Podcasts about intellectuals

From the belly of the empire to the frontlines of global liberation struggles, what does it mean to be an intellectual in service of mass movements? In this episode, Nick Estes (The Red Nation) and Pranay Somayajula sit down to dissect the vital synthesis of revolutionary theory and ground-level practice. Moving beyond academic insulation, they interrogate anti-colonial resistance, Third World solidarity, Indigenous liberation, and the role of the radical writer in organizing for collective power. Watch the livestream edition on The Red Nation Podcast YouTube channel https://youtube.com/live/JGlG0pMSFLE?feature=share Follow Pranay on Substack https://www.culture-shock.xyz/ Follow Nick on Substack https://nickestes.substack.com/ The Guardian Letter: The Anti-Imperialist Scholars Collective (AISC) Responds https://www.anti-imperialists.com/statements/dc121068-bd7d-4408-8a5f-c23c8f70e4d1/ Empower our work:    GoFundMe:  https://www.gofundme.com/f/empower-red-medias-indigenous-content    Subscribe to The Red Nation Newsletter:  https://www.therednation.org/  Patreon  https://www.patreon.com/redmediapr  

What is the role of intellectuals in public life? Matthew Sweet hosts Radio 4's Friday night round table discussion programme about ideas. His guests are: Emile Chabal, author of a new biography about Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm; Sophie Scott Brown, who's researching BBC TV programme The Brains Trust, in which historians, philosophers and others answered questions sent in by the audience; critic and columnist Muriel Zagha; former editor of Prospect magazine David Goodhart; and curator and critic Pierre d'Alancaisez. Producer: Luke Mulhall

Our gifts are to be used in ___________, to ___________ people, and ___________ them to Jesus. [Ephesians 4.11-12] Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. [12] Their responsibility is to equip God's people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. Teachers are passionate about God's Word & teaching it _________________. Intellectuals make _____________ truths difficult, but teachers make difficult truths __________________. [James 1.22-24] But don't just listen to God's word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. [23] For if you listen to the word and don't obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror. [24] You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like. Jesus __________________ what he was teaching. [1 Corinthians 8:1c-2] But while knowledge makes us feel important, it is love that strengthens the church. 2 Anyone who claims to know all the answers doesn't really know very much. Don't rely on your own __________________ to impress people. Be an __________________ of the things you teach. [1 Corinthians 11:1] And you should imitate me, just as I imitate Christ. Authority doesn't come from how ______________ you are but from the Word of God and the power of a _______________ life. Always approach God's Word with an open ____________ and an open ____________. [2 Timothy 2.15] Make every effort to present yourself before God as a proven worker who does not need to be ashamed, teaching the message of truth accurately. Always be ready to ____________. [2 Timothy 4:2] Preach the word of God. Be prepared, whether the time is favorable or not. Patiently correct, rebuke, and encourage your people with good teaching. Teachers invest in ___________________. [Matthew 28.19-20] Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. [20] Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Our goal is not simply to _______________ our gifts, but to ___________ our gifts.

Adriaan en Simon spreken over: fietsen op een driewieler / wees gegroet charly toorop / de intellectueel en de massa / omdat het een leerschool is / hoe spreek je Yeats eigenlijk uit / de uitgeverij als kwade uitwas van de democratie / 1855, het jaar van de blikopener / kodak en tiktok / Lumumba / Adriaan, correspondent in een veranderende wereld / Parapluie de Cherbourg / Charles de Gaulle (le must) / het valmoment / een voorproefje uit Mijn kust / een van de allermooiste documentaires die Adriaan ooit heeft gezien / een sterke vrouw / de post Schrijvers van dienst: John Carey | E.M. Forster | W.B. Yeats | T.S. Eliot | John Bettjeman | Graham Greene | W.H. Auden | E. de Haan | Jan Haasbroek | Andrée Blouin ADVERTENTIE MATT SLEEPS Is jouw matras inmiddels al 8+ jaar oud of lig je gewoon helemaal niet lekker, kies dan voor het matras dat al 13 keer het beste getest is volgens de Consumentenbond. Ga naar www.mattsleeps.com en gebruik de kortingscode DIS voor een extra verrassingskorting bovenop de lopende acties. Ook adverteren in Van Dis Ongefilterd? Stuur een mail naar jeroen@steamtree.nl DOCUMENTAIRE Link naar Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjZdWFXxkio BOEKEN UIT DE AFLEVERING BESTELLEN? DAT KAN VIA DEZE LINKS: John Carey – The Intellectuals and the Masses Jan Haasbroek – 100 jaar VPRO E. de Haan – Het valmoment Andrée Blouin – Afrika, mijn land COLOFON Volg het Instagram-account van de podcast: @vandis.ongefilterd Wil je een vraag stellen of reageren? Mail het aan: vandis@atlascontact.nl Van Dis Ongefilterd wordt gemaakt door Adriaan van Dis, Simon Dikker Hupkes en Bart Jeroen Kiers. Bedankt voor uw recensie. © 2026 Atlas Contact | Adriaan van Dis | Simon Dikker Hupkes | Bart Jeroen Kiers See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Philip Hensher and I discussed the history of the novel in Britain from Defoe to Hollinghurst. Philip is remarkably well-read and happy to share his real opinions. He can go from Swift to Fitzgerald on the turn of a pin, isn't shy about holding his ground, and has some very firm views. People who read novels are protected against becoming violent. Ideas are not important in most novels. Walter Scott isn't very good. Arnold Bennett is a top 20 novelist. Rachel Cusk has the best chance of being read in 100 years. That sort of thing. Here's one exchange where we disagreed about what a novel is.HENSHER: Oh, Henry, Henry, how can you kill a book like that? How can you—OLIVER: Look, you can't have Jane Austen without the Enlightenment, and you can't have George Eliot without the secularization of Jesus, and you can't have Tolstoy without all the slightly incredible things that he believed.HENSHER: No, let's not talk about Tolstoy.OLIVER: No, but the list goes on, right? Henry James even, who is often called a man of no ideas, he's an incredibly good liberal. He might be the best novelist about the liberal idea that one person should not be allowed to dominate over another, in private conditions rather than just government. These ideas are, in a way, they're the thing that distinguish those writers. Jane Austen knows how to observe and how to present because she's thinking about what it means underneath.HENSHER: I don't know. I don't know about that.OLIVER: I don't even think you can have Middlemarch without John Stuart Mill's political economy, in a way.HENSHER: Yes, that's probably true. But George Eliot's an unusual sort of novelist.Jane Austen, I mean, how do we know what did she—what did Jane Austen think about slavery in the boldest and most extreme form? I think we can deduce that she thought that people involved in the slave trade or who came near it, like Mrs. Elton, were not at all the sort of people that she would altogether like to hang out with. I think the same is true of Sir Thomas Bertram, and the weakness of his imagination is somehow tied in with the fact that he has a plantation where he doesn't really think about the people that it affects.But already we're into speculation. I don't know what we can really deduce about Jane Austen's idea, because she's such a polyphonic novelist that we don't find an idea being put forward without being able to find a character who's saying the exact opposite. And sometimes one side of the argument is eventually dismissed, but not always, I think.I said this at the conference we had a discussion with. I think that when you boil a novel down to its absolute irreducible essentials, I think what you have is not a proposal or a view of society or anything like that. It's Charles Pooter painting his bath red, or the moment in Ivy Compton-Burnett's Mother and Son when the son irrevocably falls out with his mother by telling her that he doesn't want to have sugar in his tea anymore.From the very beginning, novelists have said, “What I'm writing about, I'm writing about nothing, and this is the virtue of what I'm doing. I'm writing about the utter triviality of everyday life.” And that, for me, is the enchantment.OLIVER: Well, some novelists have said that.HENSHER: A lot.OLIVER: Samuel Richardson didn't say that. Samuel Richardson's quite an important exception.HENSHER: No, but people said it about Richardson.OLIVER: I don't think we—yes, but we can't believe it.HENSHER: People definitely said—no, I think we can.OLIVER: Pamela is a novel of ideas.HENSHER: Well, it's a novel that contains some ideas.OLIVER: Yes.TranscriptHENRY OLIVER: Today I am talking to Philip Hensher. Philip is a British novelist. He's written books like The Northern Clemency, King of the Badgers, The Emperor Waltz, and now he's got a new book, A History of the Novel in Britain, and you can see it there. It looks very pretty with Alice in Wonderland on the front.Philip, hello.PHILIP HENSHER: Hello, Henry.Novels Are for EveryoneOLIVER: Now, to begin with, tell me about your grandmothers.HENSHER: Oh, okay. Yes, well, I finished the book because—I kept my story out of it, largely. I thought that I should go back to a time when everybody read novels. It wasn't a specialist interest as it seems to be turning into. And I thought I would talk about my two grandmothers, both of whom left school when they were 14. They worked in very ordinary and hard jobs in factories all their lives, and they were passionate readers of novels.My paternal grandmother loved Dickens. She had a complete set of Dickens, which, I've discovered after some research, was issued as an offer by the Daily Express sometime in the 1930s. I've still got it, actually. I'm going to go and get a sample volume. It's terribly cheaply produced.OLIVER: Oh, I've got that set. That's great, yes.HENSHER: Yes. The publisher is otherwise only noted as a printer. The typeface is absolutely tiny.OLIVER: It's painful.HENSHER: It's painful to read. But she had it. She loved Dickens.My maternal grandmother, I don't have any of her books, I'm afraid. I would say that she loved stories of family lives, of people interacting with each other. She loved Catherine Cookson, a now slightly forgotten popular novelist of the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s. But she read an enormous amount. I mean, she must have read one or two novels a week, every week of her life.I think that the thing that has disappeared since my grandmothers' generation is the idea that everybody can read novels. They speak to everybody. They explore every part of life, potentially.What seems to be happening now, and I greatly regret it, is that it's passing into the property of expensively educated people, people who have gone to private schools, perhaps, have certainly gone to university. And the sort of reader like my grandmother, who read Bleak House with a lot of pleasure, seems to be disappearing.So that was one of the reasons why I wanted to write the book, to make the case for how wonderfully enjoyable novels are. They're not a duty, or they shouldn't be a duty. They should just be founded in pleasure, however complex that pleasure might be. And I wanted to finish the book by citing my two grandmothers, who were such great readers.OLIVER: And as well as inheriting that reading culture from them, you got a lot of that at your school, didn't you?HENSHER: Yes, I suppose I did. I think that it's hard for me to say because I was in at the beginning of a sort of curriculum change, where there was an idea that we ought to give the kids things that are relevant or are going to appeal to their social concerns. So, I mean, this is going back to the very early 1980s. My set novel for A-level was The Grapes of Wrath, a classic tale of victimhood, really. Classic approved message.And the thing was, I think what started me off as a passionate reader of novels was a sort of rebellious turn away from that sort of thing. I read Jane Austen off my own bat. I read a lot of Dickens before I left school—things that we weren't taught at all. And that's always been the sort of reader that I am, saying, “Oh, we're not supposed to be reading this,” you know? “It's not on the curriculum.”Parliament and ThatcherOLIVER: What was it like working in the House of Commons?HENSHER: It was fine. [laughter] It was a very unusual experience. I don't think it was a job that most people would've known existed. When people said to me, “Well, what do you actually do?” I used to say, “Well, you know the guys with wigs who sit in front of the Speaker? They're my bosses.” And it was a strange, ritualistic experience, and you were physically in the middle of all these political dramas.When I started work, I started work in the House of Commons the beginning of September—this is September 1990. And six weeks later, there was all the drama of Mrs. Thatcher being thrown out, which I saw physically very close up. I didn't have anything to do with it. You weren't aware of what really was going on, but you were there. And Mrs. Thatcher swept past you at crisis moments.And that's a very seductive place to be as a baby novelist, because novels are very often told by people occupying minor positions about the lives of the great. There's a mid-20th-century novelist called Alfred Duggan who made a career out of writing historical novels of the lives of Roman emperors as told by their servants.And I think that, actually, the novel that I eventually wrote about the fall of Mrs. Thatcher, Kitchen Venom, which has just been rereleased 30 years later by an American publisher, McNally Editions, as a neglected classic—I think that was very much one of those books. Somebody who saw these vast and world-changing events physically close up without really being an insider at all.OLIVER: Do you think you're more conservative than most other novelists today? Small c conservative. Or big c.HENSHER: No, I don't—I think that I've never been someone who fits in with the on dit, as it were. I don't think that I'm particularly bothered about what people think of what I might think. One of the least effective arguments to change somebody's mind, it always seems to me, is to say, “But most people think . . .” Most people are wrong about things.So yes, I do think that actually having a close connection with political figures—after Mrs Thatcher, I did get to know some cabinet ministers, mostly, for one historical reason or another, Conservative cabinet ministers. And then coming out from spending the day with them and going to some book launch in the '90s and having to listen to some member of the lumpen intelligentsia say, “Oh, these people are so evil.” I'm just going, you know, “Save the word for someone else.”So yes, I think that I have a kind of interest in some things that most literary people just aren't interested in at all. And I think I've come to conclusions of my own about some burning contemporary issues. I don't think of myself as conservative. I think of myself as a 19th-century liberal. But then again, I also think of Mrs. Thatcher as a 19th-century liberal.OLIVER: I was going to say.HENSHER: [laughs] I don't know where that leaves you.OLIVER: I was very struck in, I think it's something you wrote or an interview you gave, where you said that you were at a comprehensive school in Sheffield. And contrary to what we think was going on at the time, actually you had teachers who were quite pleased about Mrs. Thatcher getting elected. And in the age of bell-bottoms, people were going to Mahler concerts all the time. On that front, you have a different view of the way England was, as it were.HENSHER: Yes. It's partly true that those people have been flattened out of history. Eight years before the miners' strike, for instance, when Mrs. Thatcher did come to lead the Conservative Party, it wasn't actually apparent to most people that she was the embodiment of all evil. And I think that people realized that something must be done.There's a lot of retrospective reimagining of these things. I think the absolutely classic example is Mrs. Thatcher taking free milk away from, I think, seven to elevens. And this is always presented as a gesture of sheer evil. But I can tell you, as one of the children who drank the official milk, it was absolutely disgusting. It was delivered at 7:00 a.m., and then it sat there in the sun for four hours in the summer, and it was absolutely undrinkable. Nobody drank it. Absolutely nobody drank it. It was a complete waste of money.There might have been some point in giving people free milk in the 1940s when there was rationing, but by the 1970s, what was the point in the government buying you milk? It was frankly the job of your parents to buy milk. But we're returning to that position. And people seem to be assuming it's the job of the government to buy your children breakfast these days, but what do I know?Things changed later on, I would say. The mood in the North certainly altered when people saw that the economic basis of subsidy was going to be taken away and that the coal mines would close down, the steel industry would close down, and it would take a long time for these things to turn round. And I understand why people feel that, but it's completely wrong to project that backwards into the 1970s.The 18th-Century BattlegroundOLIVER: Now, you did your PhD about the 18th century. Why do you think that century is so much less popular than the 19th century, which seems to get all the attention? But in fact, the 18th century is in a way a much richer, more diverse period, aesthetically.HENSHER: Well, I don't really know, actually, because I got to the end of my PhD and I got my PhD, and after that, I have to say it took me a while to get back to it. It is interesting because it is the battleground between what people used to think literature ought to be, which was firmly rooted in the classics, and a sort of vernacular, raucous, popular form that's based in shocking things like the lives of criminals, pornography even. Rather extraordinary books explaining how people ought to behave to get on in society, how they should write letters.So it's a battleground between Alexander Pope, who I must say I do love, but a very kind of classical, perfect, absolutely glass-like surface; and then, people like Defoe, whose sentences just run on in a kind of chaotic way. It can't have been very obvious which of them was going to triumph, really. Whether it was going to be the epic poem in rhyming couplets, after Virgil, or whether it was going to be a 300-page scandalous narrative about a prostitute in London today. Or rather, the answer would've been obvious, but it would've been obvious and wrong. So, there you go.So yes, it is interesting. It is interesting. I think for me, the 19th century is more interesting simply because of the sheer abundance of material. There are plenty of books in the 18th century, but not the kind of colossal tidal wave of thousands and thousands of novels coming out, sometimes nearly a thousand novels in a single year as the tide rolls on. And that, as anyone who reads my book will appreciate, is actually the thing that I really love: a lot of books turning up.OLIVER: Did you study with John Mullan for that PhD?HENSHER: No. I knew him a little bit. He was a fellow in the college where I did it, and I used to pass the time of day with him in the courtyard. But no, I had a succession of supervisors, but not him.Judging the BookerOLIVER: I see. Now, you also judged the Booker Prize. How did that change your understanding of the way the literary world really works, as it were?HENSHER: Well, I quite enjoyed judging the Booker Prize. It's a very unusual experience because it's the only experience you're ever going to have of reading a lot of novels that are published at the same time. Even as books are being published, all sorts of filtering mechanisms are usually taking place.With that, I think I read 140, 150 novels, all of which were published in 2001. And when you do that, you see all sorts of tendencies that you hadn't really suspected. I remember that year, the thing that was extraordinarily common, to the point of being maybe a third or even 40 percent of the books submitted, were novels with a dual time scheme, where in the present day a woman is working in a library and she finds a box, and it's the love letters of Mary, Queen of Scots, and then back to Mary, Queen of Scots. I'm making it up. I can't remember.And I think the novels that kicked that off are certainly some very good novels. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala's Heat and Dust in the 1970s, or later on, Alan Hollinghurst's The Swimming-Pool Library and Antonia Byatt's Possession. But the sheer number that were imitating that structure was really extraordinary.The later insight that I had into a predominant obsession was when I judged the Giller Prize in Canada, and again, it was about 120, 130 novels. And this was about 10 years ago now. And it was predominantly tales by second-generation immigrants of historical stories of their parents' country of origin. There were a lot of those, and I think that's an admirable thing, so long as it doesn't overrun the rights of Bangladeshis, say, still living in Bangladesh to write their own stories which will be heard.It's an interesting thing, judging a big literary prize. I was very skeptical about the value of them. But that year, judging the Booker, I think we did a much better job than a lot of juries have done. We not only shortlisted Ian McEwan for his best novel, Peter Carey for his best novel, but Andrew Miller, excellent novel, Ali Smith's first novel, and who were the other two? Oh, David Mitchell's second novel, and Rachel Seiffert, a very talented novelist with a brilliant novel.Novels vs. SportOLIVER: How many novels do you read in an ordinary week?HENSHER: Oh, no idea. Three, four, five, something like that.OLIVER: So you're spending an awful lot of your time reading novels.HENSHER: Well, I don't know about that. [laughter] I'd say I'm probably reading a novel three or four hours a day, something like that. I am a pathologically fast reader. I don't want to go into it too much because it does sound insane.Remember that I've often wondered why someone like me manages to read so many books by most people's standards. And I've come to the conclusion it's because I have absolutely no interest in sport whatsoever. And it's surprising the number of people who—I mean, if you watch a football match, even if you watch it at home without the trouble of getting on a train and going there, a football match is 90 minutes, but there's half an hour in the middle; two hours.There's an hour of disquisition before; that's three hours. And there's an hour afterwards; that's four hours. Well, in four hours I can read a novel by Graham Greene. That's not a challenge. And I think that if you completely remove that from your life then, yes, you can get through a lot of novels, particularly if, like me, you absolutely love novels. It's never been anything but a sheer pleasure.Well, actually, I won't say never because there were one or two months, writing this book, when I knew I was going to have to get over a personal distaste and read a very prolific novelist in bulk who I knew I couldn't stand. I'm not going to say who they were; it's not fair. But I think you might be able to guess a couple of them.OLIVER: Did you know V.S. Naipaul?HENSHER: A little, yes.OLIVER: What was he like?HENSHER: If you said the right thing to him, he would respond intelligently and interestingly. If you weren't scared of him, that was better. I would guess that when he first met you, if he knew who you are by repute, as he happened to do with me because I was a book reviewer, he would say something borderline insulting. And if you absolutely didn't react to that, if you just kind of carried on talking to him in a respectful and interested way, then things were fine. Things were absolutely fine.Also, I think he was just a deeply interesting human being who had the knack, when he was bored, of saying something that would kick up a bit of a fuss. And I associate with that. I would say that many of my best friends are very much like that, just saying things to kick up a fuss. I wasn't any more than someone who just met him a handful of times. But I had the utmost respect for him, and I still do.OLIVER: Yes, he's one of the great writers in English, I think.HENSHER: Yes, I agree.Dominance of the NovelOLIVER: Why is the novel so dominant as a literary form?HENSHER: What, now? Is it?OLIVER: Well, there is no longer the same kind of reach or popularity for—there's no Addison, there's no poet, there's no . . . To me it seems like, for the common reader, as it were, it's all novels with a few other things. Whereas in the 18th century, it was lots of everything.HENSHER: Well, I don't know. I don't want to talk down my beloved form. It does seem to me that memoirs are very largely where it's at. Novels, to a very marked degree, get noticed much more if people can spin them as in some way memoiristic. And that's not a criticism at all.I was just thinking about this reading Rachel Cusk's new novel, Life of M. And I think Rachel is one of the authors with the best chance of being read in 50 or 100 years' time. I do think she's an absolutely marvelous novelist. But there's no question that there's more of a buzz around her when you can say, “Oh, well, this novel is based on her friendship with Emma Thompson,” or whoever the actress was—I've already forgotten—or “She's written a book about this and this. It's all based in her real life.”Those things have a tendency of fading away, but I think that it only seems to get through to people when we're talking about, “Is this real?” Like that guy that killed himself last week, is his memoir—I mean, if he'd written a novel to be published by Simon & Schuster, would we be talking about it to the same degree? It's not in the situation as the sonnet cycle. People are still reading novels, but I don't know that it's as dominant as all that.If it was, “Why was it dominant? Why was the novel form dominant?” I think actually it's to do with the omniscient voice. I think, from the beginning, the novel could go anywhere. It could take the reader by the hand, could lead them into places that they would never in a million years go. And from the invention of the railways—people commented about this a lot at the time—people were no longer limited to seeing their own class. They would be waiting on a railway station, and every class of society, it seemed, would be waiting there.But the challenges of a simple reader in finding out about the upper classes that they'd glimpse in these situations, or indeed a curious upper-class reader in finding out about the lives of the very poor carrying a chicken to market in a third-class carriage, in real life, that would be pretty limited. The novel could take you anywhere it wanted to go, and that, I think, is really never going to go away.I can see, even now, publishers are sharpening their claws, and they want to leap on any really talented novelist of, say, transgender lives now. They probably weren't very interested in that or hadn't thought about it until 20 years ago. Now it seems like a very current thing, and they're interested. They've been very interested for some time in Black British authors as well. They're not people who are trying to find a voice for those communities, necessarily, but probably just as powerfully finding an audience who wants to find out about the community without having to say, “Well, this is going to be our documentary discovery.” You can just imagine what it's like, and that's good enough.But who knows why things come into fashion, why they dominate, and why they disappear? The epic poem was the dominant form of the 17th century, and no one's really written one for about 300 years now.On Rachel CuskOLIVER: Who are the other best living British novelists?HENSHER: Oh, no, don't tempt me.OLIVER: No, you're not, no?HENSHER: No, I'm not going to be tempted.OLIVER: Can you give your argument for Rachel Cusk? Because I think she's dreadful.HENSHER: Do you?OLIVER: Yes, I think it's very boring. I find the Outline trilogy quite unreadable, actually.HENSHER: Oh, okay.OLIVER: On the first page, I thought, “Wow, this is so exciting. She's doing something really new.” And by halfway through the first book, I thought, “Well, it's over. She's done everything it can do. I can't take it anymore.”HENSHER: I think that what will keep her going is the unfailing beauty of her sentences. I think she has cadences like no other writer. That keeps people going. And what I really love about some of her books is that they are literally about nothing. I think The Country Life is an absolutely superb book, but what's it about, really? A girl goes to the country and falls out with her family. It's absolutely great.Yes, what is it? What are they about? I mean, but that's the thing. I don't think that you really find what's wonderful about novels by saying, “What are they about?” I thought the trilogy was just a wonderful bit of thread-spinning. And maybe it's just me, but those novels that consist of the gathering of one story after another, sometimes never coming to a conclusion, they work such a spell.And that's true about, not a novel, but One Thousand and One Nights; The Canterbury Tales; Calvino, If on a Winter's Night a Traveler; or in the same category, Elmore Leonard's Get Shorty, which I think is the great American novel of the last 50 years. And it's exactly that. It's a series of stories being told as one person tries to pitch a movie to another. It's absolutely glorious. And I think that the Cusk trilogy is very much like that.Long before Rachel's trilogy, I did have this plan to write a novel of storytelling, and it was going to be called Tales from the Pit. And actually, I signed a contract for it, and it was going to be stories told from one orchestral musician to another during the interminable performances of some long-running opera or other. But the thing that stopped me from writing it was that I discovered that Berlioz, the great composer and great writer, had written a book very similar, called Les soirées de l'orchestre. And I thought, “No, I'm not going to outdo Berlioz.”On Literary CriticsOLIVER: Who are the critics from whom you have learnt the most?HENSHER: Peter Garside, the great Regency critic. J. M. S. Tompkins, who wrote a superb book about 100 years ago about the popular novel after 1770 to about 1820. That's a superb book. John Sutherland I think is really good. I love his books solving problems in novels. George Saintsbury, end-of-the-19th-century critic who had the principle, “Read everything.” And I think that his books about the novel in particular are really—they can't be improved on. He was just so well read.OLIVER: Yes. What about more modern critics? That sort of ends a long time ago.HENSHER: I don't know. I don't know. I don't know that there are any critics writing—I mean, I don't describe myself as a critic. I'm just a book reviewer.OLIVER: Leavis, Carey, Hermione Lee?HENSHER: Oh, yes. I think Hermione is really a great biographer, and her life of Virginia Woolf was very good. Her life of Penelope Fitzgerald was better, and her life of Anita Brookner is exemplary. It really is.OLIVER: But the Fitzgerald book has no religion.HENSHER: Yes. I probably didn't notice that.OLIVER: Penelope Fitzgerald, she never talks about it, but it's all about God. And the book is quite secular and feminist in a way that I felt was perhaps more Hermione Lee than Penelope Fitzgerald, you know?HENSHER: Yes, that's a very good point. It's not something that I really pay attention to. You could make the case that there are all sorts of private parts of people's lives that are just closed to the investigator. Very few literary biographers talk seriously about sexual relations or about money, for instance. I don't really see why religion shouldn't be different. I don't know. I haven't really thought about that.Critics—I can't stand Leavis. I think he's wrong about everything. I do think he's wrong about everything, and I don't know what he means when he says, “This is life-enhancing.” I was like, “What does that mean,” you know? What does it mean? And people in Cambridge were always saying, “What does that sentence mean?” Who knows? Boy. And I think they must have said it to Leavis about five times a day. Who else? Suggest some names to me.OLIVER: I thought John Carey, The Intellectuals and the Masses.HENSHER: Yes, John Carey. Yes, that is a proper—OLIVER: It's a great book.HENSHER: That's a proper game changer, actually. And I don't see how you could disprove it. He's wrong—OLIVER: And the Dickens book, The Violent Effigy.HENSHER: Yes, that's brilliant. He's occasionally just wrong, but he's wrong in interesting ways. The Thackeray book writes off some great novels, in my view. The Intellectuals and the Masses, he's just wrong about George Moore. But on the whole, yes, he's a very good thing.Of course, John Carey was the last generation of critics to have a proper training in textual bibliography. So his editions of Milton, and especially the brilliant edition of the James Hogg Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, they are a very good preparation for going through a work of literature and talking about every word of that work of literature.Two Thousand NovelsOLIVER: You read 2,000 novels in order to write your history of the novel.HENSHER: Oh, a lot more than that.OLIVER: Okay.HENSHER: A lot more than that. There's 2,000 novels that are talked about.OLIVER: In the bibliography.HENSHER: There are a lot more novels that I just didn't put in.OLIVER: Where did you get them all? You must have had trouble finding some of them.HENSHER: It's much easier now than it used to be. There's Gutenberg, of course. There's this wonderful publisher—I want to get to the bottom of it—an online publisher that will sell you the collected—what's it called? I don't know—will sell you the collected works of some very minor novelists for like 1.99. A couple weeks ago, I just bought all the novels of Rhoda Broughton for 1.99. So that was very useful.And there are various other online sources. There's the London Library, of course, for physical copies, which they still have a surprising number of things. They had a copy, for instance, of the very last three-volume novel to be published, which is a novel by George Gissing's brother, Algernon. I can't tell you how bad it is. Oh, god, it's absolutely atrocious. Anyway, they had a copy. So, yes, you sort of gather them here and there.I knew that a novel was seriously obscure when neither Gutenberg nor the HathiTrust websites or anybody else could come up with a copy. There's a novel from the 1790s that crops up in a lot of bibliographies and general surveys of 1790s novels by Charlotte Palmer. She's a woman called Charlotte Palmer. I don't know anything about her at all. And it's called It Is and It Is Not a Novel. It sounds fascinating, but I did notice that it's suddenly referred to for the first time in a study of 2013, and every single reference since then more or less repeats what that first commentator has said.I couldn't find a copy of it myself in any of the sources, and I did wonder. Jane Austen was a very keen reader of women writers of that period, and I did think, “Jane Austen couldn't possibly have heard of this writer and her book, because there's a character in Jane Austen called Charlotte Palmer.” She wouldn't have done that if she'd made that connection. It would be like giving a character the name Fanny Burney. So I'm sure that it does exist somewhere, but I couldn't track it down.OLIVER: And you excluded Ulysses.HENSHER: Yes. That was a really difficult one. I tormented myself over Ulysses, and I could justify including Joyce. Firstly, he always had a British passport. He never had an Irish passport or anything else, so you could base it on that.On the other hand, it was published in Paris. I do talk a little bit about Portrait of the Artist, which was published in London. It was published in Paris, and he never lived in Britain after leaving Ireland when it was still part of Britain. So, I mean, I couldn't not mention it at all.But I thought in the end, just from a literary politics sort of standpoint, I thought if I put Ulysses in, describing it as an example of the novel in Britain, that would kick off a fuss that I didn't feel passionate about defending. Oddly enough, I would've been more tempted to include Finnegans Wake, which I'm passionately fond of and which was, of course, published by Faber and Faber in 1939. But it made no sense to leave Ulysses out and include Finnegans Wake.Where the borders were drawn, who to include and who to leave out, it wasn't an easy decision. And on the whole, I did include people rather than exclude them. But Joyce is such a national figure in Ireland that I did think there would be a bit of a row if I started claiming him as a British novelist.On Penelope FitzgeraldOLIVER: You have a very nice suggestion in the back of the book for a Library of Britain, which would be a bit like the Library of America, but obviously we have a lot more to publish here.HENSHER: Yes, it would obviously be a lot better. [laughter]OLIVER: But I think you left Penelope Fitzgerald off your list of the people who should be first in line.HENSHER: Oh, did I? Oh, that wasn't deliberate. What a disaster.OLIVER: I wondered. I thought this must be—HENSHER: Oh, no, that was a cock-up.OLIVER: So you do want her in.HENSHER: Oh, yes. Yes, definitely. And the biographies as well.OLIVER: Because I think she's a great genius. Oh, the biographies are amazing, yes.HENSHER: Yes. Penelope was the last person in my life who I've been scared of. I'm not scared of many people, and probably in my adult life on the fingers of one hand, really. But Penelope, I was scared of, and I do not know why. I do not know why, because she was always unfailingly polite and civil. She just had a sort of level stare as though she was kind of assessing you, and she might at any point say something that you would carry with yourself for the rest of your life shuddering.And she never did. She never did. She was extremely nice, but I don't know. There was something very odd about Penelope. It was as if—do you know that description of the Greek Alexandrian poet Cavafy, that he was a gentleman that stood at right angles to the universe? She was like that. You met her at a party, and she'd stand there. She looked very much like the White Queen in Alice. She always had a kind of Sainsbury's plastic bag by the side of her, and she just seemed kind of detached from the party and from everyone.I think she liked solitude. I don't think the impression that she didn't quite want to be there was at all false. She was a one-off, Penelope, I think. And I know that people who worked with her—we shared an editor at one point, and she was one of those authors that inspired huge amounts of loyalty. I think the biographies are, in a way, even stranger than—The Knox Brothers, and the Charlotte Mew biography is incredible.OLIVER: It's crazy.HENSHER: It's incredible. It's absolutely incredible. I wish she'd—there were a couple of biographies that she wanted to write and didn't. She was going to write a biography of L. P. Hartley and gave it up because she discovered too much about L. P. Hartley's sex life, and Leslie Hartley's sister was still alive. She dropped that.And I think there was talk of a biography of M. R. James. The very last thing that Penelope published, almost, I have a responsibility for because Penguin Classics—Penguin Modern Classics, probably—were going to bring out a selection of M. R. James's short stories. And they asked me to write the introduction to them, and I said, “I will write the introduction to them, but only if Penelope refuses to.” So they went to Penelope, and she said yes. And I'm very proud of that.OLIVER: Yes, that's a great piece of writing as well. Right, I'm going to read out a quote from your book.HENSHER: Oh, Lord.Novel-Reading and MoralityOLIVER: Here we go. Quote: “If you had read more than one novel with attention, it would be impossible to bring a machete down upon the face of another human being without guessing what it would be like to be behind that face as the blade fell upon it. You would not do it.” End quote. Now, we just know that that's not true, isn't it? A lot of awful people have read novels and continued to do their thing.HENSHER: Well, I think those people are celebrities in the world of psychology. Isn't it interesting that concentration camp guards read Hölderlin's poems? They're extreme cases. Overwhelmingly, there is not much overlap between habitual readers of novels and the sort of people who carry machetes in the streets of London. That's definitely the case. I think that's beyond arguing.It might be the case that it's not 100 percent cure. You can't guarantee that if somebody has read Great Expectations with attention and love, that they won't go out afterwards and say, “All right, I've done that. He gets off with Estelle”—or alternatively, “He doesn't get off with Estelle,” according to which ending you read—“Now I'm going to go and chop some bugger's head off with my machete.” Well, it's conceivable, I suppose, but it's very, very unlikely.And I don't know what better protection we have against the idea that the next generation is going to be more prone to violence. If we could persuade everybody to read and engage with novels, then that would be a very, very good protection against the spread of violence. I'm sure that's right.OLIVER: So you do think that the novel is causing the moral improvement somehow? It's not just that civilized people, as it were, enjoy novels. There is some mechanism of change there?HENSHER: Yes, and by moral improvement, I mean the simple act of imagining what it's like to be somebody else. Not necessarily to pass judgment on those people, but to imagine what it's like to live another life. And that's the beginning of the human imagination, I think.Effects of Patronage on the NovelOLIVER: One of the main arguments of the book is that patrons, as you call them, had too much control over the novel, how it was priced, what form it took, whether it could talk about naughty things, et cetera. But the thing I actually enjoyed most about your book was, you were very good at showing how diverse and innovative the form has been, and how quickly and how cleverly novelists have responded to every new set of conditions, set of constraints.Isn't the truth somewhere between these two, that the patrons are also responding to real-world conditions, what the public will and won't stick? The mothers have never wanted the daughters to read books, so the books have to get around that somehow. Isn't everyone reacting to the real world, as it were? And the cold, dead hand of the patron isn't gripping quite as tightly as that, maybe.HENSHER: Well, I think that the argument is not that patrons exert too much power, but where they do exert too much power, it has, on the whole, a bad influence on the contents of the book. And patrons always assume that the readership is a uniform thing, that because they and their—Mudie in the 19th century, his 30,000 subscribers—because they wanted to read heartwarming tales in which nobody ever committed adultery, that nobody did.Now, clearly that was completely wrong because when George Moore in the 1880s wrote a marvelous novel called A Mummer's Wife, about a woman who runs off with her lover and becomes an alcoholic among a lot of actors—glorious, and they priced it at sixpence—Mudie's turned it down flat, of course, because “No one's going to read this book. Oh, our people don't want to read it.”Well, he was completely wrong. It went into six editions in two years priced at sixpence. And that actually has gone on. In the 1950s, Kingsley Amis was persuaded by his editor to take a word—I don't know what it was, maybe it was the word bugger—out of a novel because they said, “The Boots Lending Library won't buy it.”Now, I suspect that 10 years later, Kingsley Amis would have said, “Well, stuff Boots Lending Library; I'm going to sell to people who do want to read it.” Because only five years after he was told that, Penguin published Lady Chatterley's Lover after a very useful—useful from the point of view of publicity—obscenity trial. I have no idea whether Boots Library took Lady Chatterley's Lover. I rather suspect not. But it sold hundreds of thousands within days, and quite right too.The thing is that there may be a readership that likes one sort of novel, but there's also a sort of readership that likes another sort of novel, and patrons never want to admit that.Your second point, about the way that novels reach out to new areas, it's absolutely true. And it's quite striking, the sort of novels that very effectively reach out to explore unfamiliar bits of society. For instance, the working-class novels of the 1890s, which are often horrifically violent—Arthur Morrison's A Child of the Jago, I think one of the great 19th-century novels, but there's no doubt there's bits in it that have to be read with great revulsion. That was against everything that people thought the novel ought to be doing.Even if something was a bit less specific, if it was about a new or unfamiliar minority, then it could go against the patron's power. There's a very good example of a novel by the Jewish novelist Julia Frankau called Dr. Phillips. And it was one of the most enjoyable discoveries of my reading. It's a story of murder and adultery in the upper-class Maida Vale Jewish Victorian life. I absolutely adored it. And the patrons wouldn't have touched it. They thought, “Oh, no one's going to read this.”But the novel is always going to give opportunities to people from communities that haven't had their voices heard. Women, from the start, could write and publish novels when they couldn't become doctors or lawyers or politicians. And people from ethnic minorities are heard surprisingly early in the history, and it's because readers wanted to hear about something new.And I think that's an absolutely thrilling development. And it's nothing to do with patrons either. It's invariably publishers who just think, “Well, let's try this thing out. Let's see whether we can find readership for what it's like to live on a remote farm in Africa.” Or going back to the 1880s, “Let's see if our readers want to find out what it's like to be a new immigrant off this boat called the Windrush.” One of the great novels of the 20th century emerged, Sam Selvon's The Lonely Londoners.It's always out of some sort of commercial desire just to try something out and see if there are readers there. It's a very effective mechanism for broadening participation in society, I think.The Role of IdeasOLIVER: What about the role of ideas? Isn't there an essential place for philosophy, theology, economics, all these other disciplines? The development of the novel is inseparable from these things. Not just people like George Eliot and Jane Austen, but there are ideas in every book, aren't there?HENSHER: Well, I think there are assumptions in every book. It depends what you mean by an idea, really. If you mean a philosophical proposition, then I would say no. There's also the problem that an idea, the justifiable quality of an idea, whether it's a good idea or whether it's a truthful idea, whether that has an impact on the quality of a novel. And it's quite hard to see that a novel that we agree with is necessarily going to be a better novel than a novel that's talking total nonsense from the ideas point of view.I think that there is a place for the proper Cambridge idea of a novel, a Cambridge idea of an idea in a novel. But I don't think it's essential. I've been thinking about this since we had this discussion at that conference. And I think that my main feeling about it is that we ought to admire novels for doing well what only the novel can do well. Those things are to sketch out lives, individual lives, however eccentric or idiosyncratic, to create the illusion of human beings, to listen to and convey the speech of individuals, and not necessarily to do what other forms of writing can do much better, which is to set out a case for one idea or another.Now, of course, that's oversimplifying the whole thing. But I must say that I can think of novels that I absolutely love, that no doubt have some kind of idea or assumption running through them. But I don't know that's really what I or anybody else reads a novel for. I mean, what are the ideas—I'm just looking at the shelf in front of me. What are the ideas in The Diary of a Nobody? Without a doubt, one of the greatest novels in British literature. What is the idea of The Diary of a Nobody?OLIVER: I think that novel is premised on a very clear and simple set of ideas about the British class system, and about what is acceptable to mock and what is acceptable to be the butt of satire. That novel now, in a way, isn't funny anymore because it's too mean. It's too cruel.HENSHER: Are you kidding me? Seriously?OLIVER: I find the first half funny, and by the end of it, I just think, “There's nothing actually wrong with this guy. Gosh.”HENSHER: No, there's nothing wrong with him at all.OLIVER: It's unbearable how mean they're being to him.HENSHER: It's absolutely adorable. Come on, Charles Pooter painting his bath red. [laughter] His son deciding that he's going to call himself Lupin.OLIVER: Yes, but it's not purely observational. It is what gives it its coherence and its organization. I mean, that is a very condensed novel. It's a remarkable achievement technically, to do so much in so little space. And that is because it is organized around a certain set of ideas about the British class system, which are largely no longer real.HENSHER: Oh, Henry, Henry, how can you kill a book like that? How can you—OLIVER: Look, you can't have Jane Austen without the Enlightenment, and you can't have George Eliot without the secularization of Jesus, and you can't have Tolstoy without all the slightly incredible things that he believed.HENSHER: No, let's not talk about Tolstoy.OLIVER: No, but the list goes on, right? Henry James even, who is often called a man of no ideas, he's an incredibly good liberal. He might be the best novelist about the liberal idea that one person should not be allowed to dominate over another, in private conditions rather than just government. These ideas are, in a way, they're the thing that distinguish those writers. Jane Austen knows how to observe and how to present because she's thinking about what it means underneath.HENSHER: I don't know. I don't know about that.OLIVER: I don't even think you can have Middlemarch without John Stuart Mill's political economy, in a way.HENSHER: Yes, that's probably true. But George Eliot's an unusual sort of novelist.Jane Austen, I mean, how do we know what did she—what did Jane Austen think about slavery in the boldest and most extreme form? I think we can deduce that she thought that people involved in the slave trade or who came near it, like Mrs. Elton, were not at all the sort of people that she would altogether like to hang out with. I think the same is true of Sir Thomas Bertram, and the weakness of his imagination is somehow tied in with the fact that he has a plantation where he doesn't really think about the people that it affects.But already we're into speculation. I don't know what we can really deduce about Jane Austen's idea, because she's such a polyphonic novelist that we don't find an idea being put forward without being able to find a character who's saying the exact opposite. And sometimes one side of the argument is eventually dismissed, but not always, I think.I said this at the conference we had a discussion with. I think that when you boil a novel down to its absolute irreducible essentials, I think what you have is not a proposal or a view of society or anything like that. It's Charles Pooter painting his bath red, or the moment in Ivy Compton-Burnett's Mother and Son when the son irrevocably falls out with his mother by telling her that he doesn't want to have sugar in his tea anymore.From the very beginning, novelists have said, “What I'm writing about, I'm writing about nothing, and this is the virtue of what I'm doing. I'm writing about the utter triviality of everyday life.” And that, for me, is the enchantment.OLIVER: Well, some novelists have said that.HENSHER: A lot.OLIVER: Samuel Richardson didn't say that. Samuel Richardson's quite an important exception.HENSHER: No, but people said it about Richardson.OLIVER: I don't think we—yes, but we can't believe it.HENSHER: People definitely said—no, I think we can.OLIVER: Pamela is a novel of ideas.HENSHER: Well, it's a novel that contains some ideas.OLIVER: Yes.HENSHER: Henry, I don't think we're going to agree on this. [laughter] I don't think we're going to agree on this. But if I want to read a book that sets out ideas, I do—I'm not a complete empty-headed flibbertigibbet. The other day I was reading one of my favorite books of ideas, which is The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life.And I do think that books of ideas have their place. And it's tempting to think, “Oh, I could transfer the insights of Erving Goffman into a fictional drama.” But you couldn't. You absolutely couldn't. It would rely much more on peculiar objects and observations that aren't laden with propositions.The Best English Novels for BeginnersOLIVER: One of the questions I get asked most often is from people who have not been bookish people. They're more on the science or practical side. They haven't read great novels since they were at school, and they want a list of five great English novels to get started. What's your list?HENSHER: Vanity Fair never failed. The Old Wives' Tale never failed. An Evelyn Waugh. Which Evelyn Waugh? I think Put Out More Flags, actually, because it's such a brilliantly funny novel. It's a very strange novel. But it's about a particular historical situation, which is often a kind of temptation.What else? I'm only recommending novels by men because I think it's men who have this problem, and I think that asking them straight off to read a particular feminine take on the world, sometimes you do hit just a blank wall. But I do think that they will get round to Mansfield Park or Daniel Deronda, my favorite Eliot.I think I would also suggest The Lonely Londoners, the Sam Selvon. I do think it's the most enchanting exercise in voice. And, how many is that? Is that four or five?OLIVER: I think that's four.HENSHER: Oh, what am I going to do, then? Oh, you've got to have a Dickens. Bleak House. I think actually there's a fallacy in people recommending novels to reluctant readers, which is, they always suggest something kind of easily digestible. But I think the way forward is to give something at its most intense and concentrated and just see if that counts. “This is what the novel really is like.”Oh, I know the other one. I mentioned it earlier, the James Hogg, Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner. Oh my god, that's a fantastic novel. I really do think that's good. Yes.OLIVER: And can you do the same for children's books?HENSHER: No.OLIVER: Fair enough.HENSHER: No, I'm 61 years old. “Would you like to read this book, little—?” No, no, no, thank you.Quick-Fire QuestionsOLIVER: Let's do a quick-fire round. I say the name of a novelist, and you give us your opinion. Short form.HENSHER: Oh, gosh. Oh, terrifying.OLIVER: That's all right. You'll do very well. Arnold Bennett.HENSHER: Underrated. Marvelous.OLIVER: Where should we start? And how good—HENSHER: The Old Wives' Tale. No, or The Card. The Card is a glorious novel. It's absolutely ludicrous; it's fantastic. The Old Wives' Tale is, I think, the greatest French novel in English. It's magnificent.OLIVER: When you say underrated, how good is he?HENSHER: Oh, top 20. Top 20 writers in English.OLIVER: Iris Murdoch.HENSHER: She's out of fashion at the moment, very much out of fashion at the moment, I think for reasons that were out of her control. It's impossible to tell at this point what is going to happen to a novelist like that. Is she going to carry on declining and drift out of our interest in the way that the novels of William De Morgan did? Or is she going to reach a bottom and then slide upwards?I must say that I loved Iris's novels to an incredible degree when I was 17. I could read them all day long. I think I must have read every single one of Iris Murdoch's novels between the ages of 17 and 20. And the moment when I came to London and saw Iris at a literary party was one of the most overwhelming of my life.What happened—weirdly, it was at a party in a secondhand bookshop in Clapham Old Town. Doesn't exist anymore. And she was just standing there looking around with great empty eyes. And then Woodrow Wyatt tottered in in a very noisy way and said, “Iris, Iris, what are we doing here? What is this place? What are we doing?” It was very strange.OLIVER: Walter Scott.HENSHER: The creation is immense. The achievement is overwhelming. And towards the end of the 19th century, a reaction set in, which was so powerful that it defined many of Scott's most characteristic stylistic features as the embodiment of bad writing. It's not his fault. I myself, I admit to sharing in that reaction. And he comes to me in flashes of sublimity. I think the first chapter of The Heart of Midlothian is one of the most impressive pieces of writing of the century.He did so much good for literature that it's hard to be dismissive about him altogether, and I wouldn't want to be. On the other hand, stylistically, he's so out of tune with what we regard as good writing that I thought in the end it would just ring a completely false note if I pretended that I didn't have problems with the style. So, you know, he's in a particular historical position. We're in a particular historical position. Who knows what that tells you about either of us, really?OLIVER: Alan Hollinghurst.HENSHER: Oh, who is my best friend, so yes, of course he's marvelous.OLIVER: Which one do you recommend?HENSHER: I absolutely love The Stranger's Child. I think that's such an innovative novel, and it's so clever and funny. But they're all simply marvelous. He's a marvelous novelist.OLIVER: That's the one I'm always pushing on people. It's heartbreaking. It's beautiful.HENSHER: Yes.OLIVER: It's clever. It's really wonderful.HENSHER: So clever. You're not going to trap me into saying rude things about darling Alan.Various ElizabethsOLIVER: No, no traps. No traps. Elizabeth Taylor.HENSHER: Great novelist. Great novelist. And central to her time in a way that I don't think anyone really appreciated until some time after she died. After she died, some organization or other gave her a posthumous award for a lifetime's achievement, and her husband, John, went to collect it. And he said in his acceptance speech, “What a shame you couldn't have said this while she was alive.” And it was absolutely right.As a handler of technical material, I don't think there's a novelist in the 20th century to surpass her. Just the way in which characters are introduced and interact, how the plot proceeds, the evocation of place, it is just the most extravagantly perfect technical handling.She's the novelist who, more than anything, I show to my students in Bath Spa. And it is astonishing how if you give them a page of Elizabeth Taylor, almost chosen at random, you can go through it inch by inch, word by word, and just emerge at the end absolutely astonished by the expertise of the handling. I think she's an absolutely marvelous novelist.OLIVER: Elizabeth Bowen.HENSHER: I think she went off. But those novels from To the North certainly to The Death of the Heart, and maybe even The Heat of the Day, are absolutely thrilling. Psychologically, she's an absolute whiz at seeing people, seeing into people's minds. She's better at children than almost anybody, and there are a lot of people writing about childhood in the 1930s.The Death of the Heart, I think, is her best novel, though The House in Paris runs it pretty close. The middle section, where the young heroine goes to the seaside to stay with a family that she doesn't really know and is followed by her cad of a boyfriend, is an absolutely stunning survey of uncertain behavior. And it's rarer than you think, actually, novelists writing about people behaving uncertainly for reasons that they don't quite understand.The Heat of the Day, it has superb things in it, but I would say that it falls slight victim to the tendency of the time to think that novelists ought to write about serious subjects of contemporary concern. Novels of ideas, Henry, I'm sorry to say. And she just wasn't that sort of novelist. When she's doing two people lying on the grass just talking about nothing much, it's marvelous. But when you creak it up into this plot about someone's a spy and—oh, Elizabeth, don't do it to me. Anyway, but that's just me. A lot of people absolutely love The Heat of the Day.OLIVER: Elizabeth Jenkins, Bowen's great friend.HENSHER: My knowledge of Elizabeth Jenkins that I can produce at short notice is The Tortoise and the Hare. And I think a lot of the same things that I said about Elizabeth Taylor are the same. It's a lovely classical style.I've often given people to look at the first page of The Tortoise and the Hare. I think it slightly suffers from the title, which makes the narrative seem a bit predetermined, but that's a minor sin. I would love to read some more Elizabeth Jenkins, actually. I know I read another one or two some time ago, but I've completely forgotten what they were called, so don't test me.OLIVER: The best ones are Dr. Gully, Honey, and Brightness, after The Tortoise and the Hare.HENSHER: Okay. Oh, that's interesting. Okay. I've got a bit of an allergy—you're going to disprove this immediately. I've got a bit of an allergy to novels, like Twitter profiles, which include the word doctor. [laughter]OLIVER: It's only called that because it's a historical novel.HENSHER: Yes, they are putting me off.OLIVER: Fair enough. Fair enough. Fair enough.HENSHER: I love Trollope, but I must say that when I reach out for Doctor Thorne, my hand—OLIVER: It's not the best.HENSHER: I don't know why. Why is it?OLIVER: Because relative to what actually happens, it's too long, and so you have to get through a lot of stuff that doesn't really do anything for the novel.HENSHER: No, I mean why is it the title that includes the word doctor is so off-putting?OLIVER: Oh, that I can't help you with.HENSHER: No, I can't help. Yes, I'm going to investigate to see if I can think of a novel with doctor in it.OLIVER: Jenkins is another one who's a superb biographer.HENSHER: Oh, yes.OLIVER: Her Jane Austen biography is amazing, really beautiful. Really incredible.HENSHER: Okay. All right. Okay.More NovelistsOLIVER: Martin Amis.HENSHER: Yes, I think he is great. I do think he was wonderful. There are some later novels where he slightly fell down because he wanted to say something solemn about a major political situation. But he went on being a very good novelist a lot longer than people assume. I remember when The Pregnant Widow came out, and I think The Pregnant Widow is an absolutely enchanting novel. It's just full of regret and grown-up thoughts, and, oh, I absolutely loved it.Oh, my Lord, you should have seen the reviews that it got. I think word just got round among young people that Martin was no good anymore. He's got the thing that his father had, of a brilliant ear for dialogue, and much more than his father, but sharing some of the same qualities. He had the air of being able to write a sentence that readers would remember. I'm sure that most people who like Martin Amis, if you said to them, “Give us a sentence from Martin Amis,” they'd be able to come up with one.OLIVER: And lastly, Jilly Cooper.HENSHER: Oh, yes. Do you know, people always roll their eyes when I say I don't see why Jilly Cooper shouldn't be the novelist from our time that survives in posterity. She's got a lot of the qualities that actually make for a good prospect of survival. Her characters sound distinct. You always know who's speaking. It's got a good social range. It's not about two retired actors sitting in a bedsit in Kentish Town. They're funny, which is always good. People love them.The first of the series of her long books—not the 1970s romances, though those are very enjoyable too—the earliest of them, Riders, published in 1986, never gone out of print. Now, there's not many novels from 1986 that are still going strong with large readership. They had large readerships even before the television drama. That's not the only reason. So I think, yes, I'd put my money on Jilly Cooper still to be read in 100 years' time, ahead of Julian Barnes.Final ThoughtsOLIVER: Last two questions. How do you think AI will change the novel?HENSHER: No idea. Absolutely no idea. I think that novel has found ways to take advantage of technology and change in society before. It will do so again. I'm a novelist myself, but my practice has been long formed. I don't think that I'm the person to ask this about.What you want to do is ask somebody like the brilliant student that I was just talking to, who's 22 years old, a student of mine who has been thinking about AI since he started his undergraduate degree. Those people, they will have it in their bones, and they will master it, I'm convinced. But my answer is worth less than nothing.OLIVER: What will you do next?HENSHER: Oh, I've retired. That's it. That's it. Glorious. I'm very happy.OLIVER: You're not going to set up the Library of Britain?HENSHER: No, no, I couldn't run that. Someone else can do that. No. I mean, it'd be nice if anyone took it seriously.OLIVER: I think it's a great idea.HENSHER: Yes, I think it's a great idea. I wouldn't have put it—but no, I'm going to retire now. I've spent 30 years publishing novels, and there's 12 novels, 2 volumes of short stories, and finishing with a history of my art form. I think that sounds like a nice, shapely career.I don't want to be writing novels about my idea of what the kids are like when I'm 75. I think that's absolutely a fatal idea. [laughter] Of course, I'm just saying that, and you never know when something's going to tempt. But at the moment, I think I'm going to retire.OLIVER: Very good. Philip Hensher, thank you very much.HENSHER: Pleasure. Thank you, Henry. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.commonreader.co.uk

Jane Rogoyska explores the history of Paris's Hôtel Lutetia, which served as a haven for fleeing Weimar intellectuals before becoming a Nazi military intelligence headquarters in 1940. Rogoyska traces waves of refugees fleeing Nazi persecution, including writers Heinrich Mann and Lion Feuchtwanger. These figures struggled to warn an indifferent Europe about the dangers of fascism. Despite personal tragedies and bureaucratic challenges, literary giants like James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, and Arthur Koestler frequented the hotel, carrying poison just in case they were captured. (6)

[X] SB – Gad Saad on academic idiocy Bad ideas from universities. Intellectuals come up with some of the dumbest ideas. Have you ever met somebody who was really smart? And I mean REALLY smart. Not “I read a book once and now I'm going to ruin Thanksgiving” smart. I mean genuinely gifted. You say something, and they can spit out facts, figures, studies, dates, names, formulas. And they're not bragging. They just know it. Those people are fascinating. But then there's another kind of person. This is the guy who learned something yesterday and wants to impress you with it today. He gives you the thumbnail version of a subject, but presents it like he did his graduate dissertation on it. You ask one question, and suddenly you discover the man has never actually thought about the subject. He has merely encountered vocabulary. And folks, that brings me to the modern Left. Because one of the great misconceptions of our time is that Leftists are stupid. They're not necessarily stupid. Some of them are extraordinarily intelligent. I know people on the Left who are brilliant scientists, engineers, doctors, mathematicians, researchers. They can explain molecular biology to you while you're still trying to remember what a mitochondria does. But then you ask them about politics. And suddenly the intellectual horsepower disappears. It's like watching a Ferrari pull up to a gas station and discover the driver has no idea what gasoline is. How does that happen? Because intelligence in one discipline does not automatically transfer to every other discipline. You can be a brilliant physicist and have the political instincts of a Golden Retriever chasing a ceiling fan. And I think a major reason for this is academia. Because academia doesn't just teach people facts. It teaches them frameworks. It teaches them what questions are respectable, what conclusions are enlightened, what opinions are sophisticated, and which ideas are beneath consideration. Kevin Jackson has been called, the "white-collar" Joe Rogan. Given their similar backgrounds in TV, comedy, and martial arts, it's easy to see why people enjoy Kevin's show so much. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Traditional grading systems encourage students to focus on final grades, sometimes at the expense of learning. In this episode, Jessamyn Neuhaus, Ashley Cambareri, and Cole Bailey discuss challenges associated with traditional and alternative grading systems. Jessamyn is the Director of the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence and Professor in the School of Education at Syracuse University. She is an historian and editor of Teaching History: A Journal of Methods. Jessamyn has published extensively in scholarly publications in the areas of history, pedagogy, and cultural studies. She is a recipient of the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Teaching. Jessamyn is the author of several books, including Geeky Pedagogy: A Guide for Intellectuals, Introverts, and Nerds Who Want to be Effective Teachers, Snafu Edu: Teaching and Learning When Things Go Wrong in the College Classroom and she is the editor of Picture a Professor: Interrupting Biases about Faculty and Increasing Student Learning. Ashley graduated in May as an honors student with a degree in Inclusive Elementary and Special Education from the School of Education at Syracuse University, and will begin her new job as a 5th-grade teacher this September. Cole is a student in the Renée Crown Honors Program at Syracuse University, studying International relations. Ashley and Cole were students in Jessamyn's Honors class on “Problems with Grades.” Show notes and the transcript for this episode may be found at http://teaforteaching.com

Get access to The Backroom (100+ exclusive episodes) on Patreon: [https://www.patreon.com/OneDime](https://www.patreon.com/OneDime)In this episode of 1Dime Radio, I am joined by Chris Cutrone, founder of the Platypus Affiliated Society, to debate the professional-managerial class, elite theory, and whether either offers a better explanation of today's left than Marxism. Taking Cutrone's essay “Was Lenin PMC?” as our starting point, we clash over the 20% versus 80% framework, liberal democracy, managerialism, the role of intellectuals in socialist politics, and what Marxism is actually for in the absence of a proletarian socialist movement.In the Patreon-exclusive Backroom, we move from history into strategy: whether a viable class coalition must extend beyond the proletariat, why Marxism still matters, whether Cutrone is really as Marxist as he claims, and why most self-described Marxists have no real commitment to communism. We also turn to the Graham Platner fiasco, the culture of #MeToo, and some characteristically hot takes from Cutrone.You can listen to 1Dime Radio on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get podcasts.Timestamps:0:00 The Backroom Preview: Graham Platner and #MeToo4:12 1Dime Radio Intro5:10 Marxism vs. Elite Theory13:42 The 20% vs. the 80%18:15 Is the Left Actually Left?22:50 Marxism and Liberal Democracy30:01 What Elite Theory Explains36:34 Theory, Strategy, and Practice41:03 The Synthetic Left and Family Abolition51:26 Marxism as the Critique of Socialism59:20 Intellectuals, Class, and the PMC66:15 Elite Overproduction and Academia74:16 What Is Marxism For?78:28 In What Sense Is Cutrone a Marxist?1:25:48 Join Us in The BackroomGUEST:Chris Cutrone | Founder of the Platypus Affiliated Society* Chris Cutrone's website: [https://chriscutrone.platypus1917.org/](https://chriscutrone.platypus1917.org/)* Platypus Affiliated Society: [https://platypus1917.org/](https://platypus1917.org/)* “Was Lenin PMC?”: [https://www.sublationmag.com/post/was-lenin-pmc-how-elite-theory-doesn-t-fit-the-movement-for-socialism](https://www.sublationmag.com/post/was-lenin-pmc-how-elite-theory-doesn-t-fit-the-movement-for-socialism)FOLLOW 1Dime:* 1Dime Radio YouTube channel: [https://youtube.com/@1dimeradio](https://youtube.com/@1dimeradio)* Substack: [https://1dimereview.substack.com/](https://1dimereview.substack.com/)* X/Twitter: [https://x.com/1DimeOfficial](https://x.com/1DimeOfficial)* Instagram: [https://www.instagram.com/tonyof1dime/](https://www.instagram.com/tonyof1dime/)* Main 1Dime YouTube channel: [https://www.youtube.com/@1Dimee](https://www.youtube.com/@1Dimee)Leave a like, comment, and subscribe. Give 1Dime Radio a 5-star rating on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen.

ABOUT THE EPISODEListen in as David Schrock is joined by special guest Kevin Briggins to interview Trent Hunter on his COA Longform Essay, "Socialism and the Twisted Legacy of Slavery: A Cautionary Tale from the 'Great Society'"Resources to ClickThe Off Code Podcast“One Constitution, or Two? Reviewing The Age of Entitlement by Christopher Caldwell” – Brad Green“When Whites Just Don't Get It (Part 4)” – Nicholas Kristof“A Legacy of Liberalism” – Thomas Sowell“Black Individuals Had Record Low Official Poverty Rate in 2022” – U.S. Census Bureau“Number of Black Married-Couple Families in the United States who live below the Poverty Level from 1990 to 2024 (in 1,000s)” – Statista“Address at Rice University on the Nation's Space Effort” – John F. Kennedy“Professor's ‘Big Intellectual Risk' Grabs Eyeballs Years Later” – UCLA Newsroom“How We Can Make Martin Luther King Jr.'s Dream of Ending Poverty a Reality” – Michael Tubbs“When King and Johnson Joined Forces to Fight the War on Poverty” – Andrew Small“Liberalism Versus Blacks” – Thomas Sowell“The Tragedy of American Compassion: Pilgrim Beginnings” – Hayden Ludwig“The Use of Knowledge in Society” – F.A. Hayek“The Quest for Cosmic Justice” – Thomas Sowell“Not So Great Society” Keynote Address – Amity Shlaes“Fifth Avenue, Uptown” – James Baldwin“We Just May Be On “The Wrong Side of History” If . . .” – Thaddeus Williams“Justice: Divine, Imputed, Imparted, Public, and Ultimate” – Andy NaselliTheme of the Month: Christ Over All Mixtape (2022–2026)Give to Support the Work Books to ReadGreat Society: A New History – Amity ShlaesFalse Black Power? – Jason L. RileyRed, White, and Black: Rescuing American History from Revisionists and Race Hustlers – Robert L. Woodson Sr.Intellectuals and Race – Thomas SowellDiscrimination and Disparities – Thomas SowellThe Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression – Amity ShlaesA Personal Odyssey – Thomas SowellThe Tragedy of American Compassion – Marvin OlaskyKnowledge and Decisions – Thomas Sowell

On a hot Summer night in Brooklyn, Matt Seybold is joined by McKenzie Wark to launch the "Intellectuals" issue of e-flux Journal. They discuss the legacy of the public intellectual (and other mythic species), the belated reception of the vectoralist hypothesis, education and other other spaces, the practice and pleasures of being vulgar. Followed by an energetic Q&A.Cast (in order of appearance): Brian Kuan Wood, Matt Seybold, McKenzie WarkDate Recorded: June 11, 2026Music: Danny Weiss Quartet

In the modern age, we believe that intelligence is the most important trait a person can have and learning is the most valuable pursuit, but what if those are the very things that bring about ruin? YouTube commentator News Fist joins me as we continue our reading of historian John Glubb's  famous essay "The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival." In this episode we look at Glubb's assertion that a society that places intellectualism as the highest virtue has lost its vitality and will soon be conquered by more simple and brutal people. Follow on: Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-auron-macintyre-show/id1657770114 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3S6z4LBs8Fi7COupy7YYuM?si=4d9662cb34d148af Substack: https://auronmacintyre.substack.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/AuronMacintyre Gab: https://gab.com/AuronMacIntyre YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/c/AuronMacIntyre Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/c-390155 Odysee: https://odysee.com/@AuronMacIntyre:f Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/auronmacintyre/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Why do so many intellectuals despise the market that sustains them? Ralph Raico weighs Hayek's theory of "scientism" against Schumpeter's portrait of a resentful, over-produced intelligentsia—and finds both wanting, pointing instead to the harder puzzle: why capitalism's most successful intellectuals are so often its fiercest critics.Excerpted from chapter 3 of Classical Liberalism and the Austrian School.

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research.   In the fourth panel, Jody Avirgan led a discussion about what it takes for someone to make an academic podcast. Jody Avirgan is a podcast host, producer, and editor. His production company is Roulette Productions; Sara McCrea is a writer, audio producer, and researcher, who leads podcast strategy and production at Random House Publishing Group. She has produced podcasts for Slate, Pushkin Industries, TED Audio Collective, Audible, and the Center for Humane Technology. She created and produced the "Attention Lab" series for the Strother School of Radical Attention, and wrote and produced the award-winning "McCartney: A Life in Lyrics", a 24-episode narrative journey through Paul McCartney's songwriting, hosted by poet Paul Muldoon; Caleb Zakarin is the CEO and Publisher of the New Books Network.; Julia Barton  is an award-winning podcast, audiobook, and radio editor. She was the executive editor of Pushkin Industries, where she helped develop Revisionist History and Against the Rules. She's the editor of Malcolm Gladwell's The Bomber Mafia, Michael Specter's Fauci, and Michael Lewis's unabridged Liar's Poker and companion podcast. Her 2019 series, Spacebridge, was called “dazzling” by The New Yorker. She writes the audio history newsletter, Continuous Wave. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research.   In the fourth panel, Jody Avirgan led a discussion about what it takes for someone to make an academic podcast. Jody Avirgan is a podcast host, producer, and editor. His production company is Roulette Productions; Sara McCrea is a writer, audio producer, and researcher, who leads podcast strategy and production at Random House Publishing Group. She has produced podcasts for Slate, Pushkin Industries, TED Audio Collective, Audible, and the Center for Humane Technology. She created and produced the "Attention Lab" series for the Strother School of Radical Attention, and wrote and produced the award-winning "McCartney: A Life in Lyrics", a 24-episode narrative journey through Paul McCartney's songwriting, hosted by poet Paul Muldoon; Caleb Zakarin is the CEO and Publisher of the New Books Network.; Julia Barton  is an award-winning podcast, audiobook, and radio editor. She was the executive editor of Pushkin Industries, where she helped develop Revisionist History and Against the Rules. She's the editor of Malcolm Gladwell's The Bomber Mafia, Michael Specter's Fauci, and Michael Lewis's unabridged Liar's Poker and companion podcast. Her 2019 series, Spacebridge, was called “dazzling” by The New Yorker. She writes the audio history newsletter, Continuous Wave. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research.   In the fourth panel, Jody Avirgan led a discussion about what it takes for someone to make an academic podcast. Jody Avirgan is a podcast host, producer, and editor. His production company is Roulette Productions; Sara McCrea is a writer, audio producer, and researcher, who leads podcast strategy and production at Random House Publishing Group. She has produced podcasts for Slate, Pushkin Industries, TED Audio Collective, Audible, and the Center for Humane Technology. She created and produced the "Attention Lab" series for the Strother School of Radical Attention, and wrote and produced the award-winning "McCartney: A Life in Lyrics", a 24-episode narrative journey through Paul McCartney's songwriting, hosted by poet Paul Muldoon; Caleb Zakarin is the CEO and Publisher of the New Books Network.; Julia Barton  is an award-winning podcast, audiobook, and radio editor. She was the executive editor of Pushkin Industries, where she helped develop Revisionist History and Against the Rules. She's the editor of Malcolm Gladwell's The Bomber Mafia, Michael Specter's Fauci, and Michael Lewis's unabridged Liar's Poker and companion podcast. Her 2019 series, Spacebridge, was called “dazzling” by The New Yorker. She writes the audio history newsletter, Continuous Wave. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research.   In the fourth panel, Jody Avirgan led a discussion about what it takes for someone to make an academic podcast. Jody Avirgan is a podcast host, producer, and editor. His production company is Roulette Productions; Sara McCrea is a writer, audio producer, and researcher, who leads podcast strategy and production at Random House Publishing Group. She has produced podcasts for Slate, Pushkin Industries, TED Audio Collective, Audible, and the Center for Humane Technology. She created and produced the "Attention Lab" series for the Strother School of Radical Attention, and wrote and produced the award-winning "McCartney: A Life in Lyrics", a 24-episode narrative journey through Paul McCartney's songwriting, hosted by poet Paul Muldoon; Caleb Zakarin is the CEO and Publisher of the New Books Network.; Julia Barton  is an award-winning podcast, audiobook, and radio editor. She was the executive editor of Pushkin Industries, where she helped develop Revisionist History and Against the Rules. She's the editor of Malcolm Gladwell's The Bomber Mafia, Michael Specter's Fauci, and Michael Lewis's unabridged Liar's Poker and companion podcast. Her 2019 series, Spacebridge, was called “dazzling” by The New Yorker. She writes the audio history newsletter, Continuous Wave. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/environmental-studies

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On May 13, 2026, Princeton's Center for Human Values hosted a day-long conference titled Audio and Ideas: Exploring the Possibilities for Scholarly Podcasting. It was co-sponsored by Princeton's Journalism program, and the NYU Podcast Initiative. Over the course of four panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the third panel, Allison Carruth and Ellen Horne discussed the relationship between podcasting and science. Carruth is a professor at Princeton's Effron Center for the Study of America and the High Meadows Environmental Institute. At Princeton, she directs the Program in Environmental Studies and leads Blue Lab, an environmental media and storytelling studio. Her research and teaching areas include climate storytelling, environmental art and narrative, contemporary food movements and the evolving relationships between technology and environmentalism in American culture. She is the author of Global Appetites: American Power and the Literature of Food. Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. Her research is focused on performance, documentation, the perception of authority in voice, labor and production in audio and podcasting. Horne was producer for Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, a 13-episode investigative podcast that told the story of shocking misconduct at a Virginia state crime lab. Admissible won the Gold Award for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards; an Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Public Media Award NETA for Best Podcast. Horne was an executive producer at Audible and an executive producer for WNYC's Radiolab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jordan Peterson on The Horrors of Communism and Socialism Explained, Fascism, Marxism, Communism and Socialist Intellectuals. This is an ACU encore presentation from our ACU archives.   

David Austin Walsh, author of Taking America Back, on the relationship between the kooks and respectables on the right • Laura Field, author of Furious Minds, on the intellectual wing of Trumpism [rebroadcast of a January 29, 2026, show] The post Two views of the right: the sordid side of “respectable,” and Trump's court intellectuals appeared first on KPFA.

Intellectual Slaves in Ancient Rome: The Hidden Minds Behind Roman Literature & PowerWhat is an intellectual slave, and why did some of the most educated people in ancient Rome live in bondage?In this fascinating conversation, Princeton classics professor Harriet Flower reveals the overlooked world of learned slaves and educated freedmen in Republican Rome. Discover how enslaved scholars, poets, editors, teachers, and philosophers helped shape Roman culture, literature, politics, and intellectual life, and why some were worth fortunes to Rome's elite.If you're interested in Roman history, slavery in the ancient world, classical literature, or the hidden figures behind great civilizations, this episode offers a completely new perspective on how knowledge, power, and status worked in ancient Rome.KEY TOPICS COVEREDWhat an “intellectual slave” was in ancient RomeHow educated slaves differed from common perceptions of slaveryWhy Roman elites invested heavily in slave educationThe connection between slavery, literature, and cultural prestigeHow scholars, poets, editors, and philosophers lived within elite householdsFamous intellectual slaves and freedmen of the Roman RepublicThe economics of highly educated slavesWhy some learned slaves were worth enormous fortunesHow freedmen influenced Roman politics and publishingThe role of education, authorship, and intellectual labor in Roman societyWhat these forgotten lives reveal about power and culture in the ancient worldTIMESTAMPS00:00 What is an intellectual slave?00:55 Educated slaves & freedmen in Rome02:50 How intellectuals became enslaved06:43 Why Romans educated slaves08:58 Philosophy, literature & elite culture10:12 Educated slaves as luxury assets13:07 Roman attitudes toward slavery15:16 Jobs performed by intellectual slaves18:35 The most expensive slave in Rome21:18 Intellectuals as status symbols22:23 Atticus and his scholarly household25:13 Captured scholars as war prizes27:00 Archimedes and the value of genius30:05 Rome's intellectual ecosystem33:22 Speechwriters, advisers & hidden influence37:03 Which intellectual slave deserves a movie?39:26 Final thoughts & closingIf you enjoyed this conversation, subscribe for more deep dives into ancient history, classical philosophy, and the hidden stories that shaped civilization.Comment below: Which aspect of Roman slavery surprised you most? Were intellectual slaves collaborators, status symbols, victims of circumstance... or all three?LINKS

0:30 - Trump's summary of the talks sitting next to Xi 15:33 - Angel mom Cheryl Minter testifying before House committee on behalf of daughter Stephanie 33:38 - "Everything is Awful" Lego parody song on Karen Bass 50:19 - Tom J. Stewart 53:00 - Senior Legal Fellow at Advancing American Freedom Hans von Spakovsky weighs in on election mapping and the fight over election integrity. Follow Hans on X @HvonSpakovsky 01:11:13 - Defense Priorities fellow Daniel DePetris says he’s not surprised by the lack of tangible agreements between Xi Jinping and Donald Trump, arguing “that’s not how statesmanship works.” Stay updated with Daniel on X @DanDePetris 01:32:38 - Ezekiel Emanuel, oncologist, a bioethicist, and a vice provost of the University of Pennsylvania shares his six rules for a long, healthy life from his new book Eat Your Ice Cream. Dr. Emanuel will be appearing as part of the Chicago Humanities Festival this Sunday - for details chicagohumanities.org 01:50:59 - Aaron Brown, long-time risk manager in the hedge fund space, pits Gamblers against Intellectuals in his new book Wrong Number: How to Extract Truth From a Blizzard of Quantitative Disinformation 02:08:01 - Open Mic Friday!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Zeina Al-Azmeh's Syrian Intellectuals in Exile: The Dilemmas of Revolution and the Cost of Leaving (Cambridge UP, 2026) captures a group of intellectuals forced to leave Syria, primarily after the events of 2011. Having wound up in either Paris or Berlin these intellectuals are forced to reconsider their relation to their homeland, including the ongoing revolution, while navigating their new Western homes. As Al-Azmeh shows, this creates a diverse intellectual field which, while shaped by different intellectual and personal positions shares the need to navigate how they think of the revolution and the expectation of their hosts. In the course of the book, Al-Azmeh shows us a group of intellectuals who, while adopting a ‘double gaze' of critiquing and at points valuing the West increasingly (though not wholly) adopt a position of ‘radical embeddedness' towards the revolution, giving their role as leaders and instead seeing themselves as followers of the people. In the podcast we discuss the process that led these intellectuals to this position and the problems it posed for their relevance. We also discuss the contributions Al-Azmeh makes across the sociology of intellectuals, postcolonial theory and the idea of ‘trauma work'. There are also reflections on how one navigates one's participants also being source of literature and what has changed following the fall of the Assad regime. Your host, Matt Dawson is Professor of Sociology at the University of Glasgow and the author of G.D.H. Cole and British Sociology: A Study in Semi-Alienation (2024, Palgrave Macmillan) and co-editor of The Anthem Companion to Henri Lefebvre (2026, Anthem Press) along with other texts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Zeina Al-Azmeh's Syrian Intellectuals in Exile: The Dilemmas of Revolution and the Cost of Leaving (Cambridge UP, 2026) captures a group of intellectuals forced to leave Syria, primarily after the events of 2011. Having wound up in either Paris or Berlin these intellectuals are forced to reconsider their relation to their homeland, including the ongoing revolution, while navigating their new Western homes. As Al-Azmeh shows, this creates a diverse intellectual field which, while shaped by different intellectual and personal positions shares the need to navigate how they think of the revolution and the expectation of their hosts. In the course of the book, Al-Azmeh shows us a group of intellectuals who, while adopting a ‘double gaze' of critiquing and at points valuing the West increasingly (though not wholly) adopt a position of ‘radical embeddedness' towards the revolution, giving their role as leaders and instead seeing themselves as followers of the people. In the podcast we discuss the process that led these intellectuals to this position and the problems it posed for their relevance. We also discuss the contributions Al-Azmeh makes across the sociology of intellectuals, postcolonial theory and the idea of ‘trauma work'. There are also reflections on how one navigates one's participants also being source of literature and what has changed following the fall of the Assad regime. Your host, Matt Dawson is Professor of Sociology at the University of Glasgow and the author of G.D.H. Cole and British Sociology: A Study in Semi-Alienation (2024, Palgrave Macmillan) and co-editor of The Anthem Companion to Henri Lefebvre (2026, Anthem Press) along with other texts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Zeina Al-Azmeh's Syrian Intellectuals in Exile: The Dilemmas of Revolution and the Cost of Leaving (Cambridge UP, 2026) captures a group of intellectuals forced to leave Syria, primarily after the events of 2011. Having wound up in either Paris or Berlin these intellectuals are forced to reconsider their relation to their homeland, including the ongoing revolution, while navigating their new Western homes. As Al-Azmeh shows, this creates a diverse intellectual field which, while shaped by different intellectual and personal positions shares the need to navigate how they think of the revolution and the expectation of their hosts. In the course of the book, Al-Azmeh shows us a group of intellectuals who, while adopting a ‘double gaze' of critiquing and at points valuing the West increasingly (though not wholly) adopt a position of ‘radical embeddedness' towards the revolution, giving their role as leaders and instead seeing themselves as followers of the people. In the podcast we discuss the process that led these intellectuals to this position and the problems it posed for their relevance. We also discuss the contributions Al-Azmeh makes across the sociology of intellectuals, postcolonial theory and the idea of ‘trauma work'. There are also reflections on how one navigates one's participants also being source of literature and what has changed following the fall of the Assad regime. Your host, Matt Dawson is Professor of Sociology at the University of Glasgow and the author of G.D.H. Cole and British Sociology: A Study in Semi-Alienation (2024, Palgrave Macmillan) and co-editor of The Anthem Companion to Henri Lefebvre (2026, Anthem Press) along with other texts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sociology

Zeina Al-Azmeh's Syrian Intellectuals in Exile: The Dilemmas of Revolution and the Cost of Leaving (Cambridge UP, 2026) captures a group of intellectuals forced to leave Syria, primarily after the events of 2011. Having wound up in either Paris or Berlin these intellectuals are forced to reconsider their relation to their homeland, including the ongoing revolution, while navigating their new Western homes. As Al-Azmeh shows, this creates a diverse intellectual field which, while shaped by different intellectual and personal positions shares the need to navigate how they think of the revolution and the expectation of their hosts. In the course of the book, Al-Azmeh shows us a group of intellectuals who, while adopting a ‘double gaze' of critiquing and at points valuing the West increasingly (though not wholly) adopt a position of ‘radical embeddedness' towards the revolution, giving their role as leaders and instead seeing themselves as followers of the people. In the podcast we discuss the process that led these intellectuals to this position and the problems it posed for their relevance. We also discuss the contributions Al-Azmeh makes across the sociology of intellectuals, postcolonial theory and the idea of ‘trauma work'. There are also reflections on how one navigates one's participants also being source of literature and what has changed following the fall of the Assad regime. Your host, Matt Dawson is Professor of Sociology at the University of Glasgow and the author of G.D.H. Cole and British Sociology: A Study in Semi-Alienation (2024, Palgrave Macmillan) and co-editor of The Anthem Companion to Henri Lefebvre (2026, Anthem Press) along with other texts.

Send us Fan MailSome days you wake up and you do not want to do the work. You want to sit in your feelings, disappear for a bit, and let the day happen to you. We push back on that impulse with a simple idea: manage your peace, manage your perspective, and still show up. You cannot control everything that hits you, but you can control your response, your preparation, and the habits that keep your life moving forward.From there, we zoom out into the attention economy and the way modern media and social media algorithms hijack focus. Celebrity drama, recycled relationship debates, and nonstop hot takes can trick you into caring about things that do not match your real life. We talk media literacy, cleaning up your feed, and why so much “analysis” today is really engagement bait designed to keep you reacting. The goal is not to ignore the world, but to stop letting manufactured narratives drain your time and money.We also get into the rise of internet intellectuals and why credentials alone do not equal truth. When an “expert” goes on a big platform without strong interviewers, context disappears and confidence starts to sound like fact. We break down how to ask better questions, demand clear definitions, and frame arguments with real parameters so you can think critically instead of repeating someone else's conclusions. Then we connect it all to consumerism, luxury culture, and financial freedom: chasing rich can still leave you trapped, while chasing freedom changes everything.If this conversation hits, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review. What part of your life needs less distraction and more clarity right now?Support the show

In this episode of "Gentiles Only" Orthodox Rabbi Elijah Pinchas continues the discussion of his book "The Restoration of All Things: A Gentiles Guide to Geulah." This episode is on Chapter 7: Jewish Intellectuals on Jesus Rabbi Elijah Pinchas as the author at Eye to Zion and the Executive Director of Facing Each Other. He is joined on this episode by Altarnate Media President and Cofound Bradley Vazquez, Vice President and Cofounder Seamus McGowan, and Producer and Staff Writer Jeremy Williams. https://www.facingeachother.com/ https://i2zion.com/ https://www.altarnatemedia.com/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DKV759RP?binding=paperback&qid=1734385736&sr=8-4&ref=dbs_dp_rwt_sb_pc_tpbk https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G26N28JC?binding=hardcover&qid=1768182827&sr=8-1&ref=dbs_dp_rwt_sb_pc_thcv https://altarnate-media-shop.fourthwall.com/collections/gentiles-only  

The Yaron Brook Show

In this episode from 2023, Alex speaks with Nigel Ashford about the prospects for a freer world and how the memory of history, the hope of younger persons, and the teaching of ideas can shape the future of classical liberalism.    Further Reading: https://libertarianism.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/socin003.pdf Chapter 2 of this book: https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Blundell-interactive.pdf https://fee.org/articles/the-tide-in-the-affairs-of-men/ https://cdn.mises.org/Intellectuals%20and%20Socialism_4.pdf https://www.libertarianism.org/publications/essays/why-do-intellectuals-oppose-capitalism http://wordlist.narod.ru/Government-Failure.pdf

In this week's episode of China Insider, Miles Yu reviews the widespread scale of Xi Jinping's purges in recent weeks that extends to include China's leading weapons experts and defense science officials, and the impact these removals have on PLA military operations. Next, Miles covers the CCP's ongoing global influence campaign against western nations on the individual level, and explores how independent proxies can unknowingly further party messaging in key decision-making forums. Finally, Miles discusses the challenges faced by South Korean President Lee Jae-myung since he took office, and the his attempt to delicately balance South Korea's participation in global alliances with domestic disagreements among government officials over policy toward North Korea. China Insider is a weekly podcast project from Hudson Institute's China Center, hosted by China Center Director and Senior Fellow, Dr. Miles Yu, who provides weekly news that mainstream American outlets often miss, as well as in-depth commentary and analysis on the China challenge and the free world's future.   

Our guest today in rugby league journalist and analyst Mike Meehall Wood, who launched his new Substack [https://mikemeehallwood.substack.com/p/six-tackles-and-superstructure-why] with 'Six Tackles & Superstructure: Why Rugby League needs more philosophy'. It's a fascinating look at how rugby league (with the help of others) denies its intellectual culture. In an age when soccer coaches talk about their philosophies and rugby union is awash with tactical analysis, the rugby league media are content to keep talking about physicality and putting your body on the line. But the game is a complex and subtle sport with a deep and rich culture - so why don't we talk about it more? For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, take a look at www.rugbyreloaded.com (where you can find the links for this episode) and follow me on Twitter at @collinstony

4. Guest Author: James Shapiro James Shapiro explores the complex reactions to the "Voodoo Macbeth," noting subtle racism in white critical reviews. Black intellectuals like Langston Hughes remained ambivalent, questioning if the project truly told Black stories or merely placed Black performers in "white" roles. The focus then shifts to Sinclair Lewis's *It Can't Happen Here*. Although MGM initially planned a film adaptation, they scrapped it to avoid losing the German market and to appease censors. Hallie Flanagan seized the opportunity, convincing Lewis to adapt the story for a simultaneous theatrical opening in twenty cities. (4)1928

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On October 10, 2025, NYU's Journalism Institute hosted a day-long conference titled Podcast Intellectuals: Producing Original Scholarship with Audio. Over the course of three panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In this third, and final, panel, Robert Boynton moderates a conversation which asks, “Can podcasts save the university?” In it, Joy Connolly, Barry Lam, and Dr. Aurora Hutchinson discuss what role podcasts might play in the university's system of hiring, promotion and tenure.  Robert S. Boynton is the director of the Literary Reportage program, and associate director of NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. He is author of The Invitation Only Zone: The True Story of North Korea' s Abduction Project, and The New New Journalism. Joy Connolly is president of the American Council of Learned Societies and a scholar of ancient Roman political thought and literature. At ACLS, she has led initiatives such as Doctoral Futures to broaden the scope and reach of humanistic inquiry. She is the author of The State of Speech and The Life of Roman Republicanism, and is completing a new book called All the World' s Pasts. Professor Barry Lam earned a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Princeton, taught at Vassar, and recently moved to UC Riverside. He is the host and executive producer of Hi-Phi Nation, a story-driven podcast about philosophy, at Slate magazine. He is also an Associate Director of the Marc Sanders Foundation, which promotes excellence in philosophy and public philosophy. Dr Lauren Arora Hutchinson, previously a BBC journalist, is an award-winning audio storyteller, an academic, and the inaugural director of the Dracopoulos-Bloomberg iDeas Lab, a studio and incubator for world class stories at the intersection of science, ethics, medicine and public health, at the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. Lauren's immersive audio work has premiered at IDFA and the Venice Film Festival. She has a PhD in History of Science with a focus on Oral History, and was a Wellcome Trust Imperial Media Fellow. She is the host of the signal award winning podcast playing god? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On October 10, 2025, NYU's Journalism Institute hosted a day-long conference titled Podcast Intellectuals: Producing Original Scholarship with Audio. Over the course of three panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In this second panel of the day, Ellen Horne moderates a conversation with Chenjerai Kumanyika, Barry Lam, and Julia Barton, three veterans who have made a specialty of working on creative, idea-informed series. Professor Ellen Horne directs the Podcasting and Audio Reportage concentration at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. She was the executive producer and editor of Admissible: Shreds of Evidence, and was host, reporter, and producer for Luminary's Lies We Tell. Horne was the executive producer of WNYC's Radiolab, where she won George Foster Peabody Awards, Third Coast Awards, and the Kavli Science Journalism Award. Her new documentary, Age of Audio, tells the story of the podcast from birth to boom to today. NYU Professor Chenjerai Kumanyika specializes in using narrative non-fiction audio journalism to critique the ideology of American historical myths about issues such as race, the Civil War, and policing. His podcast Empire City was chosen by the New York Times as one of the best podcasts of 2024. He was the co-creator, co-executive producer and co-host of Uncivil, a podcast on the Civil War, and he is the collaborator for Scene on Radio's Season 2 “Seeing White,” and Season 4 on the history of American democracy. Professor Barry Lam earned a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Princeton, taught at Vassar, and recently moved to UC Riverside. He is the host and executive producer of Hi-Phi Nation, a story-driven podcast about philosophy, at Slate magazine. He is also an Associate Director of the Marc Sanders Foundation, which promotes excellence in philosophy and public philosophy. Julia Barton is an award-winning podcast, audiobook, and radio editor. She was the executive editor of Pushkin Industries, where she helped develop Revisionist History and Against the Rules. She's the editor of Malcolm Gladwell's audiobook The Bomber Mafia, Michael Specter's Fauci, and Michael Lewis's unabridged Liar's Poker and companion podcast. Her 2019 series, Spacebridge, was called “dazzling” by The New Yorker. She is the author of the audio history newsletter, Continuous Wave. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

This is a special edition of the New York Institute for the Humanities' Vault podcast. On October 10, 2025, NYU's Journalism Institute hosted a day-long conference titled Podcast Intellectuals: Producing Original Scholarship with Audio. Over the course of three panels, scholars, podcasters, and journalists discuss how academics might employ the techniques of narrative audio as part of their research. In the first panel, podcaster Benjamen Walker discusses his work with NYU media studies professor Mara Mills as they produce Tuning Time, a podcast about the politics of time stretching technology. Professor Mills is an interdisciplinary scholar in the fields of disability studies, Science and Technology Studies, and sound studies. She teaches in the Department of Media, Culture, and Communication and is Director of the NYU Center for Disability Studies. Her work on “disability and media” spans disability arts and technoscience, with a focus on the history, politics, and cultures of electronics and digital media. Benjamen Walker is a radio writer and producer. He is one of the co-founders of the podcast network Radiotopia from PRX, and for a decade hosted and produced his award winning program Benjamen Walker's Theory of Everything. The first panel concluded with a presentation by NYU musicologist Fanny Gribenski in which she discusses her current project, The Elephant in the Piano: Music, Ecology, Empire. The book, and podcast, is an investigation of the 19th century piano through a material history of its primary components: ivory, wood, felt, and metal. Professor Gribenski is a historical musicologist who specializes in the history of musical and sonic practices. Her first book, L'Église comme lieu de concert. Pratiques musicales et usages de l'espace (Paris, 1830–1905) analyzes the role of music in the production of sacred spaces. Tuning the World: The Rise of 440 Hertz in Music, Science, and Politics, 1859-1955 (University of Chicago, 2023) traces the rocky path towards international pitch standardization. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 20th century existentialist and feminist philosopher, novelist, essayist, and playwright Simone de Beauvoir's book, The Ethics of Ambiguity It focuses specifically on ways in which certain intellectuals can fall into an inauthentic existence that attempts to escape the ambiguity of existence. She discusses two different forms that this takes: critical thought and creative activity. To support my ongoing work, go to my Patreon site - www.patreon.com/sadler If you'd like to make a direct contribution, you can do so here - www.paypal.me/ReasonIO - or at BuyMeACoffee - www.buymeacoffee.com/A4quYdWoM You can find over 3500 philosophy videos in my main YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/user/gbisadler Purchase De Beauvoir's Ethics of Ambiguity - https://amzn.to/32IbKya

The two hundred and eighty years between the death of the philosopher Confucius and the reign of the first Emperor of China saw one of the most profound revolutions in human history. Not only did it end with the creation of an imperial rule that persisted through successive dynasties for 2,132 years, but it also saw the creation of “new traditions of thought and practice…great monuments of art, literature, and philosophy…that still inform social life in our own lifetime.” The era of the “warring states”, as scholars call it, was critical not just for China or East Asia, “but to that of humanity writ large.”Yet this era remains almost unknown in the English-speaking world. “If one enters any bookstore…in search of a book about classical Athens, the conquestions of Alexander, or the early Roman Republic,” writes my guest Andrew Meyer, “one will have many options. But if one looks for such a book about the corresponding period in early Chinese history, there are none. I wrote this book to fill that gap.”Andrew Seth Meyer is Professor of History at Brooklyn College. A specialist in the intellectual history of early China, he is the author of The Dao of the Military: Liu An's Art of War and co-author of The Huainanzi: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Government in Early Han China. His latest book is To Rule All under Heaven: A History of Classical China, from Confucius to the First Emperor, which is the subject of our conversation today.Chapters0:35 - Book Overview & Historical Context 4:47 - Dating the Warring States Period 8:42 - What Are the Warring States? 11:08 - Social Structure & Aristocracy 18:39 - Rivers & Regional Differences 24:45 - Military Power & Wealth 31:37 - Four Great Questions: State Models 40:51 - Centralization vs Regional Autonomy 51:26 - Education & Intellectuals

In this episode, we explore the life of Justin Martyr, a second-century philosopher who transitioned from a truth-seeker of various schools of thought to a Christian intellectual. We learn about his journey to faith, his defense of Christianity against Roman misconceptions, and his ultimate martyrdom, highlighting how he bridged faith and reason.Chapters00:00 Introduction to Justin Martyr01:48 Justin's Philosophical Journey05:22 Conversion to Christianity and Epiphany08:44 Challenging Roman Misconceptions10:44 Justin's Apology and Legal Defense15:37 Logos and Christian Philosophy17:20 Martyrdom and Enduring Legacy

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comLaura Field is a writer and political theorist who specializes in far-right populist intellectualism in the US. She's currently a Scholar in Residence at American University, a Senior Advisor for the Illiberalism Studies Program at GW, and a nonresident fellow with Brookings. Her new book is Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right. We bonded over some of the right's wackier innovations, and differed over how far the left has also slid into illiberalism.An auto-transcript is available above (just click “Transcript” while logged into Substack). For two clips of our convo — on the New Right's “post-constitutional moment,” and the war on the civil service — head to our YouTube page.Other topics: growing up in Alberta; losing a parent at a very young age; Plato an early inspiration; growing tired of the Straussians; the decline of religion under liberalism; Locke; Rousseau; Nietzsche; Fukuyama; the resurgence of the illiberal left and illiberal right; the Claremont Institute and Harry Jaffa; Jaffa's extreme homophobia and hatred of divorce; Allan Bloom; Lincoln fulfilling the Founding; Hobbes; the role of virtue in a republic; Machiavelli; Michael Anton's “Flight 93 Election”; John Eastman and “Stop the Steal”; Curtis Yarvin and The Cathedral; Adrian Vermeule's Common Good Constitutionalism; Catholic conversion; Pope Leo; Obergefell, debating Harvey Mansfield over marriage; Woodrow Wilson's expansion of the state; Thatcher and Reagan slimming it down; the pros and cons of technocratic experts; DOGE vs federal workers; “queer” curricula and the 1619 Project; edge-lords; Bronze Age Pervert and pagan masculinity; Fuentes and Carlson; and debating the dangers of wokeness.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy. Coming up: Claire Berlinski on America's retreat from global hegemony, Jason Willick on trade and conservatism, and Vivek Ramaswamy on the right's future. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Caving to popular demand for more talk about Straussians, Jonah Goldberg sits down with Laura Field to discuss the ideas driving the New Right. Follow Laura and Jonah as they fall down rabbit holes and explore digressions in the complicated story of 20th-century conservatism, the rise of MAGA, and the intellects behind Trumpism. Shownotes:—Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right—Remnant on Straussians—Project 2025—“The Flight 93 Election”—Michael Anton: “Harry V. Jaffa: An Appreciation”—1776 Commission Report—Yoram Hazony: The Virtue of Nationalism—Herbert Croly: The Promise Of American Life—Charles A. Reich: The Greening of America—The 1619 Project—Marco Rubio: “Industrial Policy, Right and Wrong”—Patrick Deneen: Regime Change: Toward a Postliberal Future—The American Mind—Richard Reinsch: “‘Furious Minds' Review: The Road to MAGA”—Jonah on Invasion of the Body Snatchers and MAGA converts— Peter Schramm: “Born American, But in the Wrong Place” The Remnant is a production of ⁠The Dispatch⁠, a digital media company covering politics, policy, and culture from a non-partisan, conservative perspective. To access all of The Dispatch's offerings—including access to all of Jonah's G-File newsletters—⁠click here⁠. If you'd like to remove all ads from your podcast experience, consider becoming a premium Dispatch member ⁠by clicking here⁠. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Laura K. Field discusses her book, Furious Minds, which dissects the thought of MAGA intellectuals (yes, there are some). Anti-enlightenment, theocratic, racist, misogynistic and yet, claiming to be for the general good. Get up to 30% off OneSkin with the code MONACHAREN at https://www.oneskin.co/MONACHAREN #oneskinpod

       5/8. Thoreau, Extinction Denial, and the Destruction of America's Beaver Engineers — Dan Flores — Nineteenth-century intellectuals including Henry David Thoreau lamented the systematic extermination of iconic American fauna. Flores documents that the concept of species extinction was initially incomprehensible to European ideology, which posited a divinely perfect creation precluding permanent species loss. Flores emphasizes that beavers, functioning as immense ecological engineers reshaping aquatic and riparian landscapes, exemplified catastrophic loss; their pelts became commodity targets for the emergent global market economy, driving enterprises like the American Fur Company and precipitating near-total beaver annihilation throughout continental North America.

Marc Lamont Hill vs QueenzFlip DRAMA Sparks Joe Budden's Explosive Rant on Black Intellectuals!