Stay ConnectedIn The Back of the Book, host Christopher J. Scalia interviews writers, scholars, and other expert guests about culture and the arts.
Listen to The Back of the Book, along with more than 40 other original podcasts, at Ricochet.com. No paid subscription required.
Copyright: © Ricochet
Megan Gafford joins Chris to discuss some of her recent writing about the fate of architecture in the 20th century. Art Deco was a beautiful, ornamental style that thrived in the United States in the 1920s and ‘30s. What happened to it—why did modernism displace it and what did we lose in the process? Plus, why do manifestos and fanaticism spoil art? Megan and Chris also discuss the architectural writings of Tom Wolfe, the new film The Brutalist, and why beauty matters in even the bleakest times.
Show Notes:
· Megan’s Substack, Fashionably Late Takes—don’t miss “‘America Was Supposed to be Art Deco’: When America abandoned beauty.”
· Tom Wolfe, “The Building That Isn’t There” Part 1 & Part 2 (New York Times)
· Follow Megan on TwitterX: @megan_gafford This episode is brought to you by the Gaza Largo Club—the Crown Jewel of Palestine!
Opening and closing music: Brendan Benson, “Spit It Out,” used with permission from the artist.
Novelist Aaron Gwyn joins the show to discuss the fiction of Cormac McCarthy. Why is McCarthy’s Blood Meridian a great American novel? What does Gwyn make of recent revelations about McCarthy’s personal life? Plus, Gwyn reads from and discusses his compelling new novella, The Cannibal Owl. What is the history, and what are the Comanche traditions, behind the work? Gwyn, who teaches creative writing and contemporary literature at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, also discusses how students have changed over the past twenty years, the most important advice he gives young writers, and his favorite Van Halen album.
This episode is brought to you by the Gaza Largo Club—the Crown Jewel of Palestine!
Show Notes:
· “What Is the Best Work of American Fiction of the Last 25 Years?” (New York Times)
· Aaron Gwyn’s course lectures on McCarthy’s Blood Meridian
· Harold Bloom talks to Brian Lamb about Blood Meridian (C-SPAN)
· B.R. Myers on Cormac McCarthy’s “andelopes”
· “Cormac McCarthy’s Secret Muse Breaks Her Silence After Half a Century: ‘I Loved Him. He Was My Safety.’” (Vanity Fair)
· Aaron Gwyn’s novella, The Cannibal Owl (Belle Point Press)
· Method & Madness Podcast with Aaron Gwyn and Brad Kelly
· Follow Aaron on TwitterX: @AmericanGwyn
Opening and closing music: Brendan Benson, “Spit It Out,” used with permission from the artist.
Author Ward Farnsworth joins Chris to discuss his Classical English series, as well as his books on Stoicism and the Socratic Method. What—and how—can we learn from the style, rhetoric, and argument of great writers from the long 19th century? How are the ancient Stoics comparable to modern cognitive psychologists? And how can the Socratic method be an antidote for stupidity? Plus, Chris explains his father’s theory of the Shakespeare Principle.
Ward Farnsworth is professor and W. Page Keeton Chair at the University of Texas Law School. He’s the author the Farnsworth Classical English series, which comprises Farnsworth’s Classical Rhetoric, Classical English Metaphor, Classical English Style, and most recently, Classical English Argument. He is also the author of The Socratic Method and The Practicing Stoic.
Show Notes:
Ward’s author page on Amazon.
Chris’s review of Ward’s most recent book, Classical English Argument.
Special thanks to our sponsor, Eckleburg Optometry: from West Egg to West Hollywood, the giant eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg keep their vigil.
Opening and closing music: Brendan Benson, “Spit It Out,” used with permission from the artist.
Chris’s guest is the poet and fiction writer Sally Thomas, who shares a few of her poems and discusses some of her stories. Sally and Chris also talk about her development as a writer, why she enjoys writing formal poetry, and what she does when her short-story characters won’t leave her alone.
Sally is the author of The Blackbird and Other Stories (Wiseblood, 2024) and the forthcoming poetry collection Among the Living (Able Muse Press, TBA). She also co-edits the Poems Ancient and Modern Substack and co-edited Christian Poetry in America Since 1940 (Paraclete Press, 2022).
Show Notes
Here are the poems Sally read during the conversation:
Chris talks to philosophy professor and competitive trail, road, and ultramarathon runner Sabrina B. Little about virtue ethics, athletics, and her book The Examined Run: Why Good People Make Better Runners. How can distance running—and sports in general—form us into virtuous people? Conversely, what vices can they shape? What does it mean to live the good life? And what’s so bad about “no pain, no gain,” anyway? Thanks to Pre-Pro Guardians for sponsoring this episode.
· Sabrina’s book, The Examined Run: Why Good People Make Better Runners
· That awful Nike ad.
· Chris’s recent essay about how the classical virtue of prudence plays out in a classic novel, Walter Scott’s Redgauntlet.
Opening and closing music: Brendan Benson, “Spit It Out,” used with permission from the artist.
Chris speaks to Keith O’Brien about the life and legacy of Pete Rose. O’Brien is the author of Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball (Pantheon, 2024). Keith interviewed Rose for his remarkable book and has insights about the legend you won’t hear from anyone else. At the top of the episode, Chris shares his memories of Pete Rose, who died on September 30. Then Keith joins to tell us about how Rose, um, rose to fame, what he accomplished on the field, how he descended into the gambling addiction that ruined him. And of course, Keith and Chris discuss that perennial question: does Rose belong in the Hall of Fame? (Chris shared his opinion in the Wall Street Journal.)
Thanks to this episode’s sponsor: The all-new BrokeBros gambling gaming app, the latest way to make baseball more exciting! With BrokeBros, you’re never far away from making a reckless financial decision!
Opening and closing music: Brendan Benson, “Spit It Out,” used with permission from the artist.
The sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live is about to embark on its 50th season. How has the show lasted so long? How has it reflected and shaped our culture? Who are its best cast members, what are its funniest sketches, and who or what’s been over- or underrated? Find out during Chris’s conversation with Scot Bertram and Christian Schneider, the co-hosts of “Wasn’t That Special: 50 Years of Saturday Night Live,” a podcast dedicated to the show’s history.
Show notes:
Saturday Night Live, “More Cowbell”
Chris Farley as Matt Foley (which Chris should have told Scot is a close challenger to “more cowbell.”)
Christian Schneider, “Saturday Night Live Will Tell You the Future” (National Review)
Wasn’t That Special’s interview with former SNL cast member Victoria Jackson
Opening and closing music: “Spit It Out” by Brendan Benson, used with permission from the artist.
Father Damian Ference, a Catholic priest of the Diocese of Cleveland, joins Chris to discuss his new book, Understanding the Hillbilly Thomist: The Philosophical Foundations of Flannery O’Connor’s Narrative Art.
What did the great American novelist and short-story writer mean when she called herself a “hillbilly Thomist”—how did the thirteenth-century Catholic philosopher shape her art?
Father Damian and Chris also discuss a compelling new movie about Flannery O’Connor, as well as a recent letter from Pope Francis about the moral value of reading literature.
Understanding the Hillbilly Thomist | Fr. Damian Ference | Word on Fire
Flannery for the Faithful and the Unfamiliar | Chris Scalia | Washington Free Beacon
Capturing a Misfit: A Review of “Wildcat” | Fr. Damian Ference | Word on Fire
The Presence of Grace and Other Book Reviews by Flannery O'Connor | University of Georgia Press
Letter of His Holiness Pope Francis on the Role of Literature in Formation
Pope Francis's Apologia for Literature | Chris Scalia | National Review Online
Opening and closing music: “Spit It Out” by Brendan Benson, used with permission from the artist.
Chris talks to AEI Senior Fellow and Commentary columnist Christine Rosen about her new book, The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World.
How have new technologies shaped our interactions with each other and the physical world? Have they changed our understanding of what it means to be human? Plus, Christine talks about her favorite science fiction.
Links
Keats: “Ode on Indolence”
Drew Gilpin Faust: “Gen Z Never Learned to Read Cursive” (The Atlantic)
Commentary podcast: “Our Favorite Science Fiction”
Ray Bradbury’s fiction (Library of America)
Sunny on Apple TV+
Thanks to our sponsors: X-Caps xtosterone supplements and SeeChange from Circle Tech.Opening and closing music: “Spit It Out” by Brendan Benson, used with permission from the artist.
Our TOPPODCAST Picks 
