“Chomsky and Me: A Memoir” with Bev Boisseau Stohl

This conversation with Bev Stohl, author of “Chomsky and Me,” takes you inside Noam Chomsky’s office and daily life in a way few people have ever seen. Drawing on nearly 25 years as Chomsky’s assistant at MIT, Bev shares intimate, funny, and moving stories about his work habits, his chaotic “checkerboard” office, his deep kindness toward ordinary people, and the emotional toll of spending a lifetime confronting war, propaganda, and injustice. Along the way we talk about Chomsky’s impact on linguistics, cognitive science, and radical politics, why he was shut out of mainstream media for telling the truth, and how he managed to keep going “by action, by moving” instead of being overwhelmed by despair.

The episode is also a love letter to the broader ecosystem of radical thinkers and organizers around Chomsky: Howard Zinn and the emotional power of his memorial, civil rights legend Dorie Ladner, union lawyer and Central America activist Dan Kovalik, and the many students, filmmakers, and musicians who passed through that cramped MIT office. Bev’s memoir and stories show Chomsky not as an abstract icon but as a complicated, sometimes awkward, always deeply principled human being—and highlight her own role using humor, care, and good judgment to keep him grounded.

About Bev Stohl

Bev Stohl is a writer, former MIT administrator, and longtime personal assistant to Noam Chomsky, whose memoir Chomsky and Me chronicles their quarter century working relationship. She came to Chomsky’s office from other administrative roles at MIT—including graduate programs in economics and ocean engineering—while completing her master’s degree in psychology, expecting an easier job and instead finding herself at the center of Chomsky’s intellectual and political life.

Over the years she managed his chaotic schedule, coordinated visits from students, activists, and documentary crews, and became a kind of social buffer and comic counterweight to his intense focus and often somber work. Beyond the Chomsky memoir, Bev has written extensively on wider political questions on Substack, has experience doing stand-up comedy, and recently completed an audiobook edition of Chomsky and Me with a Spanish translation forthcoming.

Order the book: https://orbooks.com/catalog/chomsky-and-me/

Bev’s substack: https://substack.com/@bevstohl

Mentioned articles: I'm no longer waiting for the storm to pass (Bev Stohl): https://substack.com/home/post/p-190768008

“Ensnared” and “Manipulated” (Valéria Chomsky): https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/02/09/ensnared-and-manipulated-official-statement-by-valeria-chomsky-regarding-jeffrey-epstein/

Cross-Examining The Tabloid Left Show Trial of Chomsky w/ Rameez Rahman (Tara Van Duik): https://morbidsymptom.substack.com/p/cross-examining-the-tabloid-left

Greg’s Blog: http://zzs-blg.blogspot.com/

Pat’s Substack: https://patcummings.substack.com/ 

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