This week we're discussing Irish writer Edna O'Brien, and her debut novel from 1960: The Country Girls. The book's frank depiction of sex--or, more accurately, the sexual thoughts of young girls and women--was enough to get it banned, and even burned, in its native country. We consider how the book has aged, and whether it still feels scandalous today. We also talk a bit about O'Brien's trajectory as a writer, and as a young woman, enduring what seemed to be a pretty lousy marriage before breaking free and joining swinging London society.

In the second half of the show, we talk about the recent scandal at the Swedish Academy that has forced the Nobel Prize in Literature to go on hiatus for a year. We unpack the scandal's details, and consider how a group of Swedes got into a position to dole out the biggest prize in letters in the first place.

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