Stefan Al, "Dwelling on Earth: The Past and Future of the Places We Call Home" (Norton, 2026)

[ on-hold music] Welcome to the New Books Network.

Greetings, new book, uh, listeners.

Are you pretending to work from home? Well, wherever you're working, this is about your home and the consequences of your staying there.

That's what this interview is about today.

I'm your host, Jim Wunsch, and our guest today is Stefan Al, who directs the Urban Planning program at Hunter College, a, a division of the City University of New York.

His new book, Dwelling on Earth: The Past and Future of the Places We Call Home, published this year by Norton, is that rare thing: a book delivers... a book that delivers what it promises, and in fewer than 300 readable pages.

Professor Al i- is not only fully credentialed, he has a doctorate in urban planning from U Ca- University of California, Berkeley.

He's a licensed architect in New York and the Netherlands, and involved in the design of real buildings.

Uh, they're very tall, that is to say, he's been involved in the 2,000-foot Canton Tower in China.

And by the way, he wrote the book Supertalls in 2022.

And he's also involved in modest, sustainable structures where people actually live, uh, which takes us down to earth, so to speak, with his book, Dwelling on Earth.

Stefan Al, welcome to the New Books Network.

Thank you very much, Jim.

That was a very beautiful introduction.

Well, thanks.

But, uh, now let's, l- let's get down to it right away, uh, and for me, getting down to it is 400 years ago, all right? Uh, there was a chap named Peter Stuyvesant, he was another Dutchman, uh, and he landed in, uh, what we call Gotham in New York, but was then New Amsterdam.

And in your book, this new book, uh, you make, uh, many references to the Netherlands, and I, I got a sense, maybe I'm wrong, it's not the first time, that growing up there was important to you as a planner, perhaps as your prestigious doctorate from Berkeley.

Uh, so listen, in a, in a little bit, uh, what got you from there, uh, to, uh, sitting here with me today? Uh, tell us a little bit about being a Dutchman in, in, in the, in the New World.