Subtext: Conversations about Classic Books and Films
Subtext is a book club podcast for readers interested in what the greatest works of the human imagination say about life’s big questions. Each episode, philosopher Wes Alwan and poet Erin O’Luanaigh conduct a close reading of a text or film and co-write an audio essay about it in real time. It’s literary analysis, but in the best sense: we try not overly stuffy and pedantic, but rather focus on unearthing what’s most compelling about great books and movies, and how it is they can touch our lives in such a significant way.
Episodes
September 9, 2024 • 50 mins
Known for casting mythical heroes in human proportions, Eurpides has his hands full with Medea—homocidal sorcerous, granddaughter of the sun, and a woman who does not take betrayal lightly. Nevertheless, the poet is able to capture the agony of someone who has given up everything for love—family, home, and homeland—only to find her passion disregarded, and her sacrifices unappreciated, by a man who robotically puts practicality abo...
Mark as Played
September 2, 2024 • 50 mins
What is it about working class Linda Marolla, whom Arthur first encounters in the process of shoplifting a tie for her father’s birthday, that helps Arthur grow up? Wes & Erin discuss Steve Gordon’s 1981 romantic comedy “Arthur,” and why, if you want to learn to become independent, sometimes the best that you can do is to fall in love.
Mark as Played
August 26, 2024 • 43 mins
It’s awful being alone, according to millionaire playboy Arthur Bach, and nobody should be alone. And so he forestalls this feeling by getting drunk, picking up prostitutes, and laughing at his own jokes. Yet love in its true form can be a lonely business, as his servant Hobson reminds him, because it involves growing up, getting serious, and taking care of someone other than oneself … only to lose them—in one way or another—to the...
Mark as Played
August 19, 2024 • 50 mins
Wes & Erin continue their discussion of two of Marie de France's most famous lais—”Laustic” and “Guigemar”—and how their narratives marry the “flesh” of text, art, and symbology, to the “spirit” of the spoken word (via dialogue, oaths and covenants, and authorial commentary), in order, perhaps, to communicate something of the mysterious and dangerous union that is romantic love.
Mark as Played
August 11, 2024 • 50 mins
The lai, a short narrative poem from the Middle Ages that treats themes of courtly love, was originally accompanied by music and sung by minstrels. But in the 1170s, poet Marie de France translated a series of Breton lais into French and, in so doing, converted an oral tradition into text. It’s no wonder, then, that her lais’ narratives are so often preoccupied with methods of communication: both the spoken word, with its spiritual...
Mark as Played
August 5, 2024 • 47 mins
Wes & Erin continue their discussion of Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1967 noir thriller “Le Samouraï,” and the surprising power of love to capture its fugitives, even if it means finding them in the most shadowy of underworlds.
Mark as Played
July 29, 2024 • 42 mins
Jef Costello is a hit-man with airtight alibis, impeccable style, and a strict code of honor. Add to this a masterful ability to evade his pursuers, mobsters and authorities alike, and a simple but effective home alarm system in the form of a bird. But what he cannot orchestrate, control, or evade is the improvisational nature of a genuine encounter with another person, which he unexpectedly finds with the jazz musician who witness...
Mark as Played
What is the cause of human self-destructiveness? Wes & Erin continue their discussion of “Notes from the Underground” and its agonized rumination on whether freedom can be reconciled with love, individuality with virtue, and action with reflection.
Mark as Played
What is the cause of human self-destructiveness? According to Dostoyevkys’s underground man, this “most advantageous advantage” is designed to save freedom from the constraints of rationality, and vitality from the quiescence that follows success. Yet he himself finds freedom only in spite and fantasy, while in real life he oscillates between failed and humiliating attempts to dominate or ingratiate himself with other people. Wes &...
Mark as Played
July 8, 2024 • 54 mins
Wes & Erin continue their discussion John Huston’s 1948 classic, "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre."
Mark as Played
July 2, 2024 • 50 mins
It’s considered the definitive film on greed, a demonstration of just what the lust for gold can do to a man’s heart. Fred C. Dobbs starts out as a down-on-his-luck panhandler in a poor Mexican town and comes into a fortune of over $100,000 before the film’s end. Yet, in more ways than one, Dobbs never stops panhandling, never stops being subject to the vagaries of fate, to forces that might just as soon give as take away his fortu...
Mark as Played
Why do we rebel against our position within the natural world, even to the point of self-destruction? What is required to restore us? Wes & Erin continue their discussion of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s classic poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” (Thanks to our sponsor for this episode, HelloFresh. Go to HelloFresh.com/subtextapps for free appetizers for life).
Mark as Played
June 16, 2024 • 54 mins
Why do we rebel against our position within the natural world, even to the point of self-destruction? What is required to restore us? Wes & Erin continue their discussion of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s classic poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” (Thanks to our sponsor for this episode, HelloFresh. Go to HelloFresh.com/subtextapps for free appetizers for life).
Mark as Played
Why do we rebel against our position within the natural world, even to the point of self-destruction? What is required to restore us? Wes & Erin continue their discussion of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s classic poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” (Thanks to our sponsor for this episode, HelloFresh. Go to HelloFresh.com/subtextsweet for free dessert for life).
Mark as Played
June 3, 2024 • 53 mins
Why do we rebel against our position within the natural world, even to the point of self-destruction? What is required to restore us? Wes & Erin continue their discussion of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s classic poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”
Mark as Played
May 27, 2024 • 39 mins
The ancient Mariner kills his Albatross with a carelessness that stands in stark contrast to his impulse for confession. For several days he and his shipmates feed the albatross, play with it, and treat it as if it were inhabited by a “Christian soul.” The mariner never tells the wedding guest why it is that he kills the bird, but the casual and seemingly unmotivated act is followed by a psychedelic nightmare that gives us some clu...
Mark as Played
May 20, 2024 • 53 mins
The ancient Mariner kills his Albatross with a carelessness that stands in stark contrast to his impulse for confession. For several days he and his shipmates feed the albatross, play with it, and treat it as if it were inhabited by a “Christian soul.” The mariner never tells the wedding guest why it is that he kills the bird, but the casual and seemingly unmotivated act is followed by a psychedelic nightmare that gives us some clu...
Mark as Played
May 13, 2024 • 35 mins
Wes & Erin continue their discussion of "On the Waterfront."
Mark as Played
May 6, 2024 • 40 mins
Terry Malloy and his fellow longshoremen on the New York docks are witnesses to union corruption under labor boss Johnny Friendly, but won’t testify against him because of his violent intimidation tactics, which ensure that union members remain “D and D”—that is, deaf and dumb—to any illegal activity. When Terry’s collaboration with Friendly results in the death of his friend Joey Doyle, and when Terry subsequently falls in love wi...
Mark as Played
In the medieval tradition of courtly love, the aubade inverts the serenade. Where one heralds an evening arrival, the other laments a morning departure. In John Dunne’s famous poetic contribution to the genre, he chastises the sun for waking and so separating lovers, but consoles us with the notion that the power of the sun is ultimately subordinate to the imperatives of love. More bleak, Philip Larkin’s poem “Aubade" seems to aban...
Mark as Played
Popular Podcasts
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Join Holly and Tracy as they bring you the greatest and strangest Stuff You Missed In History Class in this podcast by iHeartRadio.
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show. Clay Travis and Buck Sexton tackle the biggest stories in news, politics and current events with intelligence and humor. From the border crisis, to the madness of cancel culture and far-left missteps, Clay and Buck guide listeners through the latest headlines and hot topics with fun and entertaining conversations and opinions.
If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people.