Podcast Episodes
Back to Search489 Schopenhauer (aka The Tunnel and The Hole)
Episode 489
"It is difficult to find happiness within oneself," said the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860), "but it is impossible to find it any…
3 years, 3 months ago
488 William Faulkner (with Carl Rollyson)
Episode 488
Jacke talks to "serial biographer" Carl Rollyson about his new two-volume biography of William Faulkner, The Life of William Faulkner: The Past Is Ne…
3 years, 3 months ago
487 Bond, the Beatles, and the British Psyche (with John Higgs)
Episode 487
On October 5, 1962, two items were released, hardly newsworthy at the time. One was Dr. No, the first James Bond film, and the other was Love Me Do, …
3 years, 3 months ago
486 The Creative Partnership of Willa Cather & Edith Lewis (with Melissa J. Homestead)
Episode 486
What was Willa Cather's life really like? Was she - as is often thought - a solitary artist, painstakingly crafting her novels about the Great Plains…
3 years, 3 months ago
485 Reading Pleasures - Everyday Black Living in Early America (with Dr Tara Bynum)
Episode 485
"In the early United States, a Black person committed an act of resistance simply by reading and writing. Yet we overlook that these activities also …
3 years, 3 months ago
484 Reading John Milton (with Stephen Dobranski)
Episode 484
John Milton is often regarded as second only to Shakespeare in the history of English verse - and his epic poem, Paradise Lost, is viewed by many as …
3 years, 3 months ago
483 Margaret Fuller (with Megan Marshall)
Episode 483
In her lifetime, Margaret Fuller (1810-1850) was widely acknowledged as the best read person - male or female - in New England. Her landmark work, Wo…
3 years, 3 months ago
482 Moby Dick - 10 Essential Questions (Part Two)
Episode 482
Is Moby-Dick truly the Great American Novel? How did contemporary critics miss it? When (and how) was the book rediscovered? Jacke goes through all t…
3 years, 4 months ago
481 Moby Dick - 10 Essential Questions (Part One)
Episode 481
Here we go! Moby-Dick; or, the Whale (1851) by Herman Melville is one of the greatest - and strangest - novels you will ever read. Call it what you w…
3 years, 4 months ago
480 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (with Ritchie Robertson)
Episode 480
In 1878, critic Matthew Arnold wrote, "Goethe is the greatest poet of modern times... because having a very considerable gift for poetry, he was at t…
3 years, 4 months ago