problems puts an awful strain on U.S. presidents. Kenneth Walsh's book looks at where presidents go to replenish their minds and spirits and what those places reveal about these leaders. -
Shari Caudron's book Who Are You People? peers into the lives of folks who are fanatical about singular pursuits. Her subjects range from ice fishing enthusiasts to Josh Groban groupies.
