Sherds Podcast

Sherds Podcast

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Sherds Podcast episodes

  • #13 The Dying Peasant by Karel van de Woestijne
    Karel van de Woestijne’s novella, ‘The Dying Peasant’, was originally published in Dutch in 1918. It is now available for the first time in an unabridged translation by Paul Vincent, published by Snuggly Books. The book concerns an elderly farmer, Nand, who lies on his deathbed and is visited by five figures, each representing the one of the five senses. As the fragmentary reflections occasioned by these sensory avatars tell the rich story of Nand’s life, van de Woestijne evokes a deep reverence for the surface of things, and the simplicity and beauty of ordinary life.
    55 min
  • #12 Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban
    Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker was originally published in 1980.  The novel is set in Kent some two or three thousand years after a nuclear holocaust which has destroyed the land, plunging society back to iron-age levels of technology.   Its foundational myth, the Eusa story, grown out of the scattered fragments of ancient history, is the story of how technological progress led to the nuclear war and the long dark age which is referred to as “Bad Time.”  After the death of his father in an accident at work, Riddley, our narrator, eventually finds himself leaving the community and heading out alone on a quest to rediscover and perhaps return to prosperity of the ancients.  The story is told in an imagined, future dialect of English which, though rugged and decayed, has its own alien poetry. 
    Over the course of the episode, we discuss Hoban’s invented dialect, his plundering of English folklore, what it means to create a mythology, and the pivotal significance of the figure of The Green Man.
    Bibliography:
    Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A New Verse Translation by Simon Armitage (Faber & Faber, 2007)
    The Death of Tragedy by George Steiner (Faber & Faber, 1961)
    ‘Hoap of a Tree in Riddley Walker’ by David Huisman in Christianity and Literature, Vol. 43, No. 3/4 (Spring-Summer 1994)
    ‘Dialect, Grapholect, and Story: Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker as Science Fiction’ by R. D. Mullen in Science Fiction Studies Vol. 27, No. 3 (Nov., 2000)
    1 hr 9 min
  • #11 Ice by Anna Kavan
    Anna Kavan’s Ice was originally published in 1967 by Peter Owen books. The book is Kavan’s final and best known work, and appeared just one year before her death. In the aftermath of a nuclear war, society is rapidly crumbling as a wall of ice threatens to engulf the entire planet. Our unnamed narrator roams through this barren, frozen wasteland in pursuit of a young girl with a halo of hair as bright as spun glass; his designs on her are decidedly sinister. The novel proceeds with the torturous, cyclical quality of an inescapable nightmare in which the reader is cocooned.
    Over the course of the episode, we discuss the extent to which Kavan's heroin addiction influenced the novel, consider the novels place in the tradition of post-apocalyptic fiction, and explore the unique brutality of the novel's narrator.
    Bibliography:
    A Stranger on Earth: The Life and Work of Anna Kavan (2006) by Jeremy Reed (Peter Owen)
    'The Fiction of Anna Kavan' by Victoria Walker (PhD Thesis, 2012) https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/8627
    The Drowned World (1962) by J. G. Ballard
    1 hr 11 min
  • #10 The Ship by Hans Henny Jahnn
    Hans Henny Jahnn was a German organ-builder, playwright and novelist.
    In this episode, we look at the only novel of his available in English, The Ship (1949), a beguilingly dark, allegorical tale set aboard a wooden ship with blood red sails which embarks upon an unknown mission, carrying an unknown cargo, a mystery to both captain and crew. The reasons for the journey are perhaps understood only by the shady figure of the supercargo as well as the shipowner, whose presence is as uncertain as the contents of the boxes in the ship's hold. The captain, Waldemar Strunck, has a daughter, Ellena, who follows him on this voyage, while Gustave, her fiancé, takes himself aboard as a stowaway in order not to be separated from his beloved. In the middle of the ship's journey, Ellena disappears, and in the search for her, Gustave must confront the very fabric of reality.
    Over the course of the episode, we discuss Jahnn's curious mixing of genres, the interplay between the hidden and the revealed, and speculate upon the possible allegorical intentions of the text.
    Bibliography:
    'Apologie des Untergangs: Ästhetische Erfahrung in Hans Henny Jahnns "Fluß ohne
    Ufer"' by Christoph Zeller in Poetica, Vol. 35, No. 1/2 (2003)
    Hans Henny Jahnn: eine Biografie (1986) by Thomas Freeman
    The Theme Of The Black Race In The Works Of Hans Henny Jahnn by Richard Detsch in Mosaic: An Interdisciplinary Critical Journal, Vol. 7, No. 2, LITERATURE AND IDEAS (Winter, 1974)
    1 hr 7 min
  • #9 The Wind by Dorothy Scarborough

    ‘The Wind’ concerns the fate of Letty, a young girl plucked out of a life of ease in Virginia and forced to move to the plains of Sweetwater, Texas at the height of a terrible drought in the 1880s.  Letty struggles to acclimatise in this new, hostile environment – its ugly, arid vistas and its harsh manners – but it is the incessant wind that strikes her most deeply.  As her isolation increases, she begins mentally to imbue the wind with supernatural power, coming to believe that it intends to destroy her and everything she holds dear. 

    1 hr 3 min
  • #8 Armed With Madness by Mary Butts
    In this episode, we discuss Mary Butts's novel of 1928, 'Armed with Madness'. Over the course of the programme, we consider the possible reasons for the descent of Butts' reputation, the mythological and literary underpinnings of the novel, and think about the ways in which her it expands the palette of we think of as modernism.
    1 hr 8 min
  • #7 I Burn Paris by Bruno Jasieński
    Jasieński's 'I Burn Paris' upset the French authorities enough to have him expelled from the country on the novel's publication. The story concerns a plague that breaks out in Paris, exposing the worst tendencies of the city's inhabitants. As the death toll rises, groups begin to isolate themselves according to ethnicity, nationality and ideology. In today's political climate, the book is perhaps more relevant than ever and serves as a stark warning about the perils of isolationism.
    1 hr 7 min
  • #6 Et in Arcadia Ego by Tadeusz Różewicz

    In this episode, I'm joined by Stefan Glowacki to discuss Tadeusz Rózewicz's long poem, 'Et in Arcadia Ego' (1961).  Over the course of the episode, we consider how the poem might be thought of as Rózewicz's idiosyncratic 'Italian Journey', written in response not only to Goethe's text, but as an attempt to confront the ghosts of classicisim, a journey undertaken to see if the ideals of Western art can still be found among the wreckage of postwar Europe.

    55 min
  • #5 The Man Whom the Trees Loved by Algernon Blackwood
    In this episode, we look at Algernon Blackwood's story, 'The Man Whom the Trees Loved', which was published in his collection 'Pan's Garden' (1912). The story concerns David and Sophia Bittacy, a married couple living on the edge of the New Forest. Under the influence of the bohemian painter, Sanderson, David becomes increasingly obsessed with the inner life of the trees in the neighbouring forest.
    Over the course of our discussion, we consider Algernon Blackwood's place in the Gothic tradition, the symbolism of cedars, and explore the dual possibilities of supernatural and psychological readings of the story.
    1 hr 7 min
  • #4 At Twilight They Return by Zyranna Zateli
    In this episode, we look at Zyranna Zateli's 'At Twilight They Return' (1993), translated by David Connolly. Set during the final decades of the 19th century, the novel tells the vivid and meandering history of several generations of a single family in northern Greece. As the modern world begins to encroach upon the ancient, the border between the mythic and the real becomes porous, and in Zateli's hands, both are able to exist in a perpetual twilight.
    Over the course of our discussion, we consider the transitional period of the book's setting, the symbolism of wolves, and examine Zateli's curious weaving together of folklore and mythology.
    56 min

About Sherds Podcast

From the publisher's feed

Sherds Podcast is a journey through the outskirts of literary history. Each episode, we take an in-depth look at a lesser-known literary text and attempt to give it the critical attention it deserves:…

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