When we think about literature, the last thing that comes to mind is the celebrity interview. Yet in the hands of the journalist Gay Talese, the lives of the famous are laid bear with all the insight, rhetorical verve, beauty, and tragedy of the best of short stories. Join our wayward host as he examines the writing of Gay Talese, contemplates the …

When we think about literature, the last thing that comes to mind is the celebrity interview. Yet in the hands of the journalist Gay Talese, the lives of the famous are laid bear with all the insight, rhetorical verve, beauty, and tragedy of the best of short stories. Join our wayward host as he examines the writing of Gay Talese, contemplates the …

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

Once upon a time, more than a thousand years ago, there lived a poet in China named Bai Juyi (sometimes called Po Chu-I). Unlike most poets, however, Bai wasn’t just a poet: he was also a politician, a scholar-bureaucrat tasked with helping to guide China through a moment of immense social, military, and economic crisis. Did he succeed in this ende…

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

Some writers ask the easy questions, others ask hard questions, but only one has ever asked the question: “Have you ever seen a stuffed genius?” This question—with all its despondency, moroseness, and arrogance evoke the world of Yi Sang, the weirdo titan of the Korean avant-garde. Trained as an architect, dead at 27, occasionally a pimp, obsessed …

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

Have you ever read a poem and then, without even realizing it, discover that it has implanted itself in your mind forever? For the last twelve years, there has hardly been a month where I haven’t thought at least twice about a single haiku written by Richard Wright in the last months before his death. Somber and yet joyous, imprisoning and yet libe…

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

When we talk about James Baldwin, we always talk about him in terms of America's racial politics. But Baldwin was more than just America's greatest racial pundit--he was one of America's finest novelists. In this episode, we examine his first novel: Go Tell It on the Mountain, the story of a young black boy trying to survive under the crushing weig…

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

Lu Xun was China's first great modern writer. He invented the Chinese short story. He revolutionized the Chinese language. He diagnosed the vast array of social and spiritual problems that had led China, in the early 20th century, to the brink of ruin. Above ad beyond all of his innumerable essays and stories, the Real Story of Ah-Q is widely regar…

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

Somewhere deep in Korea, a woman decides to become a vegetarian and thereby ruins the lives of everyone around her. Her husband's career is ruined. Her sister's marriage is ruined. Even her own life ultimately ends up annihilated. Why? Because there is nothing more evil in the world than difference.A caustic sledgehammer to the face. The winner of …

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis

We begin small--with a single short story by Latin America's greatest 21st century novelist, Roberto Bolaño.Consisting solely of a monologue half-spoken and half-screamed at us by a cartel hitman born into the Colombian underground porn industry, "The Prefiguration Lalo Cura" forces us to reconsider the place of pornography within the pantheon of a…

In this short episode, our host, interlocutor, and all around bookish nerd, Bryant Davis, introduces his podcast's hopes, dreams, and ambitions.What are those hopes, dreams, and ambitions?To provide the podcast listening world with a death-defyingly intelligent and (hopefully) entertaining discussion of all the wonderful little clumps of words we c…

The internet's last best hope for the cultural redemption of literary criticism.بقلم Bryant Alan Davis