LIT AF

Many people talk about Gatsby's parties, and how he used them to lure Daisy - but there is more to partying than meets the eye. What attracts us to each other? Can we account for this with attachment theory, or neuromodulators? Is it just dopamine, serotonin, testosterone, or estrogen? We know isolation is problematic, but we've also made relationships complicated - when is relying on another person a good thing, and when does it become a warning sign? Speaking of dependence, what impact/s do substances like alcohol and drugs have on our interactions? All this and a driving lesson in this week's episode.

Did school teach you to achieve your goals, or just keep setting new ones to make yourself constructively miserable? Philosophers, drug dealers, and late stage capitalists all know the  secret - you're never going to be happy as long as you want what you don't have. Welcome to Chapter 2 of The Great Gatsby.

Meet the new guy in town. Narrator Nick Carraway introduces us to Tom, Daisy, and the man himself in Chapter 1 of The Great Gatsby.

Many people describe THE GREAT GATSBY as boring and overrated. 

They're wrong.

But it does take some life experience and an intimate familiarity with pain to understand the book. Apart from F. Scott Fitzgerald, the two men who knew the book best considered it a masterpiece. They were two of the most badass writers of the 20th century, and they both blew their own brains out. This episode of LIT AF looks at THE GREAT GATSBY through the eyes of Hunter S. Thompson and Ernest Hemingway. 

You've arrived at Ground Zero for the LIT AF podcast.

Classics works of literature are classics because they tattoo your heart. The writers who are insightful, brave, and talented enough to share their sense of loss, love, death, sex, pain, and triumph speak to us, for us even, and they let us know we are not alone. 

People in every generation understand this. The classics are timeless. 

But reading the classics in school is usually boring. Teachers and students aren’t free to talk about race, or sexual orientation, or the real politics of money and power without running the risk of someone making a recording and pitching a fit at a school board meeting.  

That’s why we’re here. 

Join me for a tour through the classics like you’ve never heard them before. Each season of this podcast is an audiobook with a twist – I comment as I go, to give you the stories between the lines.

At the end of each episode I also offer opportunities for you to participate in online events, get discounts, and become a member of the Web3 community that will choose the books I read next. You can also get more information now at litafpodcast.com.

Welcome… to LIT. AS. F*CK.