An episode from 11/4/21: Tonight, I read four of William Wordsworth's greatest poems. On some days, it's only rolling along with Wordsworth's rhymed or unrhymed reminiscences or descriptions of nature, that teaches again what poetry is about, what poetry can do:

Each of these can be found in the Selected Poems of Wordsworth that I edited, as part of the S4N Pocket Poems series.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

An episode from 11/2/21: Tonight, I read a letter written by the British poet Ted Hughes, to a friend and critic, Al Alvarez, in November of 1971. At the time, Alvarez was publishing an intimate (and to Hughes's mind, exploitative) account of the 1963 suicide of Hughes's wife, the poet Sylvia Plath. The letter can be found in The Letters of Ted Hughes, pages 321-326. I use this letter as a starting point to wonder why we treat the famous, or just the infamous, the way we do, and how, fifty years later, we continue to lap up the gossip surrounding well-known people.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

An episode from 10/30/21: In this seventh episode on Celtic mythology, I review one of the greatest surviving stories in the tradition, Togail Bruidne Dá Derga, or The Destruction of Da Derga's Hostel. Since it is also fairly long, I only share two small sections from the story itself: a piece from the beginning, and from the story's conclusion. You can read more about it here, or in the sources listed below.

The translation I use here is by Jeffrey Gantz, in his indispensable book, Early Irish Myths & Sagas. As usual, I also make of from James MacKillop's Oxford Dictionary of Celtic Mythology, and his Myths & Legends of the Celts.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

A reading of an essay of mine on cultural life and everyday life in Nazi-Occupied Paris. What did it mean to "collaborate," and what acts of collaboration were worthy of punishment or ostracism after the war? As one writer put it, “Should a woman reject a seat offered by a German in the Metro?  Should one have refused to receive civilized, non-Nazi Germans whom one had known before the war? Should one have turned one’s back on a German friend in a public place?”

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

I assume that the small amount of work presented in each episode constitutes fair use. Publishers, authors, or other copyright holders who would prefer to not have their work presented here can also email me at [email protected], and I will remove the episode immediately.

An episode from 10/24/21: Tonight, I read from the letters of Ted Hughes, on how he came to discover a love for poetry, the natural world, as well as folklore and mythology, and how all three became intertwined and essential to his life. All of these can be found in Letters of Ted Hughes.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

A replay of an episode from 10/28/2020

A reading of Stephen Ambrose's book Undaunted Courage, on the last night of Meriwether Lewis's life, in October of 1809. Unlike his more famous companion, William Clark, Lewis suffered from what we today would call depression, and this passage is one of the saddest I know. Ambrose has remarked that he wept while writing it, and it was hard to keep myself from doing the same while reading it. I should note the mistake I made when introducing the passage: this scene takes place not three days, but three years, after Lewis and Clark's return, but I haven't the heart to read this aloud again. 

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected]. 

I assume that the small amount of work presented in each episode constitutes fair use. Publishers, authors, or other copyright holders who would prefer to not have their work presented here can also email me at [email protected], and I will remove the episode immediately.

An episode from 10/17/21: The death Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) came after a long series of illnesses. By then, friends and admirers and hangers-on sought out the composer in his last days. Tonight, I read Jan Swafford's account of Beethoven's death in his incredible biography, Beethoven: Anguish & Triumph.

Swafford’s book also includes one of the most moving details from any biography: that is, the supreme joy the composer experienced—even as he was wracked with illness and pain—when a complete set of Handel’s scores arrived by post. In his last days, Beethoven was able to sit up and swim through these books, hearing the music in his head.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

An episode from 10/14/21: What does culture and education mean when literacy, let alone the owning of books, is so rare? Tonight, I read two chapters from Peter Ackroyd's book, ⁠Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination⁠. The first covers education in eighth-century England, and specifically the life of the Venerable Bede. The second is a brief look into Anglo-Saxon/Old English poetry, and its continued life and reverberations in English poetry to the present day.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

An episode from 10/11/21: Tonight, a small episode where I talk about working, and about empathy and sympathy for those who live doing work they do not love, and which they derive little meaning from. Perhaps it describes you, or someone you know.

Don’t forget to support Human Voices Wake Us on Substack, where you can also get our newsletter and other extras. You can also support the podcast by ordering any of my books: Notes from the Grid, To the House of the Sun, The Lonely Young & the Lonely Old, and Bone Antler Stone.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

A reading from Shakespeare's Hamlet and book 1 of Wordsworth's The Prelude. I also share two small sections from my poem-in-progress, 1606, about the life of Shakespeare.

Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to [email protected].

I assume that the small amount of work presented in each episode constitutes fair use. Publishers, authors, or other copyright holders who would prefer to not have their work presented here can also email me at [email protected], and I will remove the episode immediately.