Wallace Stegner's "Mormon" Story w/ Alex Beam and Barbara Jones Brown | Ep. 2083
Mormon Stories Podcast
Dr. John Dehlin
4.6 • 5.2K Ratings
🗓️ 12 November 2025
⏱️ 97 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this fascinating interview, author and journalist Alex Beam joins Mormon Stories to discuss his new biography titled Wallace Stegner: Dean of Western Writers –published by Signature Books. Alex Beam is an acclaimed journalist and author known for his insightful historical biographies. Historian and executive director of Signature Books, Barbara Jones Brown is also joining us today!
Beam explores the life, legacy, and complex relationships Stegner had with Mormonism, the American West, and figures like Joseph Smith and Gordon B. Hinckley. From Stegner’s friendship and literary achievements to his nuanced understanding of Mormon culture, this conversation dives into history, literature, and faith.
Buy his new book from Signature books: https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/wallace-stegner
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host for today or co-host, John DeLinn. We are here with a very special guest. For those of you who are Mormon Stories nerds, you'll actually know him in his name. His name is Alex Beam. Hey, Alex. Nice to see you, John. Thank you for having me. Alex, those of you who are |
| 0:22.3 | nerds, will know that Alex is the author of American Crucifixion, which I think is one of the |
| 0:28.7 | most interesting and important biographies of Joseph Smith, certainly in the last decade or two, |
| 0:34.2 | if not ever. And we covered American Crucifixion with Alex Beam on a previous |
| 0:40.8 | episode of Mormon Stories like 10 years ago? |
| 0:43.2 | 2014. Yeah, we nailed it down. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But we're also here to talk about a new book |
| 0:49.0 | that Alex has recently published with signature books. So we have Barbara Jones Brown here. |
| 0:55.6 | Of course, |
| 0:56.0 | hey, Barbara. |
| 0:56.7 | Hi, John. |
| 0:57.6 | Thanks for having me back. |
| 0:59.0 | My pleasure. |
| 1:00.3 | And the book is called Wallace Stegner, Dean of Western Writers, again by Alex Beam. |
| 1:06.4 | And I'll just say, I'm torn. |
| 1:08.5 | Is this like a nerdy, obscure topic? |
| 1:11.5 | Or is this like as broad and universal as we can go? |
| 1:16.5 | Because on the one hand, I'm guessing most of my audience has never heard of Wallace Stegner. |
| 1:21.1 | On the other hand, the dude won the Pulitzer and the, what, American Book Award or whatever? |
| 1:25.8 | National Book Award. |
| 1:27.0 | National Book Award. National Book Award. |
| 1:27.6 | And he's one of the most important Western authors of all time in the U.S. |
| 1:31.9 | So is this nerdy obscure or is this broad and universal, which is it, y'all? |
... |
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