This week we discuss our first listener pick, Sophie Calle’s “The Address Book,” which was suggested by Will Howard. Also: lots of “Succession” talk (including a couple of potential spoilers), John McPhee’s inscrutable diagrams, more Chekhov, the kids’ music these days, whether we’d want to be address-booked, what we’d say about each other if it happened, Elena makes up a song about the 1985 Chicago Bears, and more! (Also, send us your favorite essays of 2021 for Pushcart nominations.)

Some things we mention:

Sophie Calle’s The Address Book:

David Searcy’s book of essays, Shame and Wonder: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/221652/shame-and-wonder-by-david-searcy/

The Jeremy Strong profile from the New Yorker:

JM Tyree’s The Counterforce:

The sad and strange case of the Wanda Tinasky letters, which apparently were not written by Pynchon:

The “Claw of Shame” episode of Nathan for You:

John Vaillant’s book The Tiger:

This week we discuss our feelings, how to write about feelings, our feelings some more, and two essays about feelings: Jerald Walker’s “Breathe,” and Chris Offutt’s “Trash Food.” (Sorry about the audio quality—we had some tech issues this week.)

Jerald Walker’s “Breathe” in New England Review:

https://www.nereview.com/vol-40-no-3-2019/breathe/ 

Chris Offutt’s “Trash Food” in Oxford American:

https://main.oxfordamerican.org/magazine/item/550-trash-food

Allen Gee’s “Old School,” the other essay about James Alan Macpherson that we mention. (Excerpt only):

https://blog.pshares.org/index.php/old-school-by-allen-gee/ 

Stephanie Soileau’s book of short stories, Last One Out Shut Off the Lights:

https://stephaniesoileau.com/last-one-out-shut-off-the-lights-2

This week we discuss the biggest news in the entire world since our last episode—Elena's appearance last week on Jeopardy!

Elena’s episode (until it gets taken down): 

Elena’s J-Archive.com contestant page: https://www.j-archive.com/showplayer.php?player_id=14301 

“The Jeopardy! Essay” by Mike Garabedian:

A clip from Mike’s appearance on Jeopardy!:

Elena’s Twitter thread about being on Jeopardy!:

River City News article re: wrong question: 

In our Season 4 premiere, we discuss what we've been up to since last season, a reader email, Big People Fashion, AI voice prints, and the recent Anthony Bourdain & Val Kilmer documentaries. Also: Elena does her best Christopher Walken impression, and we tackle the eternal question: is Val Kilmer a good actor?

Links:

Roadrunner: https://www.amazon.com/Roadrunner-Film-About-Anthony-Bourdain/dp/B09BB55XXX

The Vanity Fair article on Bourdain and Argento: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/07/anthony-bourdain-asia-argento-roadrunner

Helen Rosner's New Yorker piece: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-gastronomy/the-ethics-of-a-deepfake-anthony-bourdain-voice

Val: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt14731254/

In our season 3 finale, we discuss documentary/nonfiction theater. Elena explains the subgenre, and David joins us to discuss “The Laramie Project,” a nonfiction play. Also: a stapler anthology update, a stapler anthology cocktail, some true crime talk, a theater-themed lightning round, our worst performances, and more! Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next season.

“The Laramie Project,” full text: http://www.harringtonartsalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/The-Laramie-Project-Script.pdf

This week, we’re re-recording the lost episode from two weeks ago, about Eula Biss’ 2020 book Having and Being Had. We discuss its main topics—capitalism and class—as well as whether it’s a book-length essay and why or why not. Also: other books we’re reading, a creaky chair, the hottest day in Oregon history, how much money we’d cut our thumbs off for, and more!

Links: 

Jana’s book, Reel Bay:

Stacey Swann’s novel, Olympus, TX:

Ottessa Moshfegh, My Year of Rest & Relaxation:

This week, our special guest, longtime friend, and fellow nonfiction professor Dave Madden joins us to discuss two essays about fucking: Samuel Delaney’s “Ash Wednesday,” and Kristen Dombek’s “Letter from Williamsburg.” Also: Father’s Day presents, workshop models, a debate about sentences, Sizzler essays, and more!

Links:

Dave’s website: https://www.davemadden.org 

Dave’s web designer, Beth Sullivan: https://bethsullivan.com 

Samuel Delaney’s “Ash Wednesday”: http://bostonreview.net/arts-society/samuel-r-delany-ash-wednesday 

Kristin Dombek’s “Letter from Williamsburg” (subscription required for full essay): https://www.theparisreview.org/letters-essays/6236/letter-from-williamsburg-kristin-dombek 

The audio version of “Letter from Williamsburg”: https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2013/07/26/kristin-dombeks-letter-from-williamsburg/

Our episode for this week failed to record (thanks, Zoom!), so we're going back to the archives. More than a year ago, back when the pandemic was still young, we recorded an episode about Val Kilmer's memoir I'm Your Huckleberry. It has the fewest downloads of any of our episodes, for some mysterious reason, so we decided to dig it out and re-post it to hold you over until we can get our shit together and finish Season 3. Also: other parts of the Kilmer corpus, including his poetry, art, and music; the movie Tombstone and related trivia; David's Old Western cocktail; Frank Stallone; fake memoirs; and much, much more.

This week, we discuss the 1993 Canadian/French Canadian film “Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould,” which we think is essayistic in many ways. Also: breath mints found in orifices, the thesis circle of life, writing too-long essays, apocalyptic media, Hamlet 2, “Canadian stakes,” lyric vs. narrative, accessibility, Graham Gano, and more!

Links:

Gould’s radio documentary “The Idea of North”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szgnGV4hOKU 

Justin’s essay from Territory: http://themapisnot.com/issue-iii-justin-st-germain

In this week's episode, we discuss two "The Art of ..." interviews from the Paris Review: one on the essay with Hilton Als, and another with Geoff Dyer about nonfiction in general. Also: our mutual love of Mrs. Dalloway, Elena’s study abroad experience, our rocky resumption of vaccinated socializing, Val Kilmer has a documentary, a couple of weird bird stories, one sad cat story, a lightning round about celebrities, lots of interviewing talk, and more!

Links:

“The Art of the Essay” with Hilton Als (subscription required):

“The Art of Nonfiction” with Geoff Dyer (same):