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Subtitle: Blowin’ in the Wind

Happy Bloomsday, my fellow Joyceans! By way of celebration, Villa and I are back (after a rather lengthy delay) with the seventh installment of our Rejoyce! podcast series. Press play above to hear your two favorite windbags bloviate on “Aeolus,” Episode 7 of Ulysses. If you’d like to see the slideshow along with our ugly mugs, you can watch the video as well:

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Show Notes

• Wyndham Lewis’ sketch of Joyce is in the National Gallery of Ireland:

• Audiobook version of Episode 7:

• Take a deeper dive:

• “the onehandled adulterer”:

• “Akasic records of all that ever anywhere wherever was”:

• “Poor papa with his hagadah book, reading backwards with his finger to me”:

• “Poor Penelope. Penelope Rich” = Penelope Blount, Countess of Devonshire:

• Joycean playlist for Episode 7:

For an intro to the Rejoyce! series, see my post on Episode 1.

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Subtitle: Hoping You’re Well and Not in Hell

Hello again, Book Burners! Villa and I are back in black with another episode of Rejoyce! In this sixth installment of our Joycean podcast series we pay our respects to the gloomy sixth episode of Ulysses, in which Leopold Bloom and three of his cohorts ride in a carriage to Glasnevin Cemetery and then attend the funeral service of their departed friend Paddy Dignam, whose heart has broken down after “too much John Barleycorn.” Press play above to hear the full convo and/or click on the video below:

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Show Notes

• That misremembered quote from WCW’s intro to Ginsberg’s Howl is actually: “Hold back the edges of your gowns, Ladies, we are going through hell.”

• Thanks to the mysterious “De Selby” for posting the audiobook version of this episode:

• Henry Fuseli’s vision of Odysseus meeting his mother Antiklea (“Anti-Glory” or “Without Fame”) in Hades:

• Behold the most celebrated work of Italo Svevo, a.k.a. Aron Hector Schmitz, Joyce’s friend and the inspiration for Bloom:

• Fuseli’s incubus sits atop a sleeping beauty in The Nightmare:

• Click here for that article on “Incubism” at Blooms and Barnacles.

• Kiefer Sutherland as Athos, the name of one of the Three Musketeers (before it was the name of Bloom’s father’s dog):

• Don’t we all?

• Hamlet, Act I, Scene ii, 135-137: “Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden, / That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature / Possess it merely.”

• By that other Bloom:

• Dignam’s “coffin flop,” as it turns out, was purely imaginary, but what if it had actually happened?

• Official postcard from the Gordon Bennett Race with the handwritten date of June 17, 1904:

• Click here for that article from The Guardian on Joyce and the Childs murder case.

• William Blake’s vision of Cerberus, the three-headed hellhound:

• There may be just as much white in this episode as black. This line is particularly striking: “saltwhite crumbling mush of corpse: smell, taste like raw white turnips.”

• Joycean playlist for Episode 6:

For an intro to the Rejoyce! series, see my post on Episode 1.

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Subtitle: We Ate the Lotus

Greetings, Book Burners! G.J. Villa and I are back with more opium for the masses! In this fifth installment of the Rejoyce! podcast series, we analyze the fifth episode of Ulysses, in which Bloom goes to the post office, attends a church service, buys soap, and takes a bath. We also discuss, among many other things, Joycean newbie Maria C’s tarot-inspired readings of Stephen Dedalus and Buck Mulligan. Press play above to hear the full convo and/or click on the video below:

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Show Notes

• I wish I had described the Hanged Man as “suspended” or “left hanging” rather than “stuck,” but oh well.

• It appears that someone beat Maria C to the punch:

• Terence: Homo sum: humani nihil a me alienum puto (“I am a human being: I consider nothing human to be alien to me.”).

• Bloom in the bath, as imagined by Frank Budgen:

• Tennyson’s “Lotos-eaters” is worth rereading.

• a rather lengthy Joycean playlist for Episode 5:

For an intro to the Rejoyce! series, see my post on Episode 1.

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Subtitle: Cucklypso

Rise and shine, Book Burners! In this fourth installment of the Rejoyce! series, G.J. Villa and I discuss the masochistic and scatological fourth episode of Ulysses, in which we are introduced to Leopold Bloom (our modern-day Odysseus) and his wife Molly (who is both Penelope and Calypso). It very quickly becomes clear that the missus wears the pants in this particular family, which also includes a mewling cat and a fifteen-year-old daughter named Milly. But what actually happens in Joyce’s miniature dramatization of domesticity? Bloom, the un-kosher Jew, steps out to buy a pork kidney, which he brings home and cooks for breakfast—but burns—but still eats. He awkwardly explains the meaning of metempsychosis to his domineering spouse, to whose every whim he sycophantically caters as she luxuriates on their big brass bed. Finally, he visits the outhouse, where he first relieves and then wipes himself. Is this great literature? We argue that yes, yes it is. Press play above to hear why. If you want to watch as well, click on the video below:

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Show Notes

• Poldy = Leopold minus the Leo:

  

• The word lough, as it turns out, is the Irish equivalent of Scottish loch and has the same pronunciation:

• Milly is in Mullingar:

• tam (o’ shanter):

• Regarding the mysterious Professor Goodwin, the Blooms and Barnacles website says: “Poor old professor Goodwin was using his mirror to upskirt Molly as she left the stage.” I suspected as much!

• M is for Molly’s Mn, which reminds Me of Mnemosyne, goddess of Memory (cf. English mnemonic) and Mother of the Muses. Dante Gabriel Rossetti imagined she looked like this:

• Get Ajax to clean the jax (or jakes):

• Francis Ford Coppola produced but did not direct The Odyssey:

• a Joycean playlist for Episode 4:

“the sting of disregard”

For an intro to the Rejoyce! series, see my post on Episode 1.

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Subtitle: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Proteus Episode

Villa and I are back again with a breakdown of Episode 3 of Joyce’s Ulysses, a notoriously difficult section of the novel in which Stephen Dedalus is depicted “walking into eternity along Sandymount strand.” The Houston Joyce Society attempts to demonstrate herein that with a bit of philological diligence the “Proteus” episode is not only intelligible but also delightful. So slip off your slippers and take a walk in the sand with Stephen D (and HJS). Press play above to listen to the full conversation and/or press play below to listen and watch on my YouTube channel:

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Show Notes

• Is Gabler’s edition the definitive text? (Asking for a friend.)

• Adam Kadmon (< Hebrewʾāḏām qaḏmōn = “Primordial Man”):

• Haroun al-Rashid as depicted by Khalil Gibran:

• “hising up their petticoats”:

• “like Algy [Charles Swinburne], coming down to our mighty mother”:

• Those “empty shells of the Sefirot” are called Qlippoth, seen here on the so-called Tree of Death:

• “Books you were going to write with letters for titles,” eh?

• “fleshpots of Egypt” = “a biblical idiom from Exodus 16:3 referring to the imagined or remembered comforts, security, and food (specifically meat-filled cooking pots) the Israelites enjoyed while enslaved in Egypt. It symbolizes the temptation to prioritize material security and physical pleasure over freedom and spiritual growth, often used to describe nostalgia for a comfortable but detrimental past” (Google AI)

• Was she worth it, Billy Boy?

• Cocklepickers literally pick cockles—a cockle being “an edible burrowing bivalve mollusc with a strong ribbed shell” (Google Dictionary):

• “a threemaster” literally has 3 masts:

• Joycean playlist for Episode 3:

(Sing as: “Sittin’ on the rocks of the bay”)

For an intro to the Rejoyce! series, see my post on Episode 1.

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This week on Books Are Burning!, Will & Villa are back with the second installment of the Rejoyce! series. Press play above to hear the Houston Joyceans break down Episode 2 of Ulysses, known as “Nestor,” in which Stephen Dedalus, having commuted to his “school kip,” instructs his pupils in the art of history and then “breaks a lance” with his headmaster, the insufferable Mr. Deasy. The conversation, it is hoped, will prove useful to Ulysses virgins as well as veterans. Those who prefer to watch as they listen may do so on YouTube:

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Show Notes

• more reader resources:

Ulysses Guide

Mr. Deasy’s Perfidious Women

Ulysses - listen to the epic RTÉ dramatisation

• Villa recommends:

• Could Joyce have been aware of Sōseki?

• “Good fences make good neighbors”?

• Joycean playlist for Episode 2:

For an intro to the Rejoyce! series, see my post on Episode 1.

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Rejoyce, Book Burners! Your favorite author, songwriter, and publisher in permanent exile is now reading James Joyce’s Ulysses for the fifth (?) time in his life, and he’s documenting the experience in an 18-part podcast series here on Substack (and on YouTube)!

How did all this come about? It’s a tale more intricate than Dedalus’ labyrinth, but let me briefly try to explain. Back in 1998, when we both still lived in our home state of Texas, my friend and sometime co-author G.J. Villa and I founded the Houston Joyce Society for the purpose of reading Ulysses with a community of likeminded literati. At our inaugural meeting there were approximately ten people in attendance, all of them full of enthusiasm for the reading adventure upon which they had embarked. As it turned out, however, Villa and I were the only two members of HJS to finish the novel, everyone else having ignominiously punked out shortly after that first meeting of the club. Two failed marriages and more than a decade later, in 2013, after we had both left Houston, Villa and I, traveling from opposite sides of the globe, met in Dublin for Bloomsday—an annual event attracting an international crowd of Joyceans like us who congregate in honor of the great Irish novelist and his infamous book—and since that time we have been fictionalizing our literary pilgrimage in the Erinesque series of novelettes, the first of which, Flannsday, has been available on Amazon since 2018 and the second of which, Wildesday, is scheduled to be published later this year (yes, progress on this magnum opus has been slow). Fast forward to late 2025, when our mutual friend Brian Whitten expressed an interest in reading Joyce’s novel for the first time himself and asked us if we would like to join him in this epic undertaking at the beginning of 2026. Now here we are in the Year of the Fire Horse revisiting the fictional universe whose omphalos is Dublin as imagined by Joyce on an eternally recurring June 16, 1904, the day during which the various episodes of Ulysses take place.

In this first installment of the Rejoyce! series, the topic of discussion is Episode 1 of Ulysses, often referred to as “Telemachus.” Villa and I provide the intro and Whitten joins us about halfway through the broadcast. Press play above to hear the full panel discussion. You can also watch the video version of our chat below:

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P.S. I plan to livestream readings of each episode of the novel as well. Stay tuned.

Show Notes

• reader resources:

• Joyce on film:

• Joycean playlist for Episode 1:

• Joseph Campbell quote for those afraid to take the leap of faith into Ulysses: “What I think is that a good life is one hero journey after another. Over and over again, you are called to the realm of adventure, you are called to new horizons. Each time, there is the same problem: do I dare? And then, if you dare, the dangers are there, and the help also, and the fulfillment or the fiasco. There’s always the possibility of a fiasco. But there’s also the possibility of bliss.”

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I recently interviewed Dr. Robert M. Price about his two major literary interests: horror/fantasy fiction (especially the work of H.P. Lovecraft) and religious texts (especially the Bible). Press play above to hear the full conversation, during which we discuss, among other things, the essential Lovecraftian texts, the forthcoming Lovecraftian Pentateuch, Lovecraft’s racism and the scourge of “chronological snobbery,” Lovecraft as the indie author par excellence, the scholarship of S.T. Joshi, the influence of Lord Dunsany, the Necronomicon, “spectral fiction” vs. “weird fiction,” Joseph Campbell, Paul Tillich, Nicolas Cage, the Book of Isaiah and the mysterium tremendum et fascinans, teenage fundamentalism, the human (as opposed to the divine) wisdom of the Bible, the Satanic schtick of Dr. Ammon Hillman, the pagan continuity hypothesis of Brian Muraresku, the Gospel of Mark, and how Dr. Price balances the Jekyll and Hyde aspects of his literary life. Give us a like, book-burner, and please follow Dr. Price at his official home page and on Amazon.

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Show Notes

• Read Dr. Price’s books:

• This is the Lovecraft anthology (edited by S.T. Joshi) which is on my bookshelf:

• also recommended:

• Lovecraft on film:

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My friend and sometime co-author G.J. Villa recently joined me on BAB! to discuss the highlights of his reading in 2024. Villa made his way through 31 books in total during the Year of the Dragon, but we chose to focus on 4 of them: 2 works of fiction and 2 works of non-fiction. During the lightning round at the end of the pod, I asked Villa about some of the other books on his list and he provided some solid recommendations. As it turned out, the theme of our chat was Nuance and Complexity. Press play above to hear the full convo, during which we discuss, among other things, paperback and hardcover editions vs. ebooks, Franco-American colonialism in Vietnam, the unreliable narrator, the pronunciation of “Pulitzer,” sex education in America, dirty magazines, the evolution of porn (which is apparently a speech act), academic obscurantism, moral panics, the Mexican border, the queer community in Putin’s Russia (with Tomek offering his perspective in the chat), and Francis Ford Coppola as auteur. If you missed the livestream, subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don’t miss the next one. As always, let us know what you think, book-burner!

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Show Notes

• Villa’s top fiction picks:

• Villa’s top non-fiction picks:

• also recommended by Villa:

• the full list of 31 Baskin Robbins flavors:

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Greetings, book-burners! My Gemini Pig brother Steve W of the Idiotville YouTube channel recently joined me on the Books Are Burning! livestream to share the highlights of his reading from last year. During our marathon witter-fest—which, even after editing, clocks in at almost three hours (!)—we discussed, among other things, the distinction between the ADHD reader (Steve) and the OCD reader (me), the pros and cons of Z-Library, the rebirth of Justin Hawkins, the ecstasy of Saint Teresa, “slime trails,” personal canons, the concept of completionism, the meaning of SASA (“self-annihilating, substance-abusing”), the genius of Dr. Orion Taraban, the poetry of Brigit Pegeen Kelly, and of course the never-ending relevance of Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche, New York. Somewhere along the way, I was also introduced to Gertrude and Alice, the Idiot’s beloved marijuana plants. Press play above to hear the full convo, then give us a like and let us know what the highlights of your own reading were in the draconian Year of the Dragon.

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Show Notes

• So many books, so little time:

• “I want an axe to break the ice” (Bowie at his most Kafkaesque):

• “What shall we do, what shall we do with all this useless beauty?”

• Gemini Pig logo 1:

• Gemini Pig logo 2:

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Greetings, book-burners! Today I’m launching a series of reader—as opposed to author—interviews here on the Books Are Burning! podcast. As an author myself, I still enjoy chatting with other authors about their writing, of course, but I’m also a reader who is interested in knowing what other “serious readers” (in Thoreau’s sense) have read, are reading, and plan to read. Sometimes those “serious readers” also happen to be writers and/or content creators as well. Such is the case with the subject of my first reader interview, my co-host over at the Texting podcast, none other than Tomek—who actually appears in this episode as Jack Agnew, a character in Alice Munro’s story “Carried Away.” Press play above to hear Tomek/Jack and your favorite author, songwriter, and publisher in permanent exile discuss not only the texts he and I explored in S3 of Texting (see below), but also books by Bukowski, Bradbury, Murakami, and more. And, yes, we do address the Alice Munro abuse scandal. What’s your take on that, by the way?

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After listening to the pod, you can watch a video with full slide show. Both the livestream and the final edit are available on YouTube, because I cater to everyone—those who like their content raw as well as those who prefer it cooked. Bon appétit!

Show Notes

• Tomek aptly describes reading as “a slower burn”:

• Remember these, textual deviants?

  

• Georgia on my mind:

• Julie Christie wants to know: “Is it true that a long time ago firemen used to put out fires and not burn books?”

• I still need to read this:

  

• So this was inspired by Un Coeur Simple:

• Click here to read/watch Alice Munro’s Nobel lecture in absentia.

• G.J. Villa’s take on the Alice Munro abuse scandal:

• From my bookshelves: Open Secrets and The View from Castle Rock (with no cover), but where is my copy of Dear Life?

• Shameless self-promotion (thanks for reminding me, Tomek/Jack!):

Next on BAB!

Stay tuned for another reader interview, this time with Steve W of the Idiotville YouTube channel (formerly We Need Some Therapy, That’s All? and The Idiot’s I Ching). We’ll be chatting about his 2024 readings in the genres of poetry, biography/memoir, philosophy/mysticism, fiction, non-fiction, and psychology. Check my YouTube channel for updates on the livestream.

That’s right, book-burners, your favorite literary podcast was hijacked! Friend of show Steve W, host of the We Need Some Therapy, That’s All? YouTube channel (formerly The Idiot’s I Ching), seized control of Books Are Burning! in order to interview the host (yours truly). The focus of our wide-ranging conversation was my 2023 travelogue Pilgrimizing: A Record of a Pleasure Trip to “The Holy Land,” but if you press play above you can hear the two of us witter on about everything from the dual nature of Geminis to Woody Allen’s Bananas, the effrontery of “chuggers,” the search for the genius loci (of wherever one happens to be), the meaning of peregrinography, the characteristics of the Enneagram 5, and the cultural, mythological, and literary significance of Cadmus the Phoenician. And if you think I fumbled the answer to Steve’s first question, then please provide us with your own superior insight and wisdom. Go ahead and tell us: WHAT WOULD YOU DO if Satanyahu were suddenly deposed and you became the prime minister of Israel? (Personally I like Tomek’s suggestion that Norm Finkelstein be made emir of a new Gaddafi-inspired Isratine.)

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And after listening to the pod, why not watch the livestream and/or the final video edit on my YouTube channel?

Show Notes

• Since no post would be complete without a little shameless self-promotion and—as I never tire of telling you—“I’m much better on paper” anyway, here’s another reminder to order your copy of Pilgrimizing from Amazon.

• The author of Rogue State (whose name I was struggling to remember) is of course William Blum:

• Here’s “the Mearsheimer book” I mentioned:

• And here’s “the D.H. Lawrence book by Geoff Dyer” which Steve reminded me has been so influential on my own conception of travel-writing:

• Steve also recommends this deviant text (which looks great!):

• Have a listen to the song by Loudon Wainwright III (“Rufus’ dad”) which inspired the name-change to Steve’s YouTube channel:

• I hate to call attention to a competitor to my own audiobooks, but click this link if you’re interested in the AI reader Steve uses.

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Peaceniks, pacifists, and public policy pundits, take note: I finally got around to recording part 2 of my review of Immanuel Kant’s To Perpetual Peace. You may recall that in the first half of his philosophical sketch Kant outlines six preliminary articles for perpetual peace among nations. In the second half, which is the focus of today’s episode of BAB, he outlines three definitive articles, which relate to civil, international, and cosmopolitan right, and then concludes with various supplements and appendices (because German Enlightenment philosophers cannot stop enlightening and philosophizing). Along the way, Kant offers some interesting anthropological perspectives on Barbary Coast pirates, Bedouin marauders, the transition from hunting-gathering to agriculture, the commercial significance of salt and iron, and the influence of Tibetan religion on the Greek mystery cult at Eleusis. Press play above for the unabridged audio version of the pod and/or watch the slideshow on my YouTube channel:

As always, please like, share, comment, etc.

Show Notes

• In case you missed it, here’s the video for part 1:

• I ask again: Has World War III already begun?

• It’s not clear to me how the “enlightened absolutism” practiced by Frederick “the Great”—and apparently endorsed by Kant—could lead to perpetual peace among nations. According to Wikipedia, the King of Prussia fought “many wars,” which included at least 22 battles and sieges.

• Aleister Crowley’s hashish-inspired artwork for his book Konx Om Pax: Essays in Light appears (slightly off-center) in the slideshow, but I reproduce it here because, well, it’s awesome:

• I’ve got a stack of books on my desk, any one of which could be the focus of the next episode of BAB:

  Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

  - My Heart Laid Bare (Charles Baudelaire)
  - Prejudential (Margaret Kimberley)
  - Rogue State (William Blum)
  - 1971: Never a Dull Moment (David Hepworth)
  - The Interpretation of Dreams (Sigmund Freud)
  - The Tao of Physics (Fritjof Capra)
  - The Buddha of Suburbia (Hanif Kureishi)
  - The Man Who Fell to Earth (Walter Tevis)
  - Fingerprints of the Gods (Graham Hancock)

What’s your preference, book-burner?

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Hello, Book Burners! It’s been a while since the previous episode of the pod, but BAB is back this week with a review of Cormac McCarthy’s The Passenger. My sometime co-author G.J. Villa returns to the show for a discussion of what may or may not be King Cormac’s final masterpiece. During our 90-minute chat my guest and I consider, among other things, the meaning of the book’s title, its almost nonexistent plot, its fascinating cast of characters, and its place in McCarthy’s oeuvre. Press play above for the audio version of the entire conversation, then watch the video version with slideshow on my YouTube channel (to which you should certainly subscribe):

As always, please share your own thoughts on the book in question and let me know if you have any requests or recommendations for future episodes.

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Happy holidays, book-burners!

In this new episode of Books Are Burning!, I discuss the first section of Immanuel Kant’s To Perpetual Peace, in which the renowned German Enlightenment philosopher presents his six preliminary articles for establishing peace among the nations of the world. In my somewhat rambling explication de texte—I’ve always said that I’m better on paper than in person—I return several times to the question posed above: do the powers that be actually desire world peace? Given the history of the two centuries plus since Kant’s death, it would appear that . . . well, you know the answer.

But if establishing peace on a global scale were really a desideratum, how would we go about it? Here I think is where Kant’s preliminary articles are instructive and worthy of careful study. I hope you find my intro to his seminal work useful and feel inspired to read it yourself.

During the pod I refer to William Blum’s excellent sourcebook Rogue State, which I hope to focus on in a future episode. Blum catalogues the many crimes of the US Empire—the coups, assassinations, and other illegal actions which Kant calls “dishonorable stratagems.” But these things are now publicly boasted about by such loathsome characters as Mike Pompeo, and even Wikipedia has a list of CIA-sponsored assassinations, known in the trade as “targeted killings.” Needless to say, such war crimes are an obstacle to the kind of peace Kant promotes.

I also allude in passing to lyrics from two songs which are relevant to Kant’s discourse on peace. Bonus points if you can name those tunes:

And so we're told this is the golden age
And gold is the reason for the wars we wage

Too easy? How about the following?

With, without
And who'll deny it's what the fighting's all about?

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Erratum: The OSS, which was the forerunner of the CIA, is an abbreviation of the Office of Strategic Services—not, as I say late in the broadcast, the Office of Special Services.

If you can’t be bothered to listen to the entire episode, here’s a very brief synopsis:

I’ll post the full episode and clips on YouTube in the next few days.

Meanwhile, on this festive Christmas day, let us sing along with John Lennon, who reminds us that war is over . . . if we want it:

Hello, Book Burners!

On this episode of BAB!, I’m joined by Nigerian-born playwright and comedian Ghanniy Oyedele to discuss Part I: “Past into Present” of Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka’s 2012 non-fiction book, Of Africa. During our wide-ranging conversation we explore the cultural significance of Soyinka himself, Nigerian ethnic groups, Nollywood, Desmond Tutu’s concept of ubuntu, the role of the “strongman” in African society, Esu the Yoruba trickster god, the Trans-Saharan vs. the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, the fabled city of Timbuktu, the Well of Attenuation, the Tree of Forgetfulness, and more. Here’s a video of the intro:

At one point during the podcast, Ghanniy mentions the orishas who are featured in his plays. These are Yoruba deities, similar in their functions to the gods of the Greeks, the Norse, the Egyptians, et al. Esu is one of these orishas. Sango is another. Here are some more members of the pantheon:

Orishas and other aspects of Yoruba and African mythology and spirituality will be the subject of the next episode, when Ghanniy joins me again to discuss Part II of Of Africa: “Body and Soul.”

Stay tuned!

MW

On the latest episode of Books Are Burning!, I interview British-Australian sci fi author and self-publishing guru J.J. Green. During our chat, J.J. and I discuss her books, publication history, writing routine, literary influences, and current projects, as well as other topics of interest to both writers and readers. I was particularly inspired to hear about how J.J. overcame her early struggles as an author publishing outside of the mainstream, and I’m sure you will be as well. Press play above to hear the entire conversation.

I’ll be uploading video clips of the interview to my YouTube channel anon, so please subscribe if you haven’t already.

Also, please sign up for J.J.’s newsletter, subscribe to her YouTube channel, and visit her website:

• https://jjgreen.substack.com

• https://www.youtube.com/@jjgreen1333

• https://jjgreenauthor.com

Here is a thumbnail of the fetching Star Legend poster mentioned in the pod:

And in case you’re wondering what Gormenghast is . . .

Coming soon: On the next episode of BAB!, I’ll be discussing Part I of Wole Soyinka’s Of Africa with Nigerian-born playwright and comedian Ghanniy Oyedele. Stay tuned!

Hello again, Book Burners!

On this fifth episode of Books Are Burning!, my sometime co-author G.J. Villa and I conclude our discussion of Benjamín Labatut’s When We Cease to Understand the World with an analysis of “The Night Gardener,” the fifth and final section of the book. “The Night Gardener” opens with the description of “a vegetable plague” which is destroying trees in the narrator’s Chilean village—a detail which reminds us that the original Spanish title of Labatut’s book is Un Verdor Terrible, or A Terrible Verdure. This in turns hearkens back to the “green gas” mentioned in the first section of When We Cease to Understand the World—the chlorine gas which Fritz Haber, who also invented nitrogen fertilizers, created for use by the German military in World War I. The green background of the graphic above represents this verdor terrible which is emphasized in the original title of the book.

Stay tuned for upcoming episodes on the Proust Questionnaire and Wole Soyinka’s Of Africa, as well as a special author interview.

MW

P.S. BAB! #4 has been posted to my YouTube channel:

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Hello again, book-burners!

On this fourth episode of Books Are Burning!, my sometime co-author G.J. Villa and I continue our extended discussion of Benjamín Labatut’s When We Cease to Understand the World. Our focus this time is the book’s fourth section, which has the same title as the book itself and centers on the scientific debate between Erwin Schrödinger and Werner Heisenberg. The Heisenberg Blue background (color code = #70d4fb) of the graphic above represents the ultimate victory of Heisenberg’s theory of quantum mechanics, although the Heisenberg for whom the color is named is of course the fictional American meth manufacturer rather than the controversial German scientist:

The OG Heisenberg looked like this:

And here’s his arch nemesis, the apparently pedophiliac Schrödinger:

Speaking of apparent pedophilia, the reference to the predilections of the Dalai Lama at the end of the pod dates the recording to sometime in April of the current year.

Stay tuned for BAB! #5, in which Mr. Villa and I will discuss “The Night Gardener,” the concluding section of When We Cease to Understand the World.

MW

P.S. BAB! #3 has been posted to YouTube:

Hello, book-burners!

On this third episode of Books Are Burning!, I’m joined once again by my sometime co-author G.J. Villa as we continue our discussion of Benjamín Labatut’s When We Cease to Understand the World. This time our focus is “The Heart of the Heart,” the third section of Labatut’s novel—if we can use that term to describe this strange book. The title of the section in question is taken from a phrase used by Alexander Grothendieck—and his disciple Shinichi Mochizuki—to describe the ultimate mathematical truth. The blood-red background on the graphic above is representative of this Grothendieckian search for absolute knowledge.

FYI, In his younger days, Grothendieck looked like Michel Foucault’s twin brother:

Later, he came to resemble Gandalf:

And here’s a pic of his reclusive Japanese acolyte:

Next up on BAB!: “When We Cease to Understand the World,” the fourth section of the book thusly named. Stay tuned!

MW

P.S. The video for BAB! #2, “Schwarzschild’s Singularity,” has been uploaded to YouTube: