740 Mel Brooks and Other Eminent Jews (with David Denby) | War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (#13 GBOAT)

740 Mel Brooks and Other Eminent Jews (with D...

Up next

769 The European Byron (with Jonathan Gross) | The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald (#3 GBOAT)

The Romantic poet Byron (1788-1824) was more than just the scandal-ridden celebrity who was famously dubbed "mad, bad, and dangerous to know"--he was also a restless seeker of an identity to match his personal and artistic sensibilities. In this episode, Jacke talks to Byron scho ...  Show more

768 Young James Baldwin (with Nicholas Boggs) | My Last Book with Bruce Robbins

The American writer and civil rights activist James Baldwin (1924-1987) spent the second half of his life as a fixture in American intellectual life. But what formed him? In this episode, Jacke talks to Nicholas Boggs, author of Baldwin: A Love Story, the first major biography of ...  Show more

Recommended Episodes

Episode 10: History Special with Al Murray, James Holland and Terry Deary
Ask Penguin


Joining us in the studio to provide reading inspiration from the Roman Empire to the Second World War are author and podcast duo of We Have Ways of Making Yo ...

  Show more

Douglas Stuart on Shuggie Bain, Storytelling, and the Human Condition (Part Two)
Intelligence Squared

This event is part of Conversations at the Kiln, a new event series at Kiln Theatre programmed by Intelligence Squared. For more events with speakers from the worlds of literature, art, poetry and politics, click here. Douglas Stuart, Booker Prize-winning author of Shuggie Bain ...  Show more

Episode 7: Historical Fiction with Jodi Picoult
Ask Penguin

Join us as we time-travel through our bookshelves as we recommend must-read historical fiction in answer to your reading requests. Plus, bestselling author Jodi Picoult shares her theory on the true author behind Shakespeare's plays that inspired her new novel, By Any Othe ...

  Show more

Close Readings: 'Vanity Fair' by William Makepeace Thackeray
The LRB Podcast

Thackeray's comic masterpiece, 'Vanity Fair', is a Victorian novel looking back to Regency England as an object both of satire and nostalgia. Thackeray’s disdain for the Regency is present throughout the book, not least in the proliferation of hapless characters called George, ye ...  Show more