The History Of Literature

The poet Lord Byron is well known as a passionate revolutionary and a brooding hero who harbors dark secrets. But what about his playful sense of humor? In this episode, Jacke talks to Byron biographer David Ellis (Byron) about the Romantic poet's flamboyant life and work. PLUS Ariel Lawhon, Susan Meissner, and Kristina McMorris, the bestselling authors of When We Had Wings, return for a discussion of the last books they will ever read. Additional listening suggestions: 145 Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Know - The Story of Lord Byron The Brontes 446 Percy Bysshe Shelley - The Early Years 471 Angels of War (with Ariel Lawon, Kristina McMorris, and Susan Meissner) Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/shop. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For years, pop culture critics Len Webb and Vincent Williams have hosted the podcast The Micheaux Mission, which aims to watch and review every Black film ever released. In this episode, Jacke talks to Len and Vincent about their new limited-run series The Class of 1989, which focuses on six films (Harlem Nights, Lean on Me, Glory, A Dry White Season, Do the Right Thing, and Driving Miss Daisy) that helped spark a Black film renaissance. Additional listening suggestions: 358 The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature (with Farah Jasmine Griffin) 94 Smoke, Dusk, and Fire - The Jean Toomer Story 485 Reading Pleasures - Everyday Black Living in Early America (with Dr Tara Bynum) 103 Literature Goes to the Movies Part 1 - Great Adaptations (with Mike Palindrome) Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn m

For centuries, Shakespeare's works have been scrutinized by scholars and fans eager to engage with and learn from the texts. And yet, in spite of the prominence of race in today's media headlines and public discourse, the questions of racialized blackness and whiteness raised by Shakespeare's plays are often resisted. In this episode, Jacke talks to Shakespeare scholar Ian Smith (Black Shakespeare: Reading and Misreading Race) about the role that systemic whiteness has played on the interpretation of Shakespeare's plays. PLUS authors David Castillo and William Egginton (What Would Cervantes Do? Navigating Post-Truth with Spanish Baroque Literature) select the last books they will ever read. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ford Madox Ford lived a fascinating life, surrounded by some of the most famous writers of the era: Joseph Conrad, H.G. Wells, Henry James, Stephen Crane, D.H. Lawrence, Jean Rhys, Ernest Hemingway, and many others. Today, he's best known for his editing of others and for his modernist classics The Good Soldier (1915) and the Parade's End tetralogy (1924-8). Who was Ford Madox Ford? What was he like as a person? Just how complicated did his personal affairs get - and how did he manage to endure them? In this episode, Jacke talks to Max Saunders, "the doyen of Ford scholars," about his biography of Ford Madox Ford. PLUS Bethanne Patrick, aka the Book Maven, chooses the last book she will ever read. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Persuaded by the well-meaning Lady Russell, Anne Elliot turns down prospective suitor Frederick Wentworth. Will life give her a second chance at love? And if so, can she persuade herself to take it? In this episode, Jacke talks to Mike Palindrome, President of the Literature Supporters Club, about the second half of Jane Austen's Persuasion (1817). PLUS Juliette Bretan, freelance journalist and specialist in Eastern European current affairs and culture, tells us her choice for the last book she will ever read. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What happens when we let opportunities slip past us? And what if we let others talk us out of what looks like our best chance at love? In this episode, Jacke talks to historical romance novelist Gina Buonaguro (The Virgins of Venice) about the first half of Jane Austen's Persuasion (1817). Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harold Bloom called Persuasion "the perfect novel." Virginia Woolf said "In Persuasion, Jane Austen is beginning to discover that the world is larger, more mysterious, and more romantic than she supposed." In this episode, the first of three parts, Jacke takes a look at Jane Austen's novel of missed opportunities and second chances. PLUS Milton expert Stephen Dobranski (Reading Milton: How to Persist in Troubled Times) stops by to discuss his choice for the last book he will ever read. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Irina Mashinski is a bilingual Russophone American writer, poet, essayist, teacher, and translator, whose works include Giornata and eleven books of poetry and essays in Russian. She is also the co-editor of The Penguin Book of Russian Poetry. In this episode, Irina talks with Jacke about her childhood in the Soviet Union, her journey to becoming a poet living in America, and her new book The Naked World, which mixes poems and prose accounts to tell the story of four generations of a family living through Stalin's Great Terror, the Thaw of the Sixties, and the post-Thaw Seventies. SPECIAL NOTE: Irina would like to express her gratitude to the editors and translators who helped with The Naked World, and to whom she is very grateful. Additional listening suggestions: 130 The Poet and the Painter - The Great Love Affair of Anna Akhmatova and Amedeo Modigliani Keeping Secrets! Boris Pasternak, Doctor Zhivago, and the CIA (with Lara Prescott) 458 Alexander Pushkin (with Robert Chandler) Help support the show

It's Episode 500! Jacke shares some thoughts on Meg White's drumming, Boswell and Johnson, and living in Taiwan. Then author Margot Livesey (The Boy in the Field, The Flight of Gemma Hardy) joins Jacke for a discussion of some My Last Books with past guests. Additional listening suggestions: 439 The Poets' Guide to Economics (with John Ramsden) 417 What Happened on Roanoke Island? (with Kimberly Brock) 465 Greek Lit and Game Theory (with Josiah Ober) 463 Friedrich Nietzsche (with Ritchie Robertson) Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jacke talks to author Laura Lee about her new book Wilde Nights and Robber Barons: The Story of Maruice Schwabe, the Man Behind Oscar Wilde's Downfall, Who with a Band of False Aristocrats Swindled the World. LAURA LEE is the author of 21 books including biography, humorous reference, fiction, and children's literature. The San Francisco Chronicle has said of her work, "Lee's dry, humorous tone makes her a charming companion... She has a penchant for wordplay that is irresistible." Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jacke talks to legendary independent filmmaker John Sayles (Lone Star, Passion Fish) about his new novel Jamie MacGillivray: The Renegade's Journey, which tells a sweeping story of romance and revolution in eighteenth century Scotland and the New World. "Film director and novelist Sayles (Yellow Earth) follows in this strong outing the parallel stories of a Scottish rebel and a young Scottish woman pressed into servitude and sent to the Caribbean... he has a knack for bringing his many characters to life, and he makes palpable the raw violence of war and the uncompromising inequality of the period. It’s a worthy epic." -- Publishers Weekly John Sayles is an American independent film director, screenwriter, actor, and novelist. He has twice been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, for Passion Fish (1992) and Lone Star (1996). He has written seven novels, the most recent being Yellow Earth (2020) and A Moment in the Sun (2011). Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or history

By any measure, the ancient Chinese military treatise The Art of War has had an astonishing literary history, proving itself over two and a half millennia to be one of the world's most essential and enduring books. In this episode, Jacke takes a look at the life and legacy of this classic work, reputedly by a Chinese general named Sun Tzu, to see how it is that something so old and out of date continues to instruct and inspire. Additional listening suggestions: 143 A Soldier's Heart (with Elizabeth Samet) Conflict Literature (with Matt Gallagher) 362 Kurt Vonnegut (with Tom Roston) Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Wife of Bath, arguably the first ordinary and recognizably real woman in English literature, has obsessed readers from Shakespeare to James Joyce, Voltaire to Pasolini, Dryden to Zadie Smith. Few literary characters have led such colorful lives or matched her influence or capacity for reinvention in poetry, drama, fiction, and film. In this episode, Jacke talks to award-winning Chaucer biographer Marion Turner about her new book, The Wife of Bath: A Biography. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do today's masters create their art? In this episode, Jacke talks to Joe Skinner, producer and host of the podcast American Masters: Creative Spark, about the narrative interviews he's conducted with iconic artists about the creation of a single work - and what he's learned about the mysteries of inspired creativity along the way. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In a final powerful book, acclaimed literary biographer Robert Richardson told the story of how Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and William James dealt with personal tragedies early in their careers. In this episode, Jacke talks to Pulitzer-prize winner Megan Marshall, who wrote the foreword for the book, about her friend Robert and his look at three great thinkers and the resilience, growth, and creativity that can stem from devastating loss. Additional listening: 491 Elizabeth Bishop (with Megan Marshall) 483 Margaret Fuller (with Megan Marshall) 461 The Peabody Sisters (with Megan Marshall) Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

He loved and he hated. Other than that, not much is known about the life of Catullus, who scandalized the late Roman Republic with his bawdy poems, his aching love for the upper-class married woman he called "Lesbia," and his invective against Julius Caesar and other Roman notables. In this episode, Jacke takes a look at the life and works of Catullus, whose poetry was lost for a thousand years, but which, once recovered, became highly influential among poets for its accomplished technique and urgent intimacy. Additional listening: 93 Robert Frost Finds a Friend Ezra Pound 4 Sappho Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After the October Revolution in 1917, a teenaged Vladimir Nabokov and his family, part of the Russian nobility, sought exile in Western Europe, eventually settling in Berlin, where Vladimir lived for fifteen years. His life then included some politics, some writing and translating, some recreational pursuits - and a lot of trips to the cinema, a burgeoning art form and cultural experience that fascinated him. In this episode, Jacke talks to Luke Parker about this period of Nabokov's life, as explored in Luke's book Nabokov Noir: Cinematic Culture and the Art of Exile. Additional listening suggestions: 318 Lolita (with Jenny Minton Quigley) 112 The Novelist and the Witch-Doctor - Unpacking Nabokov's Case Against Freud (with Joshua Ferris) 96 Dracula, Lolita, and the Power of Volcanoes (with Jim Shepard) Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at www.thepodglomer

Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979) was one of the twentieth century's most accomplished and celebrated poets. In this episode, Jacke talks to Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Megan Marshall about her personal connection to Bishop, as well as her book Elizabeth Bishop: A Miracle for Breakfast. MEGAN MARSHALL is the winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize in Biography for Margaret Fuller, and the author of The Peabody Sisters, which won the Francis Parkman Prize, the Mark Lynton History Prize, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2006. She is the Charles Wesley Emerson College Professor and teaches narrative nonfiction and the art of archival research in the MFA program at Emerson College. For more, visit www.meganmarshallauthor.com. Additional listening suggestions: 396 Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes (with Heather Clark) 176 William Carlos Williams (The Use of Force) 306 John Keats (with Anahid Nersessian)  Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literat

Introducing YE GODS from producer-playwright and frequent guest of History of Literature, Scott Carter. We all know that faith and ethics are recurring themes in literature from Greek mythology to Shakespeare, to the great Russian novels, Charles Dickens, Emiliy Dickinson and everything between and after. In this new podcast series, YE GODS WITH SCOTT CARTER takes us on a pilgrimage of sorts, each week he’ll be talking to celebrity guests like historian Ken Burns, actor Susie Essman from HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, Pulitzer Prize nominated playwright Anna Deavere Smith, neuroscientist-philosopher Sam Harris and others.   Follow and subscribe to YE GODS WITH SCOTT CARTER wherever you’re listening to this podcast so you don’t miss new episodes every Wednesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jacke talks to Edgar Award-winning novelist, Tony Award-winning playwright, and legendary story songwriter Rupert Holmes about writing pop song landmarks ("Escape (The Piña Colada Song))," Broadway whodunit musicals (The Mystery of Edwin Drood), and his new book Murder Your Employer: The McMasters Guide to Homicide. RUPERT HOLMES has received two Edgar Awards from the Mystery Writers of America, and multiple Tony® and Drama Desk Awards for his Broadway mystery musicals, including the book of Curtains and his sole creation, the Tony® Award–winning Best Musical The Mystery of Edwin Drood. His first novel, Where the Truth Lies, was nominated for a Nero Wolfe award for Best American Mystery Novel, was a Booklist Top Ten Debut Novel, and became a motion picture starring Colin Firth and Kevin Bacon. His second novel, Swing, was the first novel with its own original, clue-bearing musical score. He has adapted Agatha Christie, John Grisham, and R.L. Stine for the Broadway and international stage. His short stories ha