The World in Time / Lapham’s Quarterly Podcast
1) Episode 82: David Wengrow
“If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers,” David Wengrow, an archaeologist, and the late David Graeber, an anthropologist, write at the beginnin...Show More
2) Episode 14: Charles Baxter on “The Sermon”
“Father Mapple is in some strange, almost obscure way, a kind of negative double for Ahab,” says novelist and critic Charles Baxter in this episode of The World in Time. “Like Ahab, he is speaking fro...Show More
3) Episode 13: Nicholas Boggs on James Baldwin
“They were against all categories,” says Nicholas Boggs of James Baldwin and the men he loved in this week’s episode of The World in Time. “They really were outsiders, all of them. Sometimes people th...Show More
4) Episode 12: James Marcus on Emerson and Melville
“In this part of the essay, Emerson is talking about walking a lot, you know, sort of walking through nature, taking a stroll,” says James Marcus in this week’s episode of The World in Time. “He has t...Show More
5) Episode 11: Matthew Hollis on "The Seafarer"
“This is a sea that will take your life,” says Matthew Hollis in this week’s episode of The World in Time. “This is the cruel sea. This is the hard sea. And it takes extraordinary skill and good luck ...Show More
6) Episode 10: "Loomings," with Francine Prose
“Well, I mean for starters it still is the greatest first sentence ever,” says Francine Prose in this week’s episode of The World in Time. “I mean, three words. A three-word first sentence. I think if...Show More
7) Episode 9: Roger Berkowitz
“In tyranny, you may not have a whole lot of political freedom, but you can still live a pretty free life under tyranny,” says Roger Berkowitz in this week’s episode of The World in Time. “In your pri...Show More
8) Episode 8: Herman Melville, Extracted (with Wyatt Mason)
“There’s something I find strangely moving about the ‘Extracts’ section of Moby Dick—before we even get into the text—by virtue of the attention that has been paid to the whale,” writer Wyatt Mason sa...Show More
9) Episode 7: Daniel Mendelsohn and Lewis H. Lapham
“In a famous episode, he says his name is Nobody, which in a way is obviously a lie,” says writer, scholar, and translator Daniel Mendelsohn in this episode of The World in Time. “But in another way i...Show More
10) Episode 6: Justin Smith-Ruiu and Rachel Richardson
“So what is a drug?” asks scholar-essayist Justin Smith-Ruiu in this week’s episode of The World in Time. “It’s a dry good that is transported and then sold in a particular measurable unit, and until ...Show More