Professor David Powelstock’s scholarship in nineteenth-century Russian poetry has led to his current work about the inner experience of self and the literary roots of contemporary concepts of selfhood.  This episode features fascinating exchanges between Dave and Professor Dan Caner, an expert in late antiquity, on the evolution of literature and consciousness and the perspectives of writers and readers from the classical world to the Romantic movement.  Dave gets into your head as we explore the connections between thought, the written word, and the inner world.  Also featuring Professor Emma Gilligan and Nils Muiznieks.

Discussed this week: George Orwell, Politics and the English Language; George Lakoff and Mark Johnsen, Metaphors We Live By; Richard Wilson, Inciting Genocide with Words; Longinus, On the Sublime.

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