A philosophical deep dive into forgotten or intentionally neglected texts and figures.

The Wednesday Society takes its name from the radical intellectual clubs that met in London, Berlin and Vienna. It invites listeners to explore overlooked, misunderstood and ignored ideas and thinkers. 

Hosted by philosopher Dalia Nassar, the podcast asks big (and small) questions about paths not taken and ideas not realised. 

All episodes available now.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

This podcast was made possible by the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country

Season one: On Beauty - What philosophers and writers have said about beauty over the centuries.

Philosopher Dalia Nassar takes you on a journey through experiences of beauty. She asks the question that so many philosophers, poets and artists have asked: Can beauty actually change our lives? To think through this question with Dalia is  concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

In each episode Dalia and Simon discuss beauty in connection to a different neglected, ignored or forgotten text.

All episodes available now.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

This podcast was made possible by the support of the Australian Research Council. It was supported by the School of Humanities and recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

Professor Dalia Nassar takes a philosophical deep dive into forgotten or intentionally neglected texts and figures.

The Wednesday Society takes its name from the radical intellectual clubs that met in London, Berlin and Vienna. It invites listeners to explore overlooked, misunderstood and ignored ideas and thinkers. 

We ask big (and small) questions about paths not taken and ideas not realised. 

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

The final step on Diotima’s ladder is the most enigmatic. Diotima says that we encounter the beautiful “in itself,” without any form or shape. This seems impossible, given that beauty is something we sense - or at least discern in some particular person or thing… 

Dalia Nassar and Simon Tedeschi think about this enigma in light of Audre Lorde’s 1978 essay “Uses of the Erotic.” Can Lorde’s notion of the “erotic” - as presence, attentiveness, and playfulness - help us to understand what it means to experience the beautiful immediately? And what exactly would this experience be like?

The Wednesday Society is hosted by Dalia Nassar, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. In this first season, Dalia discusses beauty in its many forms with concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

Email us: [email protected]

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

Cosmos in Greek means both order and beauty, and it refers to the order of the universe. So what is the relationship between beauty and order?

Just a few years after the French revolution and during the reign of terror, philosopher and poet Frederick Schiller wrote a series of letters in which he defended the idea of an aesthetic education for a healthy and robust democracy. But his idea has gone largely unnoticed. What is an aesthetic education and how can it be relevant for us today? In this episode Dalia and Simon discuss the idea of aesthetic education, its role in politics, and what that means for the relationship of beauty and political life. And, they strongly disagree about the success of aesthetic education.

The Wednesday Society is hosted by Dalia Nassar, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. In this first season, Dalia discusses beauty in its many forms with concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

Email us: [email protected]

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

The third step in Diotima’s ladder asks us to see the beauty of goodness. But what kind of beauty is this? And how can we think of beauty as having to do with the good when - so often - it seems to also be embroiled in evil?

In this episode, Dalia and Simon consider an essay by the twentieth-century French philosopher, Simone Weil. She was described by Albert Camus as the only great spirit of our time. Weil’s thinking was imbued with moral and ethical questions. For Weil, beauty and morality go hand in hand because the desire for goodness is an expression of beauty. Does this mean that the hunger for the good, even in its absence, is an expression of beauty?   

The Wednesday Society is hosted by Dalia Nassar, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. In this first season, Dalia discusses beauty in its many forms with concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

Email us: [email protected]

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

What might it mean to speak not of a beautiful body, but of the beauty of bodily form? This is the question that Diotima’s second step asks us to answer. And to do so, Dalia and Simon discuss a novel that - as Simon puts it - is one of the best novels he’s read. But he’d never heard of it until this episode

Germaine de Staël’s Corinne, or Italy, published in 1807, was a best-seller in its time. It takes on big philosophical questions concerning love, truth, and goodness - but also beauty and its many forms. Corinne takes Oswald (her love interest) on a tour of Italy - and it is a tour of beauty. A gifted improvisational poet, Corinne also challenges the stifling forms that her life and art are forced into, while also finding new ways to express and live in beauty.  

The Wednesday Society is hosted by Dalia Nassar, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. In this first season, Dalia discusses beauty in its many forms with concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

Email us: [email protected]

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

Physical beauty is the first step in Diotima’s ladder. In some ways it’s super easy. We know what she means. In other ways it’s not straightforward. It can be uncomfortable, superficial, even dangerous. But is it possible that the problem isn’t physical beauty, but the way our culture sees physical beauty as just visual - rather than the full experience of sound, smell and touch? 

To think through this question, Dalia Nassar and Simon Tedeschi consider two poems on narcissism and beauty by writer and philosopher Karoline von Günderrode. Günderrode, who lived from 1780-1806 and whose work is only now being translated into English, offers a unique perspective on both - and argues that physical beauty can be more than skin-deep. 

The Wednesday Society is hosted by Dalia Nassar, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. In this first season, Dalia discusses beauty in its many forms with concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

Email us: [email protected]

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

We start by going back - to ancient Greece, to an itinerant seer named Diotima. She saved Athens from the Plague for ten years; and taught Socrates everything he knew about love and beauty. Diotima, who appears in Plato’s dialogue - the Symposium - gave us the very first philosophical discussion of beauty. Her claim is that beauty is not one. Beauty appears in different guises, and to see these different guises, we must ascend a ladder.

We follow Diotima as she takes Socrates up the ladder of love and beauty. She teaches him the different forms that beauty assumes, and how beauty is related to body, form, morality, and politics. This sets the stage for our later discussions of the many ways in which beauty appears (and disappears) in our world. 

The Wednesday Society is hosted by Dalia Nassar, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. In this first season, Dalia discusses beauty in its many forms with concert pianist and writer, Simon Tedeschi.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.

A podcast that takes a philosophical deep dive into forgotten or intentionally neglected texts and figures.

The Wednesday Society takes its name from the radical intellectual clubs that met in London, Berlin and Vienna. It invites listeners to explore overlooked, misunderstood and ignored ideas and thinkers. 

Hosted by philosopher Dalia Nassar, the podcast asks big (and small) questions about paths not taken and ideas not realised. 

All episodes available from Wednesday, August 12.

• Producer: Sarah Allely
• Composer: Russell Stapleton
• Sound engineer: Bethany Stewart

This podcast was made possible through the support of the Australian Research Council, recorded at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Media Room at the University of Sydney, and supported by the School of Humanities at the University of Sydney. The Wednesday Society was created on Gadigal, Kuringai, and Dharug country.