Talia talks with the brilliant Grace Lavery, associate professor of English at UC Berkeley, about chapters 7 & 8, "The Chapel" and "The Pulpit." We discuss the nature of mysterious disappearances at sea; asyndeton and the cave of Elephanta; Jove, stove boats, and the nature of immortality; the aphrodisiac qualities of oysters; AND MORE! 

Talia talks with comedian Jamie Loftus about chapters 5 and 6, "Breakfast" and "The Street." We talk about breakfast, social anxiety, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the false promises of capitalism and the musky, erotic smells of the women of Salem, Massachusetts. 

Theme song by Noam Hassenfeld.

Talia is joined by writer Moira Donegan to discuss chapters 3 and 4 of Moby-Dick, "The Spouter-Inn" and "The Counterpane." The book is starting to get delightfully gay and we talk about it! Other topics of discussion: Ishmael and Queequeg spooning, Melville's penchant for racist metaphor, being women reading aggressively male books, and the phallic nature of harpoons.

Theme song by Noam Hassenfeld.

I'm joined by Connor Goldsmith, a senior literary agent at Fuse Literary who has never read Moby-Dick, to discuss chapter 2, "The Carpet-Bag." We talk about Vanderpump Rules, Judaism, the northeast wind known as Euroclydon, and how the word "podcast" is kind of a whale pun.

Theme song by Noam Hassenfeld.

Talia Lavin and David Roth discuss Chapter 1 of Moby-Dick, "Loomings." We also discuss the weird life of Herman Melville, how we fell in love with this book, and introduce the podcast. 

Theme song by Noam Hassenfeld.