The Monster Professor

Richard Thomas is the award-winning author of seven books and over 150 published stories, and he has edited four anthologies and numerous magazines. He also teaches creative writing and contemporary dark fiction. In this episode, we discuss the new era of dark, weird, and horrific stories on both the page and screen, advice on how to create compelling monsters, and real-life encounters with the supernatural.

His Website: https://whatdoesnotkillme.com/

The Monster Professor: a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, theater, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert. joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/conversation-with-richard-thomas.mp3

Michael Chemers, author of The Monster in Theatre History: This Thing of Darkness and a true monster professor in his own right, reveals how vital monsters are to the stage and audiences, and how vital stage-monsters have been to our monstrous imagination to this day. We hit them all: vampires, werewolves, ghosts, constructs, freak-shows—and I even get psychoanalyzed via my own personal monsters! Enjoy.

Check out his books here: https://www.amazon.com/s?i=digital-text&rh=p_27%3AMichael+Chemers&s=relevancerank&text=Michael+Chemers&ref=dp_byline_sr_ebooks_1

And more about him here: https://theater.ucsc.edu/faculty/chemers

The Monster Professor: a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, theater, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert. joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/conversation-with-michael-chemers-44100-hz.mp3

YouTube sensation Steve Ramsey of the channel Woodworking for Mere Mortals just so happens to be a massive horror buff and monster enthusiast. We discuss his horror and Halloween projects (including his infamous Ouija board video), his lifelong journey of finding joy in the dark side, his favorite monsters, and the horror films that make his top 10 list of greatest of all time. We even get some pragmatic woodworking tips on making the ideal stakes for vampires.

The Monster Professor: a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert. joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/conversation-with-steve-ramsey.mp3

Four weird writers don disguises to discuss monsters, robots, and the supernatural in their own works, as well as the strange new possibilities for storytelling in social media, virtual reality, and beyond. See the full video, masks-and-all, on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/z4IxJcUF1Ns (and please subscribe).

Pinckney Benedict is a Full Professor of creative writing and virtual-reality narrative at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. He has written many books, received a multitude of prestigious awards and honors, and can be seen in this episode as, among other things, a murderous hillbilly clown. More about him here: https://cola.siu.edu/english/faculty-staff/faculty/benedict.php

Sarah Jilek is a writer, teacher, and voice actor, and she recently graduated with an MFA in Fiction from SIUC. She has published in numerous magazines and journals, has voiced and edited numerous podcasts, has a debut novel, St. Catastrophe, forthcoming from SFK Press in August of 2020, and can be seen in this episode as, among other things, a sixteen-eyed mutant.

Mandi Jourdan is an MFA Fiction student at SIUC, holding numerous prestigious academic honors, scholarships, and fellowships. She has over 100 publications, including her novels Lacrimosa, Veritas, and The Silenced as well as the short story collections Shadows of the Mind and Immortal Dissent. She has won audio awards, produced podcasts, videos, and text adventures, and can be seen in this episode as Queen Amidala.

The Monster Professor: a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert.

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/masked-monster-professor-with-pinckney-benedict-mandi-jourdan-sarah-jilek.mp3

Monsters and martial arts? What about self-defense against zombies, vampires, and werewolves? What about the real-life human monsters that make martial arts necessary, and which martial art is your best bet? We get answers to these and more by talking with martial arts expert Jeff Westfall, black-belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Ajarn in Muay Thai, black-belt in Judo, authorized coach in Combat Submission Wrestling, full instructor in Jun Fan Gung Fu and in Filipino martial arts and weapons training, fencer, boxer, and more. He is owner and chief instructor of The Rising Phoenix Martial Arts Academy in Evansville, IN. He also hosts the podcast The Martial Brain and has recently released YouTube instructionals. Find out more about him in the links below:

Subscribe to The Monster Professor, a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert: joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/conversation-with-jeff-westfall.mp3

Viruses and similar epidemics have infected our horror stories for generations, so let’s discuss some of the most fascinating examples and try to figure out what drives our fear of monstrous plagues.

Subscribe to The Monster Professor, a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert: joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/monstrous-plagues.mp3

I talk with Michael Drout about Grendel, dragons, Balrogs, and more such monsters of both Middle-earths. Michael Drout is one of the world’s leading scholars on Tolkien and Beowulf; author and editor of numerous books, collections, and journals; lecturer on language and liberal arts; expert in Anglo-Saxon; and Professor of English and Director of the Center for the Study of the Medieval at Wheaton College. Follow him on Twitter twitter.com/MikeDrout (@MikeDrout), and find out more about him on his website, michaeldrout.com.

Subscribe to The Monster Professor, a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert: joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/conversation-with-michael-drout.mp3

I talk with author Valerie Nieman about her gritty supernatural novel To the Bones as well as local folklore, Appalachian monsters, the art of mixing the supernatural with the literary, and more. Find out more about her and her books at www.valnieman.com

Subscribe to The Monster Professor, a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert: joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/conversation-with-valerie-nieman.mp3

I talk with the Tolkien Professor, Corey Olsen, about monsters in The Lord of the Rings and other works by J.R.R. Tolkien. We get into Ring-wraiths, orcs, monstrous transformation, the morality of monster slaying, and the Tolkien Professor’s favorite monster of all time. Olsen’s podcasts and online lectures on Tolkien reached such widespread success and acclaim that they led to the formation of the Mythgard Institute and Signum University. Find out more about his projects and even join his fellowship through the links below:

Subscribe to The Monster Professor, a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert: joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/conversation-with-the-tolkien-professor-corey-olsen.mp3

In this episode I explore the disturbing image of the Doppelganger in literature as part of an ongoing attempt to figure out what it means and why, apparently, I have some kind of obsession with it.

Subscribe to The Monster Professor, a show in which we discuss and explore monsters in literature, myth, film, games, folklore, culture, and beyond. Podcast host: Josh Woods, author, editor, professor, and monster expert: joshwoodsauthor.com

https://joshwoodsauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/doppelgangers.mp3