‘Confederates were traitors’: Ty Seidule on West Point, race and American history

The discovery of a plaque showing a member of the Ku Klux Klan at the US military academy made headlines. One member of the commission which recommended its removal is a historian of the US army and the lost cause myth

Orlando Figes: ‘Gorbachev was a very sharp and likable person’

The award-winning historian on Putin’s cult of personality, why he loves Turgenev, and giving up on books after 20 pages

Ian McEwan on ageing, legacy and the attack on his friend Salman Rushdie: ‘It’s beyond the edge of human cruelty’

The author’s new novel explores how global events shape individual lives – but nothing prepared him for this ‘dark moment’

‘At first she didn’t like my drawings’: Axel Scheffler and Julia Donaldson on three decades of collaboration

In a rare joint interview, the creators of The Gruffalo talk about baddies, Brexit – and the bumpy beginning to their partnership

‘Every time I write, it’s like the first time’: Joyce Carol Oates on her 61 novels, Twitter storms and widowhood

At 84, Oates still knows how to strike a nerve. She talks about Babysitter – her new book inspired by a Detroit serial killer – loneliness and her controversial tweet about white male writers

The real Jane Tennison reveals ugly truth behind TV police drama Prime Suspect

Retired detective Jackie Malton helped writer Lynda La Plante nail her characters. She talks about the misogyny and homophobia she endured in her early years

AM Homes: ‘We want to believe that opportunity exists for women now; it does and it doesn’t’

The US author on trying to add a note of optimism to her work, getting advice from Jeanette Winterson, and her prescient new novel about a coup in Washington

Lemn Sissay: ‘I’m not angry any more, but it’s a daily battle not to be’

The poet and broadcaster, 55, on the power of forgiveness, growing up in care, loving poetry from the age of 12 and getting his OBE

Cosmologist Laura Mersini-Houghton: ‘Our universe is one tiny grain of dust in a beautiful cosmos’

As her new book on the origins of the universe is published, the Albanian-American scientist explains how her work on multiverse theory influenced Stephen Hawking

Sunday with Irvine Welsh: ‘If you sit around waiting for Monday morning, you’re going to feel blue’

The writer tells Rich Pelley how he gets out and about on Sundays in Miami, Edinburgh, the Chilterns and London

Irvine Welsh: ‘Everything has become so shouty’

The Trainspotting author on his new novel’s transgender storyline, using humour to give his readers a break and the debt he owes to Evelyn Waugh

‘I thought drink and drugs enabled my creativity’: Julia Cameron on the drama behind The Artist’s Way

When even Hunter S Thompson tells you to take it easy, you must be overdoing it. The bestselling author talks about marrying Martin Scorsese, sobering up, and writing a bestseller

From child gossip columnist to acclaimed author: K-Ming Chang’s search for the truth

The 24-year-old’s debut novel Bestiary gained plaudits in 2020. Now her love of fairy tales and queer literature has led to a collection of short stories

‘You had to be quick!’: Henry Horenstein on his breathtaking Speedway pics

From stock car racing to country music stars, the US photographer is one of the great documenters of Americana. He talks about his life in the fast lane

‘Listening to the people’: Beth Macy on the opioids crisis and her Dopesick sequel, Raising Lazarus

What’s next, the author asks, now the US has ‘a generation of users that started with heroin and fentanyl’