There are works of weird fiction that dispense their strangeness so subtly that many readers never pick up on it, books that allow themselves to be pass for mundane, the better to haunt us after we put them down. Donna Tartt's debut novel The Secret History, published in 1992, is such a work. On the surface, it is a brilliant, yet completely naturalistic, telling of the lead-up and aftermath of a murder. But The Secret History is also a work of the depths, and readers who go in seeking the Weird will find it lurking on every page. More than a masterpiece of psychological exploration, it is a story about the resurgence of the old god Dionysus, and a chronicle of fate; fate conceived, in the manner of the Ancient Greeks, as a cosmic force.

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REFERENCES

Donna Tartt, The Secret History 

Robertson Davies, Canadian novelist 

Weird Studies, Episode 98 on Exotica 

M. R. James, English author 

Weird Studies, Episode 3 on “The White People” 

E. R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational 

Jean Cocteau, La Machine Infernale 

John Crowley, Little, Big 

Star Trek: The Next Generation, “The Outrageous Okana” 

Weird Studies, Episode 110 on “The Glass Bead Game” 

Gabriel Faure, Nocturne No. 11 

Pierre-André Boutang, L'Abécédaire de Gilles Deleuze 

Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch 

Episode 156: The Only Possible End: On Donna Tartt's 'The Secret History'

Professor Phil Ford and writer J. F. Martel host a series of conversations on art and philosophy, dwelling on ideas that are hard to think and art that opens up rifts in what we are pleased to call "reality."

Society & Culture

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The ongoing crackdown on protests at many American universities prompts a discussion on the politics, ethics, and metaphysics of free expression. 

Support us on Patreon.

Buy the Weird Studies soundtrack, volumes 1 and 2, on Pierre-Yves Martel's Bandcamp page.

Listen to Meredith Michael and Gabriel Lubell's podcast, Cosmophonia.

Visit the Weird Studies Bookshop

Find us on Discord

Get the T-shirt design from Cotton Bureau!

REFERENCES 

Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own 

Federico Campagna, Technic and Magic 

George Orwell, The Prevention of Literature 

George Orwell, Inside the Whale 

New York Times, “At Indiana University, Protests Only Add to a Full Year of Conflicts 

John Stuart Mill, On Liberty 

Indiana Daily Student, “Provost Addresses Controversy” 

Official government page for the Proposed Bill to address Online Harms in Canada. 

Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals 

GK Chesterton, Orthodoxy 

Daryl Davis, American musician and activist 

DavidFoster Wallace, Just Asking 

Episode 169: On Free Expression

There are artists who express the vision of a place, person, or thing so vividly and originally that it sets the bar for all future imaginings. With his four Mad Max films, this is what George Miller did with the image of the Wasteland. No one has been able to capture the stark, raw energy and chaotic beauty of a post-apocalyptic desert quite like Miller. His portrayal not only defines the aesthetic of a cinematic world but also prompts us to think about the meaning of civilization, technology, humanity, and how they intertwine. In this episode, Phil and JF discuss how  Mad Max challenges our perception of civilization, and our conception of the human.

Support us on Patreon.

Buy the Weird Studies soundtrack, volumes 1 and 2, on Pierre-Yves Martel's Bandcamp page.

Listen to Meredith Michael and Gabriel Lubell's podcast, Cosmophonia.

Visit the Weird Studies Bookshop

Find us on Discord

Get the T-shirt design from Cotton Bureau!

REFERENCES

George Miller (dir.), Mad Max 

George Miller (dir.), Mad Max: The Road Warrior 

George Miller (dir.), Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdrome 

George Miller (dir.), Mad Max: Fury Road 

Jaroslav Hašek, The Good Soldier Švejk 

Stanley Kubrick (dir.), A Clockwork Orange 

Sam Raimi (dir), The Quick and the Dead 

Joe Bob Briggs, movie critic 

Phil Ford, “The Wanderer” 

Felix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze, Nomadology 

Our Known Friend, Meditations on the Tarot 

Episode 168: Visions of the Wasteland: On George Miller's 'Mad Max' Films

Ithell Colquhoun (1906-1988) was a British painter, poet, and occultist, long identified as a pioneer of the Surrealist movement in the UK. While her work is increasingly recognized for its mystical themes and innovative use of automatic techniques, deeply influenced by her esoteric studies, it also inspired extensive research on its broader cultural and spiritual contexts. Amy Hale, an anthropologist, folklorist, and author, has dedicated much of her career to exploring Cornwall, the fabled region of southwest England that became Colquhoun’s spiritual home. Hale’s book, Ithell Colquhoun: Genius of the Fern-Loved Gully, published by Strange Attractor Press, offers a profound biographical study of Colquhoun, examining the historical and spiritual forces that influenced her work. In this episode, she joins JF and Phil to discuss Colquhoun, Cornwall, and the transformative power of research and writing.

REFERENCES

Amy Hale, Ithell Colquhoun: Genius of the Fern-Loved Gully 

Agnes Callard, I Teach the Humanities, and I Still Don’t Know What Their Value Is 

Steven Feld, Jazz Cosmopolitanism in Accra 

Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus 

Lionel Snell, My Years of Magical Thinking  Special Guest: Amy Hale.

Episode 167: The Hand of Ithell, with Amy Hale

In culture and the arts, labeling something you don't like (or don't understand) "pretentious" is the easy way out. It's a conversation killer, implying that any dialogue is pointless, and those who disagree are merely duped by what you've cleverly discerned as a charade. It's akin to cynically revealing that a magic show is all smoke and mirrors—as if creative vision doesn't necessitate a leap of faith. In this episode, Phil and JF explore the nuances of pretentiousness, distinguishing between its fruitful and hollow forms. They argue that the real gamble, and inherent value, of daring to pretend lies in recognizing that imagination is an active contributor to, rather than a detractor from, reality.

Pierre-Yves Martel's EPHEMERA project

It isn't too late to join JF's upcoming course on the films of Stanley Kubrick, which goes until the end of April, 2024.

Support us on Patreon.

Buy the Weird Studies soundtrack, volumes 1 and 2, on Pierre-Yves Martel's Bandcamp page.

Listen to Meredith Michael and Gabriel Lubell's podcast, Cosmophonia.

Visit the Weird Studies Bookshop

Find us on Discord

Get the T-shirt design from Cotton Bureau!

REFERENCES

Brian Eno, A Year with Swollen Appendices 

Dan Fox, Pretentiousness: Why it Matters 

Ramsay Dukes, How to See Fairies 

Johan Huizinga, Homo Ludens 

Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition 

Weird Studies, Episode 49 on Nietzsche’s idea of “untimely” 

Sokal Affair, scholarly hoax 

Weird Studies, Episode 75 on ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ 

Stanley Kubrick, “Notes on Film” 

Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Uses and Abuses of History 

Vladimir Nabokov, Think, Write, Speak 

Mary Shelley, “Introduction to Frankenstein” 

Matt Cardin, A Course in Demonic Creativity 

Playboy interview with Stanley Kubrick 

Episode 166: Make Believe: On the Power of Pretentiousness

"Let the red dawn surmise / What we shall do, / When the blue starlight dies / And all is through." This short poem, an epigraph to "The Yellow Sign," arguably the most memorable tale in Robert W. Chambers' 1895 collection The King in Yellow, encapsulates in four brief lines the affect that drives cosmic horror: the fearful sense of imminent annihilation. In the four stories JF and Phil discuss in this episode, this affect, which would inspire a thousand works of fiction in the twentieth century, emerges fully formed, dripping with the xanthous milk of Decadence. What’s more, it is here given a symbol, a face, and a home in the Yellow Sign, the Pallid Mask of the Yellow King, and the lost land of Carcosa. Come one, come all.

Join JF's upcoming course on the films of Stanley Kubrick, starting March 28, 2024.

Support us on Patreon.

Buy the Weird Studies soundtrack, volumes 1 and 2, on Pierre-Yves Martel's Bandcamp page.

Listen to Meredith Michael and Gabriel Lubell's podcast, Cosmophonia.

Visit the Weird Studies Bookshop

Find us on Discord

Get the T-shirt design from Cotton Bureau!

REFERENCES

Robert W. Chambers, The King in Yellow 

Weird Studies, Episode 100 on John Carpenter films 

Algernon Blackwood, “The Man Who Found Out” 

Susannah Clarke, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell 

Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” 

Annie Besant and Charles Leadbeater, Thought Forms 

Weird Studies, Episode 140 on “Spirited Away” 

Vladimir Nabokov, Think, Write, Speak 

Charles Taylor, A Secular Age 

David Bentley Hart, “Angelic Monster” 

M. R. James, Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come to you my Lad” 

William Carlos Williams, The Red Wheelbarrow 

Episode 156: The Only Possible End: On Donna Tartt's 'The Secret History'

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