Bev Stohl at Harvard Book Store

Harvard Book Store welcomes BEV STOHL—essayist and former assistant to Noam Chomsky—for a discussion of her new memoir Chomsky and Me. She will be joined in conversation by CHRISTOPHER LYDON, host of Open Source.

Update on Event Masking Policies

Masks are not required for this event. As of June 1, 2023, masks are encouraged but not required for most Harvard Book Store events, unless otherwise specified. Please review individual listings.

About Chomsky and Me

Through these pages we observe the comings and goings of a constant and varied stream of visitors: the historian Howard Zinn; activists Alex Carey, Peggy Duff, and Dorie Ladner; the inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners Lee; actors Catherine Keener and Wallace Shawn; the writer Norman Mailer; gaggles of fourteen-year-old school students, and the world’s leading linguists. All make appearances in these stories. Many who visit are as careless of their allotted time as Chomsky is generous with his. Shepherding them out in mid-conversation is one of Bev’s more challenging responsibilities.

Other duties include arranging lectures to overflow crowds around the world, keeping unscrupulous journalists at bay, preventing teetering ziggurats of paper and books from engulfing her boss, and switching on his printer when it is deemed “broken” by a mind that is engaged less by mundane technology than the realms of academia and activism.

Over the years, what has commenced as a formal working arrangement blossoms into something more: a warm and enduring friendship that involves work trips to Europe, visits with her partner and dog to Noam’s summer home on Cape Cod, and a mentorship that challenges Bev with all manner of intriguing mental and practical puzzles.

Published with the approval of its subject and written with affection, insight and a gentle sense of humor, Chomsky and Me describes a relationship between two quite different people who, through the happenstance of work, form a bond that is both surprising and reciprocally rich.

Praise for Chomsky and Me

“This is a beautiful, tender and profound book about one of the most important thinkers of our time, by one of the people who knows him best. A masterpiece of observation and memoir.” —Johann Hari, author of New York Times bestseller Chasing the Scream

“A ringside seat on the life and times of a man regarded by millions as a remote intellectual deity, but who comes into sharp focus through the delightfully warm and humorous lens of Bev Stohl as a relatable mortal . . . If you want to know the real Noam Chomsky, this is the book for you.” —Amir Amirani