Episodes
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Jake and Phil discuss Leon Trotsky's "Communist Policy Toward Art" and Gogol's "The Overcoat"
The Manifesto:
Leon Trotsky - "Communist Policy Toward Art"
https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1924/lit_revo/ch07.htm
The Art
Gogol - "The Overcoat"
https://www.fountainheadpress.com/expandingthearc/assets/gogolovercoat.pdf -
Phil and Jake discuss Joan Didion's "Politics in the New Normal America" and Robinson Jeffers "Fire on the Hills"
The Manifesto:
Joan Didion, Politics in the New Normal America
https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2004/10/21/politics-in-the-new-normal-america/
The Art:
Robinson Jeffers, Fire on the Hills
https://ronnowpoetry.com/contents/jeffers/FireontheHills.html
For more on Jeffers in Czechoslovakia, see The Warm Reception of Robinson Jeffers’s Poetry in Cold War Czechoslovakia, by Petr Kopecky
https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/169/edited_volume/chapter/1524695/pdf -
Episodes manquant?
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Jake and Phil are joined by Nate DiMeo, podcaster and author of the forthcoming The Memory Palace, to discuss the Riot Grrrl Manifesto, Steve Albini's The Problem with Music, and The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years
The Manifestos:
Kathleen Hanna, The Riot Grrrl Manifesto
https://actipedia.org/project/riot-grrrl-manifesto
Steve Albini, The Problem with Music
https://thebaffler.com/salvos/the-problem-with-music
The Art:
Penelope Spheeris - The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DZu6T8aDCA
Nate's podcast:
https://thememorypalace.us/
Nate's book:
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/706914/the-memory-palace-by-nate-dimeo/ -
Phil and Jake are joined by Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman, the authors of What Are Children For? On Ambivalence and Choice, to discuss David Benatar's 1997 paper "Why It Is Better Never to Come into Existence," alongside Paul Schrader's 2017 film First Reformed.
The Manifesto:
David Benatar - "Why It Is Better Never to Come into Existence"
https://www.jstor.org/stable/20009904
The Art:
Paul Schrader - First Reformed
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6053438/
Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman - What Are Children For? On Ambivalence and Choice
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250276131/whatarechildrenfor
For more of Anastasia's work
https://www.anastasiaberg.com/
Rachel's work at The Point
https://thepointmag.com/author/rwiseman/ -
Jake and Phil are joined by the poet and critic Alice Gribbin to discuss Ezra Pound's The Serious Artist and Eliot Weinberger's The Life of Tu Fu
The Manifesto:
Ezra Pound, The Serious Artist
https://archive.org/details/literaryessaysof00poun/page/n5/mode/2up
The Art:
Eliot Weinberger, The Life of Tu Fu
https://www.ndbooks.com/book/the-life-of-tu-fu/
For more of Alice's writing:
https://www.alicegribbin.com/?utmsource=substack&utmmedium=web&utmcampaign=substackprofile -
Jake and Phil are joined by Sam Kimbriel, director of the Aspen Institute's Philosophy and Society Initiative, to discuss Wallace Stegner's 1987 novel Crossing to Safety.
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Jake and Phil are joined by the novelist and chronicler of post-secular religious movements, Tara Isabella Burton, to discuss J.R.R. Tolkien's 1939 essay “On Fairy-Stories” and Christina Rossetti's 1862 poem, "Goblin Market."
The manifesto:
https://ieas-szeged.hu/downtherabbithole/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Tolkien-On-Fairy-Stories.pdf
The Art:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44996/goblin-market
Tara's new novel, Here In Avalon:
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Here-in-Avalon/Tara-Isabella-Burton/9781982170097 -
Phil and Jake are joined by the Matt Gallagher, author of Daybreak, to discuss George Orwell's "Looking Back on the Spanish War", and Benjamin Busch's photographs from Ukraine, "Nine Dialogues: Conflict in Context"
The Manifesto:
George Orwell, "Looking Back on the Spanish War"
https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/essays-and-other-works/looking-back-on-the-spanish-war/
The Art:
Benjamin Busch, "Nine Dialogues: Conflict in Context"
https://www.wlajournal.com/copy-of-busch-gallery
Ben's hair:
https://lthumb.lisimg.com/939/13342939.jpg?width=280&sharpen=true -
Jake and Phil are joined by the novelist and essayist Jared Marcel Pollen to discuss Vaclav Havel’s “The Power of the Powerless” and The Velvet Underground’s second album, White Light/White Heat
The Manifesto:
https://www.nonviolent-conflict.org/wp-content/uploads/1979/01/the-power-of-the-powerless.pdf
The Art:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJy0LP8iYPg&list=PLaVHibd49QFIsKywss9Jh0rati5skWEYD
Jared's essay, The Metaphysician-in-Chief, in Liberties
https://libertiesjournal.com/articles/the-metaphysician-in-chief/ -
Jake and Phil discuss "How Money Culture Hurts the American Family," by Ian Marcus Corbin, and episode seven of the first season of Girls
The Manifesto:
Ian Marcus Corbin, "How Money Culture Hurts the American Family"
https://www.capita.org/money-culture
Girls, Welcome to Bushwick a.k.a. The Crackcident
https://www.hbo.com/girls/season-1/7-welcome-to-bushwick-a-k-a-the-crackcident -
Jake and Phil are joined live at Fairfield University by the great critic and essayist George Scialabba to discuss Last Men and Women
At a time of war, impending ecological disaster, and partisan rage, our commitments to the modern, liberal order are being questioned like never before. Do we understand ourselves best as individuals or as members of a community? Must we renew our absolute commitment to political freedoms, or accept greater state control to deal with the dangers and allures of new technologies? Should the future be post-liberal, neo-liberal, or some other, perhaps more frightening and electrifying possibility? For the past forty-four years the critic George Scialabba has been engaging in arguments with both the critics and proponents of modernity, staking out a commitment to liberty and mass democracy even in light of powerful challenges.
On December 4th at 4:30pm George Scialabba will join Phil Klay and Jacob Siegel for a live recording of Manifesto! A Podcast. The three will discuss the price we pay for modern liberalism, and George’s commitment to it nonetheless (the essay “Last Men and Women,” originally for Commonweal Magazine and included in his latest book, Only A Voice, published by Verso Books, outlines the basics of his argument)
https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/last-men-and-women
George Scialabba is the quintessential critic’s critic, an outrageously learned and subtle thinker whose stylish, witty and elegantly argued reviews have served as guides to the modern age for generations of writers and intellectuals. Christopher Hitchens, Norman Rush, James Wood, and Vivian Gornick have all declared themselves devotees—while Richard Rorty declared his essays “models of moral inquiry.” An award-winning essayist and critic, his writing has appeared in the Nation, Dissent, bookforum, Riritan, n+1, and the Boston Review among many others. He is a Contributing Editor at the Baffler and the author of six essay collections and a memoir, How to Be Depressed. -
Jake and Phil discuss Josef Skvorecky's "Red Music," an account of playing jazz under Nazism and Communism, alongside Mal Waldron's "Mal Waldron Plays Erik Satie"
The Manifesto:
Josef Skvorecky, "Red Music"
https://harpers.org/archive/1986/03/red-music/
The Art:
Mal Waldron, "Mal Waldron Plays Erik Satie"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juNNxsUXvQw -
Phil talks with poet and translator Philip Metres about the current conflict, the position of a Western observer in regards to what is happening in Gaza, his poem "Remorse for Temperate Speech," as well as his book "Returning to Jaffa."
https://philipmetres.com -
Phil asks Jake about the recent conflict in Israel, and they take listener questions.
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Phil is joined by Sam Kimbriel, director of the Aspen Institute's Philosophy and Society Initiative, and Jennifer Shyue, a Spanish language literary translator, to discuss her recently published translation of Augusto Higa Oshiro's The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu.
https://archipelagobooks.org/book/the-enlightenment-of-katzuo-nakamatsu/ -
Jake and Phil are joined by Walter Kirn to discuss Kirn's essay "The Bullshit" alongside Mark Twain's "My First Lie and How I Got Out of It"
The Manifesto:
Walter Kirn, "The Bullshit"
https://walterkirn.substack.com/p/the-bullshit
The Art:
Mark Twain's "My First Lie and How I Got Out of It"
https://americanliterature.com/author/mark-twain/short-story/my-first-lie-and-how-i-got-out-of-it -
Jake and Phil are joined by Santiago Ramos, a contributing writer to Commonweal Magazine, to discuss Michael Novak's The Secular Saint and the epilogue to Michel Houellebecq's 1998 novel The Elementary Particles.
The Manifesto:
Michael Novak, The Secular Saint
https://www.amazon.com/theology-radical-politics-Michael-Novak/dp/B0006BZ4H2
The Art:
Michel Houellebecq, The Elementary Particles, Epilogue
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/83039/the-elementary-particles-by-michel-houellebecq/ -
Phil is joined by Becca Rothfeld, BD McClay, and Jon Baskin to discuss Norman Rush's 1991 novel Mating, and whether it offers a roadmap for love in the 21st century.
Becca Rothfeld is the nonfiction book critic at the Washington Post and an editor at the Point.
BD McClay is an essayist and critic who has written for publications like Lapham's Quarterly, The New Yorker, and New York Times Magazine.
Jon Baskin is Deputy Editor at Harper's and a founding editor of The Point.
The Art:
Norman Rush, Mating
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/158972/mating-by-norman-rush/
Article cited:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/29/style/mating-norman-rush.html -
Phil is joined by the great novelist, short story writer and essayist Mary Gaitskill to discuss Gaitskill's essay "The Trials of the Young" in the most recent Liberties Journal, alongside the Nirvana songs "Drain You" and "Moist Vagina."
The Manifesto:
Mary Gaitskill, "The Trials of the Young "
https://marygaitskill.substack.com/p/the-despair-of-the-young
The Art:
Nirvana, "Drain You"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJUpHxlJUNQ
Nirvana, "Moist Vagina"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRT6sYzVN78 -
Jake and Phil are joined by Gurwinder Bhogal to discuss Poe's Law and Philip K. Dick's Faith of Our Fathers
The Manifesto: "Poe's Law"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
The Art: Philip K. Dick's "Faith of Our Fathers"
https://genius.com/Philip-k-dick-faith-of-our-fathers-annotated
Also discussed:
Gurwinder Bhogal, "The Best Cure for Fake News is Fake News"
https://rabbitholemag.com/the-best-cure-for-fake-news-is-fake-news/
Ryan Ruby, A Golden Age?
https://www.vinduet.no/essayistikk/a-golden-age-ryan-ruby-on-literary-criticism-and-the-internet/ - Montre plus
