An experimental new podcast.

Who killed the author? The prime suspect: Roland Barthes. The structuralist critic argued that modern readings of literature placed too much importance on the individual that created the work. In this essay, he lays out how 'the Author' came to be so revered, and the dangers of such reverence.

What is society? As man caught between worlds – Swiss and French, Catholic and Protestant, fugitive and hero – Jean-Jacques Rousseau was better positioned than most to answer that question.  In this essay, the Social Contract, Rousseau not only uncovers the unjust foundations of human society under the rule of gods and kings, but also proposes a vision for a fairer system – that of a Republic. 

What is the point of poetry? In 1798, William Wordsworth attempted to answer this question, in a preface written for his collection of poetry 'the Lyrical Ballads'. This revolutionary set of poems heralded the arrival of the Romantic movement, with Wordsworth and Samuel Coleridge as its leaders. In this essay, Wordsworth tries to prepare his readers for this new poetry. Aware that people may not like what they hear, Wordsworth articulates his philosophy, answering the question of what it means to be a poet, and what the purpose of poetry should be.

What terrifies us? What is it that elevates mere fear or nervousness to that all-consuming, paralysing emotion of terror? As a philosopher, Edmund Burke sought to understand what we actually mean when we talk of ‘terror’ and ‘beauty’.  In this essay, first published in 1767, he attempts to explain the idea of ‘the sublime’, and the effect that it has on us.