KGNU's Claudia Cragg speaks here withCatie Marron about her second book, 'City Squares: "CitySquares: Eighteen Writers on the Spirit and Significance of SquaresAround the World".In this important collection,eighteen renowned writers, including David Remnick, Zadie Smith,Rebecca Skloot, Rory Stewart, and Adam Gopnik evoke the spirit andhistory of some of the world’s most recognized and significant citysquares, accompanied by illustrations from equally distinguishedphotographers.Over half of the world’s citizensnow live in cities, and this number is rapidly growing. At theheart of these municipalities is the square—the defining urbanpublic space since the dawn of democracy in Ancient Greece. Eachsquare stands for a larger theme in history: cultural,geopolitical, anthropological, or architectural, and each of theeighteen luminary writers has contributed his or her own innatetalent, prodigious research, and local knowledge.Divided into three parts:Culture, Geopolitics, History, headlined by Michael Kimmelman,David Remnick, and George Packer, this significant anthology showsthe city square in new light. Jehane Noujaim, award-winningfilmmaker, takes the reader through her return to Tahrir Squareduring the 2011 protest; Rory Stewart, diplomat and author,chronicles a square in Kabul which has come and gone several timesover five centuries; Ari Shavit describes the dramatic changes ofcentral Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square; Rick Stengel, editor, author, andjournalist, recounts the power of Mandela’s choice of the GrandParade, Cape Town, a huge market square to speak to the world rightafter his release from twenty-seven years in prison; whileaward-winning journalist Gillian Tett explores the concept of thevirtual square in the age of social media.This collection is an importantlesson in history, a portrait of the world we live in today, aswell as an exercise in thinking about the future. Evocative andcompelling, City Squares will change the way you walkthrough a city.