The TLS Podcast

Latest Episodes:

WW1: Remembering / forgetting Nov 08, 2018

Show notes

To mark the centenary of the end of the First World War, the TLS's History editor David Horspool talks us through books, exhibitions and events that commemorate cataclysmic slaughter and scars that endure to this day; it’s easy to think of privacy invasion as a peculiarly modern phenomenon, but it has its own history dating back to the American Civil War – Sarah Igo tells us more; finally, the food writer Bee Wilson discusses two new cookbooks that capture a “fresh mood of experiment in the kitchen”

Works discussed

Pandora’s Box: A history of the First World War, by Jörn Leonhard (translated by Patrick Camiller)

Robert Graves: From Great War poet to ‘Good-Bye to All That’, 1895–1929 by Jean Moorcroft Wilson

Making a New World (across the Imperial War Museum, London, and the Imperial War Museum North)

Plus reviews and original pieces published in the TLS, including “What did Tommy read: The complex mental worlds of soldiers on the Western Front” by Bill Bell – go to the-TLS.co.uk for details

Sight Smell Touch Taste Sound: A new way to cook by Sybil Kapoor

Lateral Cooking by Niki Segnit

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Remembering Peterloo Nov 01, 2018

Show notes

As Mike Leigh's film of the Peterloo massacre of 1819 is released, Clare Pettitt revisits the history; Marina Benjamin offers a personal and literary account of the threshold between sleep and wakefulness; following the publication of a second volume of Sylvia Plath's letters, Hannah Sullivan looks for fresh insights into the poet's work, life and death; finally, Sam Riviere reads his new poem, "Sushi Tuesday"

Works discussed

Peterloo, directed by Mike Leigh

Insomnia by Marina Benjamin

The Letters of Sylvia Plath Volume I (1940-1956) and Volume II (1956-1963), edited by Peter K. Steinberg and Karen V. Kukil

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BONUS: Must read – must buy? Oct 24, 2018

Show notes

Are authors, reviewers and publicists wasting their time on book coverage? The contemporary conversation about books and ideas goes way beyond traditional features and interviews. Book groups, academic seminars, Amazon user reviews, Goodreads, the press, radio, podcasts, and sometimes even TV: the form, tone and quality of coverage has infinite variety. But how much does any of it help the books business – if it can be measured at all? Do authors, reviewers, and publicists feel their efforts are worthwhile? Michael Caines, an editor at the TLS, chairs an eclectic panel for a crucial conversation about the conversation around books. (This a live recording of an event, in collaboration with BookMachine, which took place on October 3, 2018, at the Driver, Kings Cross, London)

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1844, remember the date... Oct 24, 2018

Show notes

Elaine Showalter on a history of obscenity and censorship and the largely futile efforts of a US Postal Inspector; Ladee Hubbard on five years of Black Lives Matter and the myth of an egalitarian, post-racial America; Kassia St Clair on women, weaving and the rewriting of history

Books

Lust on Trial: Censorship and the rise of obscenity in the age of Anthony Comstock by Amy Werbel

The Fire This Time: A new generation speaks about race, edited by Jesmyn Ward

My Brother Moochie: Regaining dignity in the face of crime, poverty and racism in the American South by Isaac J. Bailey

The Golden Thread: How fabric changed history by Kassia St Clair

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Ever-enigmatic Leonardo da Vinci Oct 17, 2018

Show notes

Keith Miller joins us to discuss everybody's favourite Renaissance man; the TLS's Fiction editor Toby Lichtig meets Anna Burns, the winner of the 2018 Man Booker Prize for her novel Milkman; this year's Nobel Prize for Literature, meanwhile, remains suspended following charges of serious sexual misconduct and cronyism – Richard Orange reports on the mess that has engulfed the Swedish Academy

Books

Living with Leonardo: Fifty years of sanity and insanity in the art world and beyond by Martin Kemp

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An Odyssey for everyone Oct 10, 2018

Show notes

Mary Beard reflects on the peculiarities of Homer's best-loved, many-sided epic; Neel Mukherjee on the scandalous survival of the Indian caste system; following the recent party conferences, James O'Brien offers a wry overview of Britain's political mess

Books:

The Measure of Homer: The ancient reception of the Iliad and the Odyssey by Richard Hunter

Ants Among Elephants: An untouchable family and the making of modern India by Sujatha Gidla

How To Be Right ... in a World Gone Wrong by James O'Brien

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Radical Cheltenham and a poem from Paul Muldoon Oct 03, 2018

Show notes

Michael Caines joins us to discuss female liberation in genteel Cheltenham; we look ahead to an Odyssey extravaganza, with Ted Hodgkinson from the Southbank centre; Paul Muldoon brings a salutary note of optimism to US politics and history with his new poem "With Joseph Brant in Canajoharie"

Books

Votes for Women: Cheltenham and the Cotswolds by Sue Jones

The Odyssey translated by Emily Wilson

Selected Poems 1968-2014 by Paul Muldoon

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Diarmaid MacCulloch on Thomas Cromwell Sep 26, 2018

Show notes

In this bonus episode, the TLS's History editor David Horspool discusses Thomas Cromwell with Diarmaid MacCulloch, the author of a new, definitive biography.

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Mexico's great disgrace Sep 26, 2018

Show notes

Lorna Scott Fox joins us to discuss the fiftieth anniversary of Mexico's Tlatelolco of 1968, a travesty still shrouded in obfuscation; the TLS's History editor David Horspool discusses Thomas Cromwell with Diarmaid MacCulloch, the author of a new, definitive biography; and finally, Rozalind Dineen offers a round-up of interesting new podcasts

Books and podcasts discussed

México 68: The students, the President and the CIA by Sergio Aguayo

Thomas Cromwell: A Life by Diarmaid MacCulloch

The Teachers Pet (The Australian)

West Cork (Audible)

The Ratline (BBC)

In Our Time (BBC Radio 4)

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Henry James in LA Sep 19, 2018

Show notes

Philip Horne and Frances Wilson join us to discuss Henry James, the not-always masterly Master who gave us novels as apparently divergent as Washington Square, with its clear, tight prose, The Ambassadors (prone to accidents of publication) and The Golden Bowl, which spills pleasures of an altogether more sinuous nature; plus, details of a little-known trip James took to California, which – unexpectedly, perhaps –“completely bowled” him over

Books

Generous Mistakes: Incidents of error in Henry James by Michael Anesko

The Cambridge Edition of the Complete Fiction of Henry James: The Ambassadors; Edited by Nicola Bradbury. The Portrait of a Lady; Edited by Michael Anesko. The Jolly Corner and Other Tales, 1903–1910; Edited by N. H. Reeve (Michael Anesko, Tamara L. Follini, Philip Horne and Adrian Poole, general editors)

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