Close Readings

• Conversations in Philosophy: 'The Ethics of Ambiguity' by Simone de Beauvoir

  At the heart of human existence is a tragic ambiguity: the fact that we experience ourselves both as subject and object, internal and external, at the same time, and can never fully inhabit either state. In her 1947 book, Simone de Beauvoir addresses the ethical implications of this uncertainty and the ‘agonising evidence of freedom’ it presents, along with the opportunity it creates for continual self-definition. In this episode Jonathan and James discuss these arguments and Beauvoir’s warnings against trying to evade the responsibilities imposed upon us by this ambiguity. They also look at the ways in which Beauvoir developed these ideas in The Second Sex and her novels, and her remarkable readings of George Eliot, Virginia Woolf and E.M. Forster. Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and all our other Close Readings series, subscribe: Directly in Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/applecrcip⁠⁠⁠ In other podcast apps: ⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/closereadingscip Read more in the LRB: Joanna Biggs: ⁠https://lrb.me/cipbeauvoir1⁠ Toril Moi: ⁠https://lrb.me/cipbeauvoir2⁠ Elaine Showalter: ⁠https://lrb.me/cipbeauvoir3⁠ Audiobooks from the LRB Including Jonathan Rée's 'Becoming a Philosopher: Spinoza to Sartre': ⁠https://lrb.me/audiobookscip

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• Novel Approaches: ‘The Last Chronicle of Barset’ by Anthony Trollope

  Trollope enthusiasts Tom Crewe and Dinah Birch say they could have chosen any one of his 47 novels for this episode, so it’s no wonder Elizabeth Bowen called him ‘the most sheerly able of the Victorian novelists’. They settled on The Last Chronicle of Barset: a model example of Anthony Trollope’s gift for comedy, pathos, social commentary and masterful dialogue. At the heart of Last Chronicle is a mystery: how did the impoverished Reverend Crawley get his hands on a cheque for £20 that no one can account for, and is he capable of theft? The scandal has dire repercussions not only for Reverend Crawley, but the whole county: his ostracision raises broader questions about inequity in the church; it sparks rifts between his daughter, her would-be husband and his parents; and it gives his young relative Johnny Eames an excuse to flee the entanglements of London high society for the continent, in search of the only man who may be able to solve the puzzle. Although it’s the final book in the Barchester series, Last Chronicle can be read as a standalone novel, and Tom and Dinah join Thomas Jones to explore its sensitivities, ambivalences and sheer readability. Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen in full, and to all our other Close Readings series, sign up: Directly in Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/applecrna⁠⁠⁠⁠ In other podcast apps: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/closereadingsna⁠⁠ Further reading in the LRB: John Sutherland: Trollopiad ⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v14/n01/john-sutherland/trollopiad⁠⁠ Richard Altick: Trollope’s Delight ⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v06/n08/richard-altick/trollope-s-delight⁠⁠ Next time on Novel Approaches: 'The Portrait of a Lady' by Henry James. LRB Audiobooks Discover audiobooks from the LRB: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/audiobooksna

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• Love and Death: ‘Poems of 1912-13’ by Thomas Hardy

  Without Emma Gifford, we might never have heard of Thomas Hardy. Hardy’s first wife was instrumental in his decision to abandon architecture for a writing career, and a direct influence – possibly collaborator – on his early novels. Their marriage, initially passionate, defied family expectations and class barriers, but by the time of Emma’s death, it had deteriorated into hostility and bitterness. Out of grief, regret and ambivalence, Hardy produced the work Mark Ford considers to be among ‘the greatest poems in any language’: Poems of 1912-13. Mark and Seamus discuss the collection in the light of what Hardy called ‘strange necromancy’: the reconfiguring of Emma as ghost, critic, corpse and mythic lover. They pay close attention to the tight structure and novelistic detail in these poems, which exemplify Hardy’s gift for mixing the lyrical with realism. Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and to all our other Close Readings series, subscribe: Directly in Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/applecrld⁠⁠⁠ In other podcast apps: ⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/closereadingsld Read the poems: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2863/2863-h/2863-h.htm Further reading and listening from the LRB: On Mark’s book, Woman Much Missed: ⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n19/matthew-bevis/i-prefer-my-mare⁠ Hugh Haughton on Hardy’s ghosts and Emma’s diary: ⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v07/n21/hugh-haughton/ghosts⁠ Dinah Birch on the letters of the two Mrs Hardies: ⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v18/n22/dinah-birch/defence-of-the-housefly⁠ Mark and Seamus on Hardy for Modern-ish Poets: ⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/close-readings/modern-ish-poets-thomas-hardy⁠ Mark and Mary Wellesley discuss A Pair of Blue Eyes: ⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/the-lrb-podcast/thomas-hardy-s-medieval-mind⁠

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• Fiction and the Fantastic: Stories by Jorge Luis Borges

  Jorge Luis Borges was a librarian with rock star status, a stimulus for magical realism who was not a magical realist, and a wholly original writer who catalogued and defined his own precursors. It’s fitting that he was fascinated by paradoxes, and his most famous stories are fantasias on themes at the heart of this series: dreams, mirrors, recursion, labyrinths, language and creation. Marina and Chloe explore Borges’s fiction with particular focus on two stories: ‘The Circular Ruins’ and ‘The Aleph’. They discuss the many contradictions and puzzles in his life and work, and the ways in which he transformed the writing of his contemporaries, successors and distant ancestors. Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and all our other Close Readings series, subscribe: Directly in Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/applecrff⁠⁠⁠ In other podcast apps: ⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/closereadingsff⁠⁠ Further reading in the LRB: Michael Wood on Borges’s collected fiction: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v21/n03/michael-wood/productive-mischief⁠⁠⁠ Colm Toíbìn on Borges’s life: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v28/n09/colm-toibin/don-t-abandon-me⁠⁠⁠ Marina Warner on enigmas and riddles: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v29/n03/marina-warner/doubly-damned⁠⁠⁠ Daniel Wassbeim on Sur and Borges’s circle: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v10/n05/daniel-waissbein/dying-for-madame-ocampo⁠⁠⁠ Next episode: Marina and Chloe discuss The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington.

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• Fiction and the Fantastic: Stories by Jorge Luis Borges

  Jorge Luis Borges was a librarian with rock star status, a stimulus for magical realism who was not a magical realist, and a wholly original writer who catalogued and defined his own precursors. It’s fitting that he was fascinated by paradoxes, and his most famous stories are fantasias on themes at the heart of this series: dreams, mirrors, recursion, labyrinths, language and creation. Marina and Chloe explore Borges’s fiction with particular focus on two stories: ‘The Circular Ruins’ and ‘The Aleph’. They discuss the many contradictions and puzzles in his life and work, and the ways in which he transformed the writing of his contemporaries, successors and distant ancestors. Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and all our other Close Readings series, subscribe: Directly in Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/applecrff⁠⁠ In other podcast apps: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/closereadingsff⁠ Further reading in the LRB: Michael Wood on Borges’s collected fiction: ⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v21/n03/michael-wood/productive-mischief⁠⁠ Colm Toíbìn on Borges’s life: ⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v28/n09/colm-toibin/don-t-abandon-me⁠⁠ Marina Warner on enigmas and riddles: ⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v29/n03/marina-warner/doubly-damned⁠⁠ Daniel Wassbeim on Sur and Borges’s circle: ⁠⁠https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v10/n05/daniel-waissbein/dying-for-madame-ocampo⁠⁠ Next episode: Marina and Chloe discuss The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington.

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