Open Book

An introduction to the second book of Geoffrey Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde.

An introduction to the life of Geoffrey Chaucer and to his five-book romance Troilus and Criseyde. 

We focus in this episode on the third book and final book of “one of the most important [novels] to come out of the English-speaking world in this generation.” Midnight’s Children (1981) consists of three books narrated by Saleem Sinai: the first about events preceding his birth; the second about his life intertwining with the histories of India and Pakistan; and the third about his experiences after the deaths of his family in bombing raids in 1965. He is embroiled in the 1971 Bangladeshi independence struggle, returns to India, and finally  undertakes to preserve his memories in the book we have been reading, before he prophecies his impending death.

Page references throughout refer to the 2006 Vintage Canada edition.

Covering the second of three books in Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children (1981), in which the narrator Saleem Sinai recounts the history of his life from 1947 to 1965. He learns that his parents are more complex than he knew, his family is his by adoption rather than by birth, and that his own mind is like a radio receiver for the thoughts of 1,001 other children born with the nation of India.

Page references throughout refer to the 2006 Vintage Canada edition.

An interpretive overview of the first Book of Salman Rushdie’s consummate novel of India, Midnight’s Children (1981).

Page references throughout refer to the 2006 Vintage Canada edition.

This is a recording of John Keats' "Endymion: A Poetic Romance (1818)," read by Michael Ullyot.

The text is from the 21st-Century Oxford Authors series, edited in 2017 by John Barnard. 

This is a recording of John Keats' "Endymion: A Poetic Romance (1818)," read by Michael Ullyot.

The text is from the 21st-Century Oxford Authors series, edited in 2017 by John Barnard. 

This is a recording of John Keats' "Endymion: A Poetic Romance (1818)," read by Michael Ullyot.

The text is from the 21st-Century Oxford Authors series, edited in 2017 by John Barnard. 

This is a recording of John Keats' Endymion: A Poetic Romance (1818), read by Michael Ullyot.

The text is from the 21st-Century Oxford Authors series, edited in 2017 by John Barnard. 

This is a recording of Jonathan Swift's "Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift," read by Michael Ullyot.

The text is from the 6th edition of the Norton Anthology of Poetry, edited in 2018 by Margaret Ferguson, Tim Kendall, and Mary Jo Salter.