Ken Burns: 'America's Storyteller' on His Creative Process

In this episode, acclaimed documentarian Ken Burns offers us a look into his dynamic creative process and shares what inspires him to create powerful, enduring narratives of iconic historical figures and periods. Since this episode originally aired in 2020, Burns has captivated audiences with documentaries on Ernest Hemingway, Muhammad Ali, Benjamin Franklin, the U.S. and the Holocaust, and the American buffalo as well as Burns' first non-American figure and topic: Leonardo da Vinci. This fall, he will release a new series on PBS about the American Revolution and how the nation's founding turned the world upside down.

You can listen to Ken Burns: 'America's Storyteller' on His Creative Process online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Ken Burns: 'America's Storyteller' on His Creative Process is an episode from After the Fact by The Pew Charitable Trusts.

This episode is 26:31 long.

This episode was published on Aug 1, 2025.

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