Do You Even Lit?

Was the sexual revolution a mistake? (Houellebecq's Atomised, part 1)

Houellebecq's 1998 novel Atomised (also known as The Elementary Particles) is prophetic, provocative and absolutely filthy.
This chat covers the first ~200 pages:
On the sexual revolution: Are inceldom and looksmaxxing the inevitable consequences of the intrusion of market forces into every facet of human society? If Clavicular did not exist, would it be necessary to invent him?
Fertility crisis: Can we rely on new technologies to save us from population crash? Rich argues that this time might really be different; Benny is more optimistic. Do any of us really want to RETVRN to forced monogamy? Is liberalism at risk of extincting itself? Which cultures will win the memetic battle?
...and more
 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) Metaphysical mutations and historical determinism(00:08:00) Bruno the proto-incel and Michel the proto-asexual(00:15:30) Mother nature is Bad, Actually(00:21:50) Clavicular and the sexual marketplace(00:32:36) Enforced monogamy and slut shaming(00:42:30) The fertility crisis and population crash
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Atomised — Michel Houellebecq (part 2)

Stefan Zweig's The Royal Game: What's the ultimate desert island book?

This week's between-novel quick read is Stefan Zweig's The Royal Game: A Chess Story, written in 1941, immediately before Zweig obliterated his map.
We argue over the perfect answer to the 'desert island book' question, whether it's possible to fracture your own mind into pieces, why Cam sucks at chess, and whether we should pressure our kids to become pro athletes/chess prodigies/concert pianists.
 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) plot summary(00:05:43) What’s the perfect desert island book?(00:17:00) Tulpas and fractured psyches(00:26:10) Our own chess performance(00:34:56) On monomania and pressuring kids into sports/music/chess
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Atomised — Michel Houellebecq

Moby Dick finale: Ahab Derangement Syndrome

Tell me if you've heard this one: A mentally unstable old man abuses his position of power to pursue his own personal agenda. He alternates between smooth talking—tremendous moxie, the best speeches—and threatening the LOSERS and HATERS who stand in his way. He runs roughshod over checks and balances, ignores the norms of civil society, and whips his followers into a fervour against an imagined enemy. In his egotistical mania, he takes down everyone else with him.
We are talking of course about Herman Melville's MOBY DICK (chapters 81-135).
Rich gets political: On Melville's egalitarian dream, the milk and sperm of human kindness, Ahab as demagogue, why the crew don't mutiny, parallels to the current political moment, and Latin America as a cautionary tale. Does Rich have a point here, or has he fallen victim to Ahab Derangement Syndrome?
Benny is all symbolism-ed out: Bad omen after bad omen, we get it. We can see the ending coming a mile away. Has Melville created too rich of a feast for us? Does the explicit fatalism make Ahab a more or less interesting character? Did any of us feel any narrative tension in this last third of the book? What is with the pacing?
What's it all about: Cam proposes the 'interpretation interpretation'. We talk about the limitations of Ahab's approach to meaning-making, vs Ishmael's more pluralistic approach.
And our final thoughts on tackling this behemoth of a book. 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) don’t cry for me argentina(00:07:30) what did we think of the final section?(00:16:02) What does it all mean?(00:20:30) Ahab vs Ishmael meaning-making project(00:28:23) overdosing on omens and symbolism(00:37:40) Pip the cabin boy(00:44:07) The milk and sperm of human kindness(00:47:48) Ahab the demagogue(00:59:18) Next book announcement
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Royal Game — Stefan Zweig
Atomised — Michel Houellebecq

Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein: Look how they massacred my boy

Quick film review before we get back to the final part of Moby Dick.
Guillermo del Toro's long-awaited Frankenstein adaptation is absolutely cleaning up in the Oscar nominations, including a nod for Best Picture.
Benny and Rich make the comparison with Mary Shelley's source material and find it to be sadly wanting (altho we do have some nice things to say).
On the dumbing-down of nuanced morality stories, and the ubiquity of daddy issues/therapy speak in modern media. Can't a guy just be a crazy hubristic scientist anymore?? 
Plus: a brief detour through the horror of quantum immortality.
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The final third of Moby Dick
The Royal Game — Stefan Zweig
Atomised — Michel Houellebecq

Moby Dick, part 2: A conceptual analysis of Whiteness

We continue our voyage with chapters 40-80 of Herman Melville's leviathan MOBY DICK.
Talking nihilism and meaning-making, the deeper significance of making the whale white (seriously), the terrifying vastness of the ocean, animal welfare and charismatic megafauna, and whether we're OK with reading an abridged edition of the book. 
In short: we're having a whale of a time. Tune in next week for our third and final instalment. 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) They should make some kind of 'abridged' version of this book(00:12:21) BULKINGTON(00:19:18) Whiteness conceptual analysis(00:32:10) First whale encounter(00:41:51) The bloody, brutal business of the sperm whale fishery(00:52:32) Charismatic megafauna / animal ethics(01:00:48) Tashtego falls into a vat of sperm(01:10:02) Listener mail: Is it OK to use another man's Anki deck?
 
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The final third of Moby Dick
??

Moby Dick, part 1: My name is Ishmael and my special interest is whales

Starting the year off right by signing on for an epic voyage with Herman Melville's MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE, published in 1851, and widely considered to be the great American novel.
It's quite the beast so we're dividing it into three parts, with this first convo covering chapters 1-40.
Call me Ishmael: Dissecting the iconic opening line, why we love Ishmael as a narrator, on the optimal strategy for getting snuggly in bed, the precise nature of his relationship with (we claim) our fellow New Zealand native Queequeg, and the question of race and class politics onboard a whaling ship.
The mysterious Captain Ahab: various ominous warnings, initial thoughts on Ahab's motivations, punching through the pasteboard mask, and a climactic ritual atop the Quarter-deck.
Infamous infodumps: Benny's eyes glazed over at times, Cam skimmed the Cetology chapter, but Rich makes the case for soldiering through. Plus we look at some of the interesting formal choices Melville makes, the early seeds of modernism, and can't help but make some comparisons to Blood Meridian and Butcher's Crossing.
 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) Ahoy shipmates(00:03:20) Call me Ishmael analysis(00:11:33) NEW ZEALAND MENTIONED!!!(00:17:32) Race politics in international waters(00:23:51) Perilous adventures for young men(00:29:29) The infamous cetology chapter(00:34:44) Jonah and the whale/biblical allusions(00:42:20) We need to talk about Ahab(00:54:48) Infodumps, genre mashups and the roots of modernism(01:01:10) Listener mail: Adam G in NYC 
 
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??

Crashing out of Gravity's Rainbow: A postmortem of our first DNF

Yeah fuck this book. After much blood, sweat, tears, and other unspeakable bodily excretions, we've had enough.
This is our first ever DNF after 50+ titles, so we thought we should do a postmortem of what went wrong.
Did we not try hard enough? Is Pynchon basically an asshole? Do we have a problem with postmodernism as a tradition? Or the maximalist writing style? How is that we (mostly) love David Foster Wallace, who copied so much of his schtick from Pynchon, but not the master himself?
And several other theories for why this book ultimately defeated us:
(00:00:00) Theory 1: we chose the wrong Pynchon to start out with(00:06:45) Theory 2: we are straight-up too dumb for this book(00:11:35) Theory 3: GR is intended for literary masochists(00:19:34) Theory 4: Postmodernist disorientation spiral(00:30:30) Theory 5: Pynchon is painfully unfunny(00:38:10) Theory 6: Maximalism is just too much, man(00:49:20) comparison vs DFW, the New Sincerity, and irony poisoning(00:56:50) Listener mail: In defence of Woolf and the modernists(01:01:51) Next book announcement
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Moby Dick — Herman Melville

DYEL wrapped: Most beloved and hated books of 2025

Some festive chit-chat and navel gazing on the year that was. 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) big tiddy goth gfs and rival podcast recs(00:10:09) DYEL wrapped stats analysis(00:19:39) Third best book of the year(00:23:41) Second best book of the year(00:29:01) Best book of the year(00:33:11) Biggest stinker of the year(00:40:13) Best non-book club book or blog(00:56:25) Favourite movie or TV show of the year(01:03:53) What we're gonna do differently next year
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Moby Dick by Herman Melville

Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow: It's not rocket science

We've been making eyes at the postmodernists for a while, but up until this point have lacked the stones to go take a ride on daddy Pynchon's rocket ship.
Now that we have a little experience we thought we were ready for a mature and sophisticated lover like Gravity's Rainbow (1973): 800 pages long, and widely considered to be one of the greatest novels of all time.
...we were not ready.
It's right back to clumsy virginal fumblings as we attempt to decipher the first 100 pages. A shameful and frankly demoralising experience for the boys.
Does it get easier?
Please dear god let it get easier.
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) introductory fumblings(00:06:19) Rocket warfare(00:12:40) Pirate, ACHTUNG, and the Firm(00:17:14) Slothrop’s psychic schlong(00:22:58) Roger Mexico the statistician(00:30:12) Reverse causality(00:36:16) I didn't get that reference
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
???

Murakami's Norwegian Wood: the sadboi and his manic pixie dream girls

In 1987, Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami set himself a challenge: to set aside his magical realism schtick and try to write one 'straight' novel in the realist tradition.
The result was Norwegian Wood, in which the author-insert protagonist is transported back to his college days, breaking free of ennui and depression just long enough to sleep with a string of hot but crazy chicks (and giving each of them the greatest sexual experience of their life).
Naturally it was a smash hit among the youth. Murakami was propelled to fame and had to move to Italy, hounded from his home country by a mob of shrieking Japanese girls intrigued by his magical but sad penis.
But is the book actually any good?
The boys are divided on this. We talk about Murakami's treatment of suicide, his portrayal of female characters, use of memory and nostalgia as a writing device, in which ways we relate to Toru Watanabe, which demographic this book aimed at, and in general whether this is a work of great art or should be relegated to r/iam14andthisisdeep.
If you're a Murakami fan, please write in and tell us what we got wrong, and especially which other book of his you'd most recommend we read.
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) blather(00:05:06) On memory as a writing device(00:11:15) Portrayal of suicide(00:24:15) Toru Watanabe character analysis(00:36:03) Norwegian Wood as a teenage boy fantasy(00:49:20) A profound and deeply moving ending(00:54:30) Final judgments(00:58:25) Next book announcement + One Battle After Another argument
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein
Gravity's Rainbow — Thomas Pynchon

A Portrait of the Artist: James Joyce on the difference between tasteful nudes and porn

This week we're reading James Joyce's semi-autobiographical novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, published in 1916.
Moments of adolescent significance: on heated dinner-time conversations, a child's keen sense of injustice,  the fear of burning in Hellfire, contemplating eternity, sexual guilt, and teenage rebellion. Which did we relate to the most? 
Theory of aesthetics: why are evo psych explanations distasteful? Do Aquinas' three criteria give us an objective description of art? How about Stephen's 'impelled action' theory? can we tell propaganda, pornography and sermonising apart from the real deal? Does Joyce's novel kinda fail by its own lights?
Overall vibes: What did we think of the prose style evolving in line with Stephen's maturation? Is Joyce fully sincere here or kinda making fun of himself? Is Stephen Dedalus a romantic hero or a teenage blowhard? Dare we tackle Ulysses or Finnegan's Wake?
 
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) intro(00:05:54) Baby tuckoo and the moocow(00:14:35) Dinner time convos and unjust punishments(00:23:18) Hell and the true nature of eternity(00:33:38) Epiphany (seeing a hot girl at the beach)(00:40:15) Stephen’s theory of beauty and aesthetics(00:56:40) Did we like the book?
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood
Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein
Gravity's Rainbow — Thomas Pynchon

C.P. Snow's The Two Cultures: the original stemcels vs shape rotators beef

This week we're discussing C.P. Snow's influential 1959 lecture 'The Two Cultures', on the growing division between literary and scientific intellectuals:
"So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had."
Why do literary types tend to be Luddites? Is it kinda good that hubristic tech bros refuse to read the classics? Has the gap narrowed or widened in recent decades? How closely does The Two Cultures map onto the stemcels vs shape rotators meme? And of course Cam analyses the various status dynamics at play.
Trickling out episodes atm while Rich is on paternity leave. Normal service will resume shortly
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
James Joyce - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood

Butcher's Crossing: John Williams's rougher cut

Back to the novels. This week, the DYEL boys decide to try Butcher's Crossing, the first novel from John Williams, the author famous for writing the so-underrated-it-might-be-overrated-but-probably-is-now-just-correctly-rated novel Stoner.As to be expected, it's not on the same level of Stoner but we still enjoy it. 
Decline of the buffalo: Rich reminds Cam that we already had this discussion in our episode of Blood Meridian but Cam forgot it and found himself in new disbelief on the staggering decline of the North American Bison. 
Emerson and finding yourself: It turns out Rich went through an Emerson phase. Well, actually more of a Thoreau phase but the both had three names and wrote around the same time so it counts. We discuss Emerson's idea of transcendence and whether this novel is meant as a refutation or embodiment of it. 
Miller: Not on the level of the Judge in Blood Meridian but a memorable character in his own right. Rich has some small gripes with his characterisation.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:01) Intro(00:06:10) Summary(00:07:53) Emerson's transcendentalism(00:17:30) American Buffalo: Decline, hunting, skinning(00:26:02) Miller's stoicism and characterisation(00:34:24) Schneider's empty (Chekhov's) gun(00:41:18) Does Miller's motive make sense?(00:46:26) Lesser work to Stoner(00:48:54) Anti-Emerson(00:53:02) Ending and nihilism(01:00:15) Outro and next picks
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
James Joyce - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood
 

Borges's Library of Babel: Ctrl + F for meaning

The Do You Even Lit boys put down the heavy tomes and choose a short story. Well, we're not sure if it counts as a story. Maybe a thought experiment?This week we’re talking about one of our favourite authors: Jorge Luis Borges. We read The Library of Babel, Borges’s classic meditation on infinity (well, not infinity exactly — but an almost-might-as-well-be infinity). There are a lot of books.
Nonsense: Not to complain about pLoT hOlEz, but we take slight issue with the fact that it's no feasible for a librarian to find any coherent passages, even if the library contains everything collectively.
How would you know? We worry about the metaphysical horror of not being able to know you found the book with all the codes in it even if you found it. We're reassured by reminding ourselves that we won't stumble across
The library: How are the hexagons actually connected? Can you piss off the railing? Was it designed to be pissed off? And if you jumped, which book would you bring on the way down?
CHAPTERS
(0:11) Banter and boners(2:13) Thought experiments vs short stories(4:28) Summary(06:07) How many books is it really?(08:23) It'd all be nonsense, practically speaking(10:23) Metaphysical layers 1 and 2(18:06) the real world website(21:10) Falling down the shaft(27:06) No author doesn't quite hit the same(39:06) How do they have history?(44:30) What does the library look like?(47:25) Multiverse(59:03) Wrap up
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Butcher's Crossing - John Williams
James Joyce...

Anna Karenina FINALE: Revenge of the Reddit Atheists

What an absolutely dogshit ending to an otherwise incredible book. We made it through 800 pages for this?? I still love you Tolstoy but seriously wtf bro.
This discussion covers parts 6, 7, and 8 of Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. 
Anna's unhappy ending: Look how they massacred my girl. Is this a tale of a wanton harlot who got what was coming to her, or a good woman driven mad by society's strictures? What is it exactly that Tolstoy disapproves of about Anna's actions? How much would he hate her revival as a feminist icon? Is Aella the modern Anna K?
Levin's leap of faith: Is there any way this isn't totally unredeemable bullshit that ruins the end of the book? Sadly, no. Nevertheless we explore Levin's 'undefined but significant ideas'. Should we turn our brains off, and disregard reason and philosophy in favour of tradition? Is Christianity the final word in moral progress? Cam is more sympathetic to the leap of faith: if we replace religion, what do we replace it with?
Final thoughts: Jordan Peterson has a line about Dostoevsky being the great psychologist of the 20th century and Tolstoy being the great sociologist. Is he right? Where do we land on this book overall? Would we recommend it wholeheartedly? What are our favourite things about Tolstoy? Do we have to read War and Peace now? 
...and, if you can believe it, more
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) hot takes(00:05:30) Anna’s unhappy ending(00:24:26) the feminist reading of Anna vs society(00:29:55) Parallels with the Kitty/Levin arc(00:44:05) Vronsky’s teeth discourse(00:49:35) Levin’s depression and rejection of reason(01:05:40) Cam makes the case for the leap of faith(01:11:43) Dostoevsky vs Tolstoy: who’s the better psychologist?(01:19:12) Would we recommend this book?
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Library of Babel - Jorge Luis Borges
Butcher's Crossing - John Williams

Anna Karenina part 2: I am begging you to touch grass

Levin is a turbo nerd who runs away from social awkwardness to theorise on agrarian economics or whatever. Sound like anyone you know??
Anyway he finally touches grass and gets the girl. 
Meanwhile we are falling out of love with Anna. It feels like something bad is gonna happen? The foreshadowing is very subtle, only experts in Media Literacy will be able to catch it.
On Levin's journey away from intellectualism: Is the peasant life really that appealing? Does doing good need to come from the heart, not from the mind? Rich gets mad about Tolstoy basically shitting on effective altruism; benny offers a partial defence. 
Nikolai's gruesome death: Kitty steps up and shows her worth. Is she meant to be the paragon a good Christian, or a good woman? Rich is now terrified of dying and wants to be euthanised.
Anna & Vronsky's empty self-gratification: Tolstoy literally accuses Vronsky of jerking himself off with the whole 'amateur artist in Italy' pose. Anna gives in to passion, abandoning her 8yo child in the process. Seems bad. We notice we are falling out of love with Anna.
Karenin's emotional repression cracks: First he gets big mad and is on the verge of joining the manosphere. Then he has a proper Christian moment and forgives both Anna and Vronsky; a move so powerful that Vronsky attempts to kill himself in shame. Then he backslides a little but it's progress. We are warming up this cold fish.
This discussion covers parts 3, 4, and 5 of the book. 
Tune in next week for the finale. Can't wait to see how this ends.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) yes I'm mad(00:02:35) Levin's journey from cerebral dork to touching grass(00:11:32) Leave effective altruism alone!(00:22:45) Trouble in paradise for the newlyweds(00:27:45) Nikolai's gruesome death as an argument for euthanasia(00:37:18) Karenin finally gets in touch with his emotions(00:51:48) Anna and Vronsky empty self-gratification spiral(01:03:51) Listener mail: Dawkins on Kafka redux
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Anna Karenina finale: parts 6-8
The Library of Babel - Jorge Luis Borges

Tolstoy's Anna Karenina: Real Housewives of Russia

Benny decided it was time for the boys to read Leo Tolstoy's 800 page whopper Anna Karenina. Today we discuss parts 1 and 2 of the novel.
Rich immediately fell in love with all the characters. He wants be Levin, be with Anna, and be... something with that majestic horse Frou Frou. 
On the famous opening line: Are happy families alike? Are any of Tolstoy's families happy? Rich argues the line is actually about statistical mechanics. 
On Stepan and Dolly: We meet our first unhappy family. Are they meant to be nodes who connect everyone else? Will they stick in there and make the marriage work?
On Levin: Rich identifies with Levin, warts and all. Is this Tolstoy's mary-sue character? How did he fumble the bag so hard with Kitty? Speaking of, why can't Benny bowl without the gutters up?
On Anna: Rich falls in love with Anna almost as quick as a Tolstoy character. Her elegance, intelligence, and her black dress. He loves her even more than Levin but Frou-Frou the horse gives her a run for her money. How does Tolstoy write such likeable characters? Is Anna's burgeoning relationship with Vronsky love? What to think of her cucked bureaucrat husband Alexei Karenin, who's obsessed with propriety? On fiery passion vs duty.CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) AI rates our podcasting skills  (00:05:00) Opening line: are all happy families alike?  (00:11:58) Benny history snippet: Freeing the serfs  (00:13:44) Stepan and Dolly(00:20:10) Meeting the famous Anna Karenina  (00:27:15) Levin crushing on the Schchchcherbatskys  (00:36:15) Anna and Vronsky  (00:50:23) Alexei Karenin in denial(01:01:23) Where's all the sex?  (01:14:00) Tolstoy's writing
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Anna Karenina - parts 3-5
Anna Karenina - parts 6-8
A new book!
 

One Hundred Years of Solitude: The optimal amount of incest is non-zero

Everyone loves Gabriel García Márquez' 1967 genre-defining classic One Hundred Years of Solitude.
At first we were charmed. But after trying to track a complex web of births and deaths and affairs and inc*stuous unions all taking place in the first 100 pages we found ourselves mired deep in the swamp.
When we reached the halfway mark we recorded an episode so hopelessly confused that we had to junk it. As we trudged through the second half, we fantasised about the devastating critiques we would unleash. then right on the very cusp of recording this pod, we all sheepishly admitted we were kinda back on board again??
Come on a journey with us to Macondo: often maddening but always magical.
The elephant in the room is magical realism: have we found our kryptonite? Rich accepts that we're meant to soak up the vibe rather than spergily analyse it, but still has problems with the genre. How can characters have meaningful stakes in an arbitrary world? is it even possible to write a non-fatalistic work? Can fiction be in some sense 'truer than true'? Cam advances the bold thesis that magic is cool, actually.
On the cyclicality of human decline: do the characters matter as individuals, or are they fractals of Macondo itsef? Is this a biblical post-eden loss of innocence story? A nod to Spengler's theory of cyclical civilizational collapse? Is historical determinism total bullshit? We're not sure but we don't love the fatalism here.
On the solipsism of the Buendia family: seriously, what's with all the inc*st?? why is there so little true love or tenderness? why couldn't they have called their kids Pedro or Juan or something? This book is supposedly critical of colonialism and material progress but Cam and Rich can't help coming away with a straussian reading in which GGM is mostly mocking his stupid inbred countrymen.
On the belovedness of this book, and why it missed the mark for us: Is there something here that only Latin American people can understand? Do you need to be familiar with the history of Colombia? Is the book better in the original Spanish? Is it a dose-dependent thing?
Plus: new book announcement. it's a big one
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) first impressions(00:06:40) The case against magical realism(00:26:08) Fiction is ‘truer’ than real life (Baudrillard redux)(00:31:45) Macondo as a fractal set of human failures(00:38:37) Spengler’s theory of cyclical history(00:43:00) biblical parallels: post-Eden loss of innocence(00:44:53) A Straussian reading contra the anti-progress themes(00:50:48) Back to Spengler: is historical determinism bullshit?(01:01:34) ‘The optimal amount of inc*st is non-zero’(01:10:55) Solipsism and lack of true connection amongst the Buendías(01:16:34) Do we like this book? Would we recommend it?(01:27:45) BIG SUMMER BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy

Everything is Illuminated: Cultural Learnings of Trachimbrod for Make Benefit Glorious Book Club

we have very premium episode for you this week. welcoming special guest Nicole (@elocinationn), one of the great up-and-coming poasters of our time.
We revisit one of her younger self's favourite books, Jonathan Safran Foer's ambitious 2002 novel Everything is Illuminated.
On being disconnected from history: can you be traumatised by losing connection with your past? how reliable is our conception of history anyway? can the stories we tell ourselves be 'truer than true'? do we care about our own family genealogies? what are the challenges of trying to write about the Holocaust as a third-generation survivor?
Foer's incredible ambition: How derivative is this book? does it really matter? Who are Foer's postmodernist forebears, and what did he do differently? Should more young authors try to swing for the fences like this?
Plus we stumble upon the inspiration for borat, find out who invented the gloryhole, and MORE
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro and why we chose the book(00:07:10) Alex as the proto-borat(00:25:50) playing at happy families with Brod and Yankel(00:33:56) traumatic impact of being disconnected from history(00:46:42) Lista and Alex's grandad: survivor guilt(01:02:21) Brod and the Kolker's violent love(01:16:00) Jonathan's grandad finally achieves release(01:28:10) Truth of fact, truth of feeling redux(01:35:53) How original is this book? mapping influences and forebears(01:52:18) final thoughts
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Truth of Fact, Truth of Fiction: Is Ted Chiang a Luddite?

This week we tackle another short story by Ted Chiang: From his 2019 Exhalation collection Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling.
Luddism and cognitive tool breakthroughs: we go through the pros and cons. Rich wants to go to the moon. We're not sure how much of a luddite, or dare we say relativist, we should make Chiang out to be.
Fallible memories: just how bad are our memories? Benny and Rich have opposing intuitions,
Special guest episode coming soon!
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) Summary
(00:00:00) Chiang, a luddite?
(00:00:00) Founding myths
(00:00:00) Cognitive tools
(00:00:00) Fallible memories
(00:00:00) Final thoughts
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The Dispossessed part 2: Why would capitalism make me do this?

This week we wrap up our discussion of Ursula LeGuin's 1974 classic The Dispossessed.
Simultaneity physics: just a mcguffin, or deeper thematic significance? How is it different to a block universe? Does this count as hard sci-fi?
on the [redacted] scene: why would LeGuin include this? how are we supposed to feel about our hero Shevek? why would capitalism make me do this??
Final thoughts on the book: was Shevek's arc satisfying? who would we recommend it to? are we gonna read more LeGuin?
Ted Chiang story coming soon. plus special guest episode!
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) shevek’s arc or lack thereof
(00:11:20) talking about THAT scene
(00:16:40) Simultaneity theory unpacked
(00:25:45) Final thoughts on the book
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling - Ted Chiang
Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed: Real anarchy has never been tried

A brilliant physicist grows disenchanted with the stifling anarchist society of his home planet, defecting to a capitalist world in the hopes of finding true freedom...but what he finds only horrifies him.
Cam says Ursula K. Le Guin's 1974 award-winning piece of sociological fiction is a leftist pamphlet. Benny and Rich call bs.
who's right? let us examine the textual evidence.
On incentives: Are social sanctions powerful enough to get everyone to work voluntarily? Can an economy function without price signals and division of labour? How does crime and justice work with no police or courts? Do we have any existence proofs of flourishing anarchist societies?
On family life: Is having your children raised by other people as grotesque as it sounds? How about mere copulation without monogamy? Or living in communal dorms? The boys are much more sympathetic to the idea of ditching compulsory education, but wonder if unschooling etc is a luxury belief.
And the million-dollar question: from behind the veil of ignorance, would we rather be born on Anarres or Urras?
A fun wonky discussion of the central ideological clash. In part 2 we'll try to talk more about the characters and the story.
Also: a humiliating question in the reader mailbag! bold of you to assume we actually read books outside of the podcast.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) an ambiguous anarchist utopia
(00:09:33) communal parenting, unschooling, and luxury beliefs
(00:19:10) soft coercion through social norms
(00:33:18) the free-rider problem and central planning
(00:42:52) capitalism as the root cause of all antisocial behaviour
(00:48:02) crime rate is zero if you don't have any laws hehe
(00:59:42) has real syndicalist anarchism ever been tried?
(01:04:37) how good is le guin’s worldbuilding
(01:15:21) reader mailbag: which new releases from living authors do we read immediately?
WRITE US:
We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling - Ted Chiang
Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
One Hundred Days of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

DeLillo's White Noise: psy-opping ourselves on death and po-mo

“All plots tend to move deathward. This is the nature of plots.”
After a break, the boys jump into the 1980s po-mo White Noise by Don DeLillo. We talk about the denial of death, toxic airborne events, and Baudrillardian copies of copies of copies (of copies...)
Simulacra: The boys shake off their reddit I Love Science teenage years and start to embrace all things post-modernism. Namely, Baudrilliard's idea of the Simulacra where some "signs" no longer point to any underlying reality.
Denial of Death: A fairly straight-forward retelling of Ernest Becker's Denial of Death: We're all terrified of death, so we build our entire lives to avoid confronting it. Cam and Benny try denying Becker's denial thesis.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) Chitter chatter
(00:03:13) Quick summary
(00:09:16) The most photographed barn in America
(00:13:51) Post-modernism
(00:16:35) Baudrillard's Simulacra
(00:24:26) How po-mo is DeLillo himself
(00:32:18) Fake preferences & signalling
(00:36:36) Airborne Toxic Event
(00:55:17) Fear of Death
(01:17:50) Ending and Jack's arc
(01:31:26) Final thoughts
WRITE US:
We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our bad takes, add your own, or just say hi.
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Ursula Le Guin - The Dispossessed
Ted Chiang - Truth of Fact, Truth of Feeling
Jonathan Safran Foer - Everything is Illuminated

The Odyssey, part 2: Failsons and deadbeat dads

This week we finally shut up about translations and get into some juicy themes and character analysis.
Telemachus: why is he such a dweeb compared to his dad? Rich argues that he's doing the best he can growing up with an absent father. The others are less sympathetic.
Odysseus: is his paranoid murderous rampage justified? what are his singular heroic attributes? Is he portrayed more as admirable or a hubristic figure? Why won't his men obey him?
On homecoming: Why was Odysseus away for so long? Was he kinda dragging his heels on the return voyage? How much strange was he getting? What motivated him to finally come home?
The Ancient Greek marshmallow test: exploring the recurring themes of self-denial, time preference, binding mechanisms, and whether playing the long game could arguably be the central theme of the whole poem.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) Telemachus the failson
(00:19:39) why the poem spends so much time on household politics
(00:29:31) Bronze Age morality redux: what have we learned?
(00:36:28) The Ancient Greek Marshmallow Test
(00:45:12) Odysseus’ slow homecoming
(00:57:04) Godhood and rat bastard cunning
(01:13:07) Suitor slaughtering time
(01:17:25) Final thoughts on Odysseus and bronze age heroism
(01:32:48) Listener mailbag and next book announcement
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
White Noise - Don DeLillo

Emily Wilson's The Odyssey, part 1: Bronze age perversion

WOKE classics professor DESTROYED by three random guys who've never read homer before!!!
just kidding we love it.
Wilson translation discourse: is she really importing her feminist beliefs into the text? has she stripped the grandeur out to take 'complicated' Odysseus down a peg? what are the connotations of sluts and slaves? is the fancy language of other translators really just stylistic anachronism? who would win in a fight between the yass queens and the greek statue avatars?
Odysseus the hero: what's with all the false modesty? where is the line between seeking glory and outright hubris? did he do the Cyclops dirty or did the rude savage get what was coming to him? a comparison of the Greek heroic obsession with honour and social status vs Byronic heroes and modern superheroes.
Bronze age morality: which ethical framework does it correspond to? is the hospitality stuff a useful cultural adaptation? same for the tit-for-tat honour culture? do the greek gods enforce morality, or they more like regular capricious people who happen to have super powers? what are the other big differences to judeo-christian morality?
This episode is pretty light on actual plot and character stuff but I promise we will get into it much more next week: especially the ousting of the suitors, cunning Penelope, Telemachus arc, etc.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro and initial reactions
(00:04:52) does Wilson strip the majesty out of the poem?
(00:19:50) wading into the woke and anti-woke accusations
(00:36:32) Civilisation vs barbarism: sympathy for the Cyclops
(00:47:57) Walking the line between fame and hubris
(00:54:00) Bronze age morality: you gotta give respect to get respect
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
White Noise - Don DeLillo

Nikolai Gogol: Cutting your nose to spite the faceless bureaucracy

"For how could the nose, which had been on his face but yesterday, and able then neither to drive nor to walk independently, now be going about in uniform?"We take a break from reading novels and take a quick nose dive into Gogol's famous 1830s short story, talking absurdity, bureaucracy, and Russian wives.Status and bureaucracies: The most straight forward reading is a satire 19th century Russian bureaucracies and status seeking. Benny outlines outlines the table of ranks and the boys consider the pros and cons.
Inconsistencies and the absurd: Rich is frustrated with the lack of internal inconsistency and doesn't buy George Saunders defence of the story as self-aware of its limitations.
Gogol's nose: Perhaps the story can be understood via a more personal lens. Benny points out Gogol's insecurities about his own noise which may be reflected in Major Kovalyov’s obsession with his appearance.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) Chitter chatter
(00:07:14) Quick summary of The Nose
(00:11:05) Is this story even good?
(00:16:00) Absurdism and surrealism
(00:21:20) George Saunders defends The Nose
(00:24:32) The Table of Ranks
(00:29:18) Gogol's nose
(00:36:15) Listener feedback
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Odyssey - Homer (Emily Wilson translation)
White Noise - Don DeLillo
 

Blood Meridian, part 2: It's time for some game theory

"He never sleeps, the judge. He is dancing, dancing. He says that he will never die."
Wrapping up the second half of our discussion on Cormac McCarthy's 1985 classic, in which various chickens come home to roost.The Glanton gang's downfall: on the run from the Sonoran cavalry, mercy killings, greed and symbolism of coins, the takeover of the ferry, the Yuma strike back, the judge's apocalypse-chic fashion, the Idiot plays his part (??).
On violence and human nature: Rich makes the base case that humans don't have a 'true' nature but respond to local incentives, Benny finds some logic in the conservative tradition for avoiding a major upset to the fragile equilibrium of modern civilisation, and Cam adds game theoretic reasons for having a government or third party that can make credible threats of violence.
What makes the Kid different: Rich thinks he isn't any more moral than the rest of the gang, but we end up coming up with a pretty good explanation for why the judge singles him out for opprobrium and considers him such a disappointment.
On the sunset of the Wild West: the kid becomes the man, the cycle of violence perpetuates itself, mass slaughter of the buffalo, McCarthy's satirical skewering of manifest destiny, interpreting of the epilogue and the last dance.
Also: some general thoughts on tackling our first McCarthy, his idiosyncratic writing style, and the ambiguity around his antagonist's true identity.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) chitter chatter
(00:09:08) The Glanton gang’s downfall
(00:25:00) The Idiot
(00:32:33) Cultural technologies for reducing violence
(00:45:33) What makes the Kid different?
(01:03:06) Greed, exploitation, and the end of the Wild West
(01:13:13) The Bonepickers: the cycle of violence repeats
(01:22:12) The last dance: Is the judge a supernatural being?
(01:49:40) Summing up and last-minute token criticism
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Nose - Gogol (short story)
The Odyssey - Homer (Emily Wilson translation)
White Noise - Don DeLillo
 

Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, part 1: A legion of horribles

Hell aint half full. Hear me. Ye carry war of a madman's making onto a foreign land. Yell wake more than the dogs.
Rich is a big McCarthy head. For Benny and Cam, it's their first taste, and we're going straight to the top shelf: the 1985 epic historical novel Blood Meridian; or, The Evening Redness in the West.
In this discussion we cover the first half of the book (chapters 1-12) as a meditation on violence, manifest destiny, self-mythology, and McCarthy's own cunning plot to positioning himself within the literary canon.
At the centre of it all there is the judge: a towering, hairless enigma who might be a false god, or a devil... or something even worse.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) quick background
(00:06:07) introducing the Kid and the judge
00:12:46) why did Captain White’s expedition fail so badly?
(00:24:54) Comanche war party run-on sentence fever dream
(00:34:12) Sometime come the mother, sometime come the wolf
(00:42:00) the strangely egalitarian Glanton Gang
(00:56:13) Judge Holden piss-infused gunpowder volcano massacre
(01:15:19) Decoding the story of the harness-maker and the traveller
(01:28:01) Goodhart’s law in scalp-hunting bounties
(01:34:48) First impressions of McCarthy
(01:37:32) Listener mail: Knausgaard and autofiction rant revisited
WRITE US:
We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our bad takes, add your own, or just say hi.
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Odyssey - Homer (Emily Wilson translation)
 

DYEL Christmas party: The most beloved and hated books of 2024

A bit of festive fun looking back on the year that was.
Which books have stayed with us? Which were forgettable? What was the best reading/watching we did outside of book club? What did we learn about podcasting? Are we gonna keep posting this stuff in public?
and MORE
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) festive chit chat
(00:07:35) Revealing our favourite books of the year
00:34:13) Biggest STINKER of the year
(00:48:25) Our #1 (non-book club) book/essay/blog
(00:59:39) Favourite film or TV
(01:10:05) Navel-gazing on the book club meta and podcasting lessons learned
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy
The Odyssey - Homer (Emily Wilson translation)

The Moviegoer: In which we escape a deep existential malaise

A paradox: how can an author—say, Walker Percy—get the reader to care about a protagonist—say, Binx Bolling—who is stuck in a malaise and doesn't himself particularly care about anything?
A corollary: how can a book club have an engaging discussion when they don't particularly care about said book and said protagonist?
Honestly you might as well skip the first 10 minutes or so in which we half-assedly try to talk about the actual plot elements.
Luckily Cam saves the day with an impromptu lecture on Kierkegaard and we get to yapping about the meaning of life instead:
Is it patronising to claim that everyone is living in a state of despair?
Is self-gratification and individualism actually bad?
What are the main avenues for having a meaningful life?
How does society stigmatise or incentivise meaning-making activities?
Has the existentialist project more or less been a success?
Which of Popper's three worlds does 'meaning' fall into?
I can't be bothered doing chapter markers for this one so just take a leap of faith you cowards
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy
The Odyssey - Homer (Emily Wilson translation)

Banned books: Vladimir Nabokov's infamous Lolita

“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul... You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style.”
Nabokov had a lot of trouble getting anyone to publish a story about a grown man falling in love with a 12 year old. After multiple bans and scandals, Lolita caught fire in America, and is now considered perhaps his greatest work (altho you still cop some dodgy glances reading it on the train).
The great central tension is between Humbert Humbert the monster and HH the sensitive and sympathetic aesthete. How reliable is HH as a narrator? Is he deluding himself? Did he successfully hoodwink certain critics? Is he truly capable of love and redemption, or is everything staged for effect?
On the murder mystery: is HH really any better than his nemesis Clare Quilty? What's the significance of trying to kill one's shadow? Did we catch Quilty's lurking presence throughout these pages? Does he even exist at all?
What's the message of this story? On didactic vs aesthetic fiction, whether this book is meant to be moralising, Nabokov's instructions to the reader, and an overall vibe check on how we feel about his tricks after reading both Pale Fire and Lolita.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) life imitates art
(00:04:11) the two faces of Humbert Humbert
00:13:42) is HH an unreliable narrator?
(00:26:32) Trying to distinguish between love and lust
(00:36:50) Sympathy for the pedo
(00:40:32) the questionable reality of Clare Quilty
(01:04:49) Quilty vs HH
(01:08:45) Does Lolita have a moral? (death of the author redux)
(01:14:22) comparison to Pale Fire and Nabokov vibe check
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Moviegoer - Walker Percy

Karl Ove Knausgaard's My Struggle: Autofiction and autofellation

These days every bestselling author writes novels about how their dad was too strict and they got bullied for bringing stinky indian food to school etc.
But Karl Ove Knausgaard walked so millennial narcissists could run.
This week we get absorbed in part 1 of his epic six-part autobiographical novel My Struggle, published in 2009.
The big central question: what makes a book which spends five pages describing the author making a cup of coffee so good? The prose is nice but prosaic, there are few major insights, and no plot beats or narrative tension. But we (mostly) agree that it is in fact a good or even great book.On the performance art aspect to Knausgaard's project, the barriers to being truly sincere and honest, pathological self-awareness, why early memories are so often dominated by shame, nostalgia for premature ejaculation, and MORE.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro
(00:00:56) patient zero for the autofiction disease
00:11:40) My Struggle as performance art
(00:20:20) Shame and pathological self-consciousness
(00:30:38) what is it exactly that makes Knausgaard so good?
(00:40:12) next book announcement
WRITE US:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Lolita - Nabokov
The Moviegoer - Walker Percy

Ted Chiang's Understand: Intelligence explosions and AI doom

Yeah, it's big brain time. This week we're reading 'Understand' from Ted Chiang's 2002 collection Stories of Your Life and Others.
what is the ceiling on human intelligence? can we jooce it up? did Chiang inspire the whole AI doomer movement? would superintelligence beings have to annihilate each other instead of cooperating? Do we buy the orthogonality thesis?
Also: introducing David Deutsch's 'universal explainer' theory of intelligence, which gives radically different answers to all of the above. Is the dumbest guy you know really capable of making novel advances in quantum physics? The answer may surprise you.
On abstractions and 'chunking': how important is working memory? Should we expect our high-level explanations to converge on a theory of everything? Would super-smart people really communicate in short series of grunts? Could they hack their own autonomic nervous systems or incept a linguistic killshot?
tl;dr: gestalt gestalt gestalt gestalt gestalt gestalt. gestalt gestalt? gestalt gestalt, gestalt.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro and synopsis
(00:05:13) Can you jooce up human intelligence
00:14:53) How would super-smart people communicate?
(00:22:01) ’chunking’ abstractions towards a theory of everything
(00:39:23) behavioral priming gone WILD (Greco vs Reynolds grunt battle)
(00:51:23) why can’t we all just get along??
(00:55:40) reconciling David Deutsch’s ’universal explainer’ theory with IQ
(01:16:42) unresolved AI safety concerns
 
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
My Struggle, volume 1 - Karl Ove Knausgaard
Lolita - Nabokov
The Moviegoer - Walker Percy
 
 

Chekhov urself before u wreck-ov urself (The Little Trilogy)

This week we're reading three of Anton Chekhov's most beloved short stories: The Man in the Case, Gooseberries, and About Love (The Little Trilogy, 1898).
We get a minor assist from George Saunders and his fantastic book A Swim in the Pond in the Rain but have no shortage of stuff to discuss.
Talking big 5 personality traits, the degree to which people oppress themselves, why Rich fell out of love with the early retirement movement, whether it's OK to be happy in a world full of suffering, and if having to settle in romantic relationships is antithetical to true love. Also: Cam takes a controversial and brave stance against home-wreckers.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro
(00:01:54) ’The Man in the Case’ synopsis
00:07:12) Are some personality types just better than others?
(00:12:52) Belyakov fumbles the bag with Varenka
(00:24:07) Is everybody trapped in a case of their own making
(00:34:58) Mavra and the tranquil village
(00:40:15) Gooseberries synopsis
(00:42:30) The pitfalls of the ’early retirement’ movement
(00:52:55) theorising on happiness
(01:01:57) Ivan the big fat hypocrite
(01:07:23) ’About Love’ synopsis
(01:11:44) Did Alyohin make the right decision?
(01:22:10) Can love by analysed rationally
(01:33:49) our favourite story of the trilogy
(01:37:59) accessibility of chekhov
 
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS:
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
My Struggle, volume 1 - Karl Ove Knausgaard

Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms: War and love

Hemingway's 1929 semi-autobiographical classic tackles two big timeless themes: love and war.
Two out of three of us can relate to the first one, but war feels pretty alien to us. How would the boys do if they were conscripted? What made WWI so uniquely dispiriting? What is it about this novel that so faithfully captures the experience of war?
We also talk quite a bit about Hemingway's laconic characters and terse writing style. How representative is this of his broader work? What do we think of the 'iceberg method'? Why did he go with the most depressing possible ending?
and MORE
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) first reactions and synopsis
(00:06:02) Hemingway’s understated style and the ’Iceberg method’
(00:19:10) What made WWI a uniquely dispiriting war?
(00:28:35) Catherine and Henry are the same person
(00:38:44) downer ending
(00:46:45) A catalogue of arbitrary and meaningless death
(00:57:34) Final thoughts and next book
 
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS:
We wanna start reading listener feedback out on the pod, so send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our bad takes or share your own. 
 
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
My Struggle, volume 1 - Karl Ove Knausgaard

Crime and Punishment finale: is Dostoevsky...overrated??

Not too much plot to cover in parts 5 and 6; mostly we're hashing out our final thoughts on the book and Dostoevsky's legacy.
First up is the controversial epilogue. The boys are not sure how believable Rodya's redemption is. It feels kinda cheap? Dostoevsky is not very good at character development but maybe it doesn't matter. Sonya is a perfectly implausible character who exists only as a sort of a prop for Rodya. How on earth does Dosto have a reputation for writing realistic characters? Again, it prob doesn't matter.
Svidrigailov sneaks up on us as perhaps the most interesting (or at least the most underrated) character in the book. We talk about the three incredible scenes that bring his journey to an end: kidnapping Donya, the feverish hotel dream, and the dramatic exit.
Finally quite a bit of discussion about whether Dostoevsky is actually any good as a thinker. Rich is not sold: the critique of utilitarianism is unfair, blind deference to tradition leaves no room for progress, and God has been pretty neatly replaced by secular humanism. Benny pushes back and adds some nuance to the problem Dosto was trying to describe, and Cam talks about how he still feels the tension between nihilism and common-sense morality.
Don't miss the surprise guest appearance from Cam's manager. Is this the week he gets busted? will he live to skive off another day?? Tune in now to find out.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intriguing and important discussion on different translations (do NOT skip)
(00:13:15) Epilogue: Raskolnikov speedruns character development
(00:36:03) Sonya character analysis
(00:42:21) how realistic are dostoevsky’s characters?
(00:49:24) Svidrigailov meets his twisted end
(01:06:46) Are dostoevsky’s philosophical ideas actually any good
(01:17:26) Commonsense morality, nihilism and metaethics
 
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS:
We wanna start reading listener feedback out on the pod, so send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our bad takes or share your own. 
 
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Candide — Voltaire
A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway

Crime and Punishment, part 2: Three extraordinary men

we're just normal men. We're just innocent men!
In parts 3 and 4 of Fyodor Dostoevsky's 1866 Crime and Punishment we get a lot more meat on Raskolnikov's 'extraordinary man' thesis.
How does it overlap with the concept of the Übermensch in Nietzsche and Hegel? Are we too deeply steeped in Christian morality to become 'extraordinary' without destroying ourselves?
We reconsider Raskolnikov, Svidrigailov, and Luzhin through this lens.
Plus: cam's obligatory sibling inc*st fantasies, rich tries to give dostoyevsky writing advice, etc
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) hangry
(00:02:00) the Extraordinary Man thesis
(00:06:28) Nietzsche, hegel and the RETVRN to bronze age morality
(00:13:35) Can you be an extraordinary man without breaking yourself?
(00:23:05) Svidrigailov introduction
(00:29:45) What would you do if your best friend killed someone
(00:34:32) lil dick Luzhin
(00:44:30) Lazarus story (the ultimate flipperoo)
(00:49:00) Porfiry’s police procedural: pragmatic pressure or pure punishment?
(00:59:32) could this be a shorter book
(01:05:33) Listener mail: revisiting Hamlet’s soliloquy
 
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS:
We wanna start reading listener feedback out on the pod, so send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our bad takes or share your own. 
 
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Crime and Punishment - parts 5 and 6
Candide — Voltaire
A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway
 

Crime and Punishment, part 1: Mister Schizo and the First Trad

Cracking into the first two parts of Dostoevsky's 1866 classic Crime and Punishment.
The first surprising thing is that this is a conservative/reactionary book: it mocks the fancy new ideas of the youth, the spirit of revolution, naive utilitarianism, etc. Jordan Peterson laps this shit up. But did the moral panic over materialism hold up? Does modern society in any way compare with the turmoil of Dostoevsky's Russia, or are we at the end of history? How relevant are Dostoevsky's concerns today?
We argue quite a bit about that but we're more aligned on the brilliance of Dostoevsky as psychologist, and especially the character of Rodya 'mister schiz' Raskolnikov: what causes his mind to fracture so spectacularly? What motivates him to do the deed? why does Rich kinda relate to him? 
plus a masterclass on freestyle rap. and much more
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) opening rap
(00:04:23) history class with professor chugg
(00:12:13) Part 1 summary and reactions
(00:23:25) what motivates Rodya ’ mister schizo’  Raskolnikov?
(00:28:50) Dosto subtweets bentham and SBF
(00:40:46) Part 2 summary
(00:52:00) Parallels between Raskolnikov and Marmeladov
(00:56:08) Rodya’s amorality
(01:05:02) Arguing whether we live in tumultuous times comparable to Dosto’s era
(01:14:05) Moral panic over materialism
(01:21:45) Rodya’s altruism
 
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Crime and Punishment - parts 3 and 4, then parts 5 and 6
Candide, by Voltaire
 

Susanna Clarke's Piranesi: Gaslight gatekeep girlboss

The beauty of this book is immeasurable, and its kindness is infinite.
We all love Susanna Clarke's 2012 metaphysical thriller, which feels like a mashup of Borges/C.S. Lewis/Gone Girl. 
Venture deeper into the labyrinth with us:
Piranesi as amateur scientist: On indigenous knowledge, the dangers of naïve empiricism, achieving dominion over nature, and whether the Other kind of had a point.
Metaphysics of the House: Are abstractions real, revisiting Plato's world of perfect forms, and whether the world is fundamentally Good.
Identity and mental illness: The illusion of stable personhood over time, repressed memories as trauma response, and how a person with dementia or psychosis can maintain a consistent internal worldview.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) meet the Beloved Child of the House
(00:09:55) Piranesi as amateur scientist
(00:19:48) metaphysics of the House and Plato’s theory of forms
(00:38:13) C.S. Lewis allusions
(00:41:21) The BIG REVEAL (spoilers)
(00:46:30) The illusion of stable personhood
(00:55:02) Internal consistency of dementia or psychosis patients
(01:02:30) Piranesi’s escape and reintegration
(01:09:11) Is the world (or the House) fundamentally Good?
 
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We wanna start reading listener feedback out on the pod, so send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our bad takes or share your own. 
 
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky (reading in three parts over six weeks)

The Tragedy of Hamlet: The O.G. annoying theatre kid

holy shit this was hard. Our first attempt at shakespeare and it was a doozy!
Rich struggled through the original text and only had the vaguest idea what was going on. Cam watched every single movie adaptation and studied for two weeks but still got casually mogged by his girlfriend.
By the time we got done with the discussion we were all actually hyped to read more shakespeare so something must have gone right.
Covering such topics as:
The impenetrability of Shakespearean english, whether it's better to read modern translations or the original text, our favourite lines and soliloquies, shitting on the Freudian reading, connections to David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, and Hamlet as the archetypal annoying theatre kid.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro
(00:03:53) ye olde Shakesperean english vs modern translations
(00:14:52) Cam’s film corner segment
(00:18:07) Hamlet’s pathological indecisiveness
(00:23:27) To be, or not to be?
(00:25:34) shitting on the Freudian/oedipal reading
(00:32:12) Ophelia and Gertrude’s motivations
(00:34:06) protestant heaven loophole
(00:42:15) favourite lines and famous quotes
(00:45:05) Influence on DFW and other theatre kids
(00:48:12) There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so
(00:51:44) we rescue the freudian/oedipal reading!
(00:53:08) what does the clusterfuck of an ending signify
(00:58:07) will we engage with W. Shakespeare again in future
(01:03:37) Terrence Howard penis size analysis
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THE ADDRESS I SAID IN THE RECORDING IS WRONG! it has since been changed to douevenlit@gmail.com
 
NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Piranesi - Susanna Clarke
Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky

Albert Camus' The Fall: Signalling, scrupulosity, and pathological self-awareness

This one starts slow but it ends up being one of my favourite book clubs ever.
Camus' last finished novel was The Fall (1956). It has a lot of personal resonance for Rich and the other boys loved it too.
Loss of innocence: how much of our behaviour comes down to signalling? Is there such a thing as genuine altruism? Is it dangerous to learn about this stuff? Was David Foster Wallace's 'new sincerity' idea doomed from the outset?
Escaping the double bind: Choosing which status games to play, finding solace in sports and other explicit games, why hedonism doesn't work, moving awareness away from the self and towards others, dissolving the problem of a meaningless universe.
Performative castigation: Is Jean-Baptiste's judge-penitent stance actually coherent? The pitfalls of woke ideology, recursive traps of judging people, and why virtue signalling is good, actually.
Religious interpretations: The biblical fall, Jean-Baptiste as antichrist, the death of God, and organised religion as laundering scheme.
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) worst opening segue competition
(00:03:25) Is the pre-fall Jean-Baptiste a virtuous person?
(00:07:22) Some personal reflections
00:17:10) Signalling theory and loss of innocence
(00:30:19) How to cope with a bottomless pit of suffering
(00:37:17) David Foster Wallace and the curse of pathological self-awareness
(00:51:41) Judging the judge-penitent: has Jean-Baptiste really solved his problem?
(01:02:48) Pro and anti-religious interpretations
(01:14:24) Free will and (dis)continuity of personal identity
(01:26:50) Strategies for escaping from the spiral of self-awareness
(01:32:20) Is the idea of a meaningless universe a reductionist mistake?
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Hamlet - Shakespeare
Piranesi - Susanna Clarke
Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky
 

Philip K. Dick's paranoid classic Ubik: Fluttering at the windowpane of reality

Philip K. Dick is a sci-fi legend, but the boys have only ever seen the film adaptations of his work (Blade Runner, Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly).
Dick's 1969 classic Ubik has us divided. Benny is mad that major premises are introduced and then abandoned, internal logic is sloppy, and the twist ending is lazy writing. Rich and Cam are charmed by the imperfections and think it heightens the sense of (un)reality. 
Is Ubik a metaphor for God? What are the parallels to Gnosticism, and who is the demiurge behind the false reality of half-life? Do people who experience psychotic breaks even know that it's happening? What does Plato have to do with all of this?
“He felt all at once like an ineffectual moth, fluttering at the windowpane of reality, dimly seeing it from outside.”
 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) intro to the world of Ubik
(00:08:35) critique of PKD’s worldbuilding
(00:20:10) Cold storage and half-life suspended animation
00:25:00) Why is everything decaying? entropy and platonic essences
(00:34:43) Joe Chip’s search for Ubik + the battle between Jory and Ella
(00:43:10) Christian parallels and PKD’s gnostic epiphany
(00:58:35) Arguing whether the twist ending is lazy writing
(01:06:28) Is PKD under or overrated?
(01:09:54) Psychosis, psychedelics, and paranoia
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
The Fall - Camus
Hamlet - Shakespeare
Piranesi - Susanna Clarke

Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis: A Bug's Life

“As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into an enormous insect.”
(who amongst us, etc)
This week we're talking Kafka's 1915 novella The Metamorphosis.
Rich swoons over Gregor and is deeply moved by his plight. Cam wonders whether the giant freaky bug might bear some responsibility for events. Benny starts out sorta lukewarm on the whole thing but comes around in the end.
Is this story meant to be a depiction of depression? An autobiographical work about an artist becoming alienated from his philistine family? A Marxist commentary on capitalism? A subconscious Freudian incest thriller? 
We fearlessly explore all of these interpretations... and if you can believe it, even more
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) reinterpreting kafka thru the lens of richard dawkins tweets
(00:01:50) what kinda filthy vermin are we dealing with here??
(00:06:57) arguing about what Gregor’s initial reaction means
00:15:44) part two synopsis: I didn't choose the bug life
(00:19:17) Cam’s incest theory: who is the real parasite?
(00:25:15) Metamorphosis as kafka's autobiographical self-therapy
(00:36:30) Alienation and depression
(00:44:12) genuinely upset about Gregor’s plight
(00:50:48) Is kafka meant to be funny?
(00:54:23) Refreshing subversion of realism
(01:01:29) closing thoughts
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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:
Ubik - Philip K DickThe Fall - CamusHamlet - Shakespeare

Frankenstein, part 2: Nature vs nurture

Wrapping up Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which we all loved.
Nature vs nurture: the monster as proto-incel, to what extent do we feel sympathy for him, should Victor have made him a bride, self-loathing and recrimination, and whether hot people are actually more virtuous than ugly people.
Also: why rousseau was a giant piece of shit, the monster as Byronic hero, importance of pariahs and moral entrepreneurs, pitbull discourse, etc
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) just grave robber problems
(00:05:20) peephole language learning montage
(00:09:00) Nature vs nurture debate
00:17:00) Cam’s crank theory that hot people are more virtuous
(00:24:11) Frankenstein as the original incel
(00:28:40) pitbull digression
(00:33:31) Ethics of making frank a bride and letting him go
(00:42:20) The monster as the true Byronic hero
(00:52:50) Sympathy for the devil
(00:59:02) Romantic heroes as moral entrepreneurs
Send us mail: doyouevenlitbro@gmail.com
COMING UP
The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka
Ubik - Philip K Dick
The Fall - Camus

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, part 1: Post-nut clarity and forbidden knowledge

Discussing chapters 1-10 of Mary Shelley's 1818 genre mash-up Frankenstein.
On Mary Shelley's stacked genetics, the 'scenius' with Lord Byron and Percy Shelley, questions over authorship including a suspiciously accurate depiction of post-nut clarity.
Forbidden knowledge: are infohazards real, taking accountability for new technology, guilt and the disgust instinct, strong parallels with AGI, arguments for and against creating new species. Can we defend a parochial concern for our own family/friends/species?
Is the monster innately evil? Or a product of his environment?
We love this book. hyped to hear the monster's side of the story in part 2.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) pop culture Frankenstein and namespace collision
(00:04:55) synopsis
(00:07:56) Initial reactions
00:11:20) Suspiciously accurate depiction of post-nut clarity
(00:13:38) Mary Shelley’s elite genetics
(00:16:54) Forbidden knowledge and infohazards
(00:26:08) Victor as deadbeat dad
(00:31:15) AGI comparison: how do we feel about creating a new species?
(00:38:00) The burden of guilt (the bumblebee incident)
(00:41:27) Nature vs nurture and rebelling against god
(00:45:08) Back to the question of AGI and creating new species
(00:55:35) Parochialism and expanding moral circles
(01:03:45) Cultural legacy of this book
(01:08:43) should Zuckerberg and friends try to model consequences of AI?
Send us mail: doyouevenlitbro@gmail.com
COMING UP
The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka
Ubik - Philip K Dick
The Fall - Camus
 

Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot: The One TRUE Interpretation

Wandering through Samuel Beckett's 1953 absurdist play Waiting for Godot.
Did Beckett actually have an interpretation in mind, or did he deliberately write a maximally vague story that everyone could map their own interests onto?
How well does the humour hold up over time? Where does Beckett rank in the canon of absurdist and existentialist writers? What proportion of reported suicides are actually autoerotic asphyxiation accidents? etc 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) gooning oneself to death
(00:05:28) synopsis (nothing happens, twice)
(00:07:32) Initial reactions + arguing about interpretation
00:17:16) What are we waiting for?
(00:22:09) Religious, Freudian, Marxist interpretations
(00:26:56) tHaT’s sOOO RANdoM!!
(00:31:00) Beckett’s fame
(00:35:01) Beckett vs Camus
(00:38:02) The One True Interpretation

The Razor's Edge, part 3: Climbing off the wheel of suffering

Our final session with W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge (chapters 5-7).
Elliot Templeton as the last relic of a dying age. Was he really happy? We consider his self-worship and clout-chasing Catholicism as a counterpoint to Larry's spirituality. Rest in power queen.
Sophie MacDonald attempts to climb off the wheel of suffering via more prosaic means. Did she get what she wanted? An argument over whether Isabel is a total psycho or only a minor-league bitch. 
Larry's spiritual journey as a synthesis of the best parts of the Eastern tradition. Was this whole book just a delivery mechanism for Vedic philosophy? On the transmigration of souls, God as a deadbeat dad, and whether it's bad for society to encourage serenity-maxxing.
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) tattoo discourse
(00:02:18) The sad (?) saga of Elliott Templeton
(00:16:31) The sad saga of Sophie MacDonald
(00:29:25) Is this whole book just a delivery vehicle for vedic philosophy?
(00:36:18) Larry’s struggle with the problem of evil
(00:42:11) Oneness and universality of transcendent experience
(00:47:03) Buddhism as a mind-killing philosophy
(00:52:22) The boys experience with meditating

The Razor's Edge, part 2: Lay your hands on me Larry

Discussing chapters 4 and 5 of W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge.
Larry becomes aloof and reserved. Is he really bringing anything to the table besides his sexy forearms? Has he gone full woo-woo granola cruncher? Why can Kosti only talk about spirituality when he's drunk? Why aren't muses a thing these days?
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) Synopsis
(00:02:23) What do we think of Larry now?
(00:13:54) Curing Gray’s headache
(00:16:50) Christian mysticism as thinly veiled Buddhism
(00:20:05) What does Kosti’s character represent?
(00:28:30) Why we can take Larry more seriously than typical hippie
(00:33:10) This book would hit way harder at age 18 or 20
(00:41:28) What happened to muses? (these old service sector jobs)

W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge, part 1: Nobody loafs like Larry

Cracking into the first three chapters of Maugham's 1944 spiritual odyssey.
Why do we love Larry so much? Rich talks about his own years of loafing around. Is Larry's decision to take a step off the beaten path less admirable given his 'trifling' $54,000 inflation-adjusted stipend?
Talking about the spergy drive to collect All the Knowledge, and how to think about which problems to work on. Is the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake a noble activity, or should we actually be building stuff in the world? 
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) Synopsis
(00:02:18) Everyone loves Larry
(00:06:26) The perils of stepping off the beaten path
(00:09:30) Larry the trust fund kid
(00:12:34) Pursuit of knowledge vs building stuff
(00:20:00) How to choose which problems to work on?
(00:26:00) Larry as mythic Siddhartha figure
(00:28:00) Sex as a brief respite from 10 hours of reading
(00:33:04) Maugham’s style and Herman Hesse comparison
(00:37:01) Predictions for how Larry’s journey plays out

Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, part 3: Was David Foster Wallace a hideous man?

Starts with light and breezy over-sharing of our masturbatory habits, ends with a downer discussion about how we should re-contextualise Wallace's work thru the lens of the abuse allegations against him.
The main stories we talk about:
Brief Interview #59: Logically coherent masturbation fantasies (00:01:34) is this a universal experience, why are adolescent boys so creepy, the rare 'gooner to godhood' pathway.
Brief Interview #28 (00:10:20) Does feminism create a double bind for modern women, was the sexual revolution a mistake, what's with the neo-trad movement, why everyone should have the freedom to make mistakes and explore their preferences.
On His Deathbed, Holding Your Hand... (00:30:02) a paean to r/childfree? do parents sometimes secretly hate their children, why small kids are sociopaths, was the father an unreliable narrator, 'radical honesty' is a terrible idea, are lies of omission morally permissible, rich's experience of fatherhood.
Church Not Made With Hands (00:52:42) dreamlike disorientation, modernist subjectivism redux, what does the title mean, ego and pride as an obstacle to healing.
The Mary Karr abuse allegations (01:10:38) what are the allegations against DFW, can mental health ever absolve people of responsibility, a framework for separating art from artist, should we reanalyse DFW’s work in light of what we know about his life, to what extent is he telling on himself in this book.
Brief Interview #20 and #46: The Granola Cruncher and the Viktor Frankl guy (01:27:25) are harm and traumatic events 'good' if they lead to more meaningful lives, could you weaponise this argument to justify anything, epic levels of cope never before conceived of.