The Literary Life Podcast Angelina Stanford Thomas Banks
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Not just book chat! The Literary Life Podcast is an ongoing conversation about the skill and art of reading well and the lost intellectual tradition needed to fully enter into the great works of literature.
Experienced teachers Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks (of www.HouseOfHumaneLetters.com) join lifelong reader Cindy Rollins (of www.MorningtimeForMoms.com) for slow reads of classic literature, conversations with book lovers, and an ever-unfolding discussion of how Stories Will Save the World.
And check out our sister podcast The Well Read Poem with poet Thomas Banks.
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“Agnes Grey” by Anne Brontë, Introduction and Ch. 1-5
Today on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks begin a new book discussion series covering Anne Brontë’s Victorian novel Agnes Grey. This week they are giving an introduction to the social and literary climate in which Anne was writing, as well as discussing chapters 1-5 of the book.
Thomas shares a little information on Utilitarianism, and Angelina talks about how this affected the literature of the Victorian period. She also points out that the Brontës were writing in the medieval literary tradition rather than the didactic or realistic style, and as such we should look for symbols and metaphors in their journey of the soul. Thomas and Angelina explore the background of the Brontë sisters, discuss the position of the governess in this time period, and compare Agnes Grey to other governess novels.
Diving into the first five chapters of this book, Angelina and Thomas look at the life of young Agnes Grey and at her family. In treating the characters in the early chapters, they talk about Agnes Grey’s first forays into the life of the governess, the horrid children in her care, their irresponsible parents, and more.
Check out the schedule for the podcast’s summer episodes on our Upcoming Events page. If you haven’t heard about Cindy Rollins’ upcoming Summer Discipleship series, you can learn more about that over at MorningTimeforMoms.com.
In June Mr. Banks will be teaching a 5-day class on St. Augustine, and in July Dr. Jason Baxter will be teaching a class on Dostoevsky. Also, don’t miss the launch the HHL publishing wing, Cassiodorus Press! Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.com to stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up!
Commonplace Quotes: Truth is the trial of itself,/ And needs no other touch.
Ben Jonson The previous literary life of this country had left vigorous many old forces in the Victorian time, as in our time. Roman Britain and Mediæval England are still not only alive but lively; for real development is not leaving things behind, as on a road, but drawing life from them, as from a root. Even when we improve we never progress. For progress, the metaphor from the road, implies a man leaving his home behind him: but improvement means a man exalting the towers or extending the gardens of his home.
G. K. Chesterton, The Victorian Age in Literature Ganymede By W. H. Auden
He looked in all His wisdom from the throne
Down on that humble boy who kept the sheep,
And sent a dove; the dove returned alone:
Youth liked the music, but soon fell asleep.
But He had planned such future for the youth:
Surely, His duty now was to compel.
For later he would come to love the truth,
And own his gratitude. His eagle fell.
It did not work. His conversation bored
The boy who yawned and whistled and made faces,
And wriggled free from fatherly embraces;
But with the eagle he was always willing
To go where it suggested, and adored
And learnt from it so many ways of killing. Book List: George MacDonald
Charles Dickens
Lewis Carroll
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot
Tom Jones by Henry Fielding
Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe
Adam Bede by George Eliot
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier
My Cousin Rachel by Daphne Du Maurier
The Infernal World of Bramwell Brontë by Daphne Du Maurier
Thomas Hardy
Villette by Charlotte Brontë
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
Mary Poppins by P. L. Travers
The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
Esther Waters by George Moore
Support The Literary Life: Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us: You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/
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“Best of” The Literary Life – “The Machine Stops” by E. M. Forster
This week on The Literary Life, we bring you another episode in our “Best of” series with a throwback to one of our 2021 Summer of the Short Story shows. In this episode, Angelina, Cindy, and Thomas talk about E. M. Forster’s short story “The Machine Stops.” If you are interested in more E. M. Forster chat, you can go listen to our hosts discuss “The Celestial Omnibus” in Episode 17. Angelina points out how this story made her think of Dante. Thomas and Cindy share their personal reactions to reading “The Machine Stops.” They marvel at how prescient Forster was to imagine a world that comes so close to our current reality. They also discuss how to stay human in an increasingly de-humanizing world.
Past events mentioned in this episode replay:
Back to School 2021 Conference: Awakening
Cindy’s new edition of Morning Time: A Liturgy of Love
Cindy’s Charlotte Mason podcast The New Mason Jar
Commonplace Quotes: Imagination, in its earthbound quest,
Seeks in the infinite its finite rest.
Walter de la Mare (from “Books”) from “The Hollow Men” by T. S. Eliot
This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this
In death’s other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death’s twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.
Book List: Two Stories and a Memory by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Howards End by E. M. Forster
The Great Divorce by C. S. Lewis
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
The Worm Ouroboros by E. R. Eddison
1984 by George Orwell
Support The Literary Life: Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us: You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/
Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let’s get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB -
“Tartuffe” by Moliere, Acts 3 - 5
On today’s episode of The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina and Thomas wrap up their series on the satirical comedy Tartuffe by Jean-Baptiste Moliere. If you want to listen in to the read along of this play, you can view replays on the readings on the House of Humane Letters YouTube channel. Angelina and Thomas start off the conversation on the play reviewing the idea of enchantment and the classical structural elements of this play as suggested by Aristotle. We finally meet Tartuffe himself, and Angelina and Thomas both cringe and laugh at his over-the-top antics.
Check out the schedule for the podcast’s summer episodes on our Upcoming Events page.
In June Mr. Banks will be teaching a 5-day class on St. Augustine, and in July Dr. Jason Baxter will be teaching a class on Dostoevsky. Angelina will also be teaching a class on Harry Potter in August! Also, don’t miss the launch the HHL publishing wing, Cassiodorus Press! Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.comto stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up!
Commonplace Quotes: Moliere…reached perfection through a strange apprenticeship of vagabondage following an excellent middle-class birth among the tradesmen of Paris, imprisoned for debt, tramping the roads with the strolling players, starting his own small theater and failing, meeting men of every kind…In that knowledge he became a master.
Hilaire Belloc, from Monarchy: A Study of Louis XIV A man is angry at a libel because it is false but at a satire because it is true.
G. K. Chesterton Fools are my theme. Let satire be my song.
Lord Byron The Burial of Moliere By Andrew Lang
“Dark and amusing he is, this handsome gallant, Of chamois-polished charm, Athlete and dancer of uncommon talent— Is there cause for alarm In his smooth demeanor, the proud tilt of his chin, This cavaliere servente, this Harlequin? “Gentle and kindly this other, ardent but shy, With an intelligence Who would not glory to be guided by— And would it not make sense To trust in someone so devoted, so Worshipful as this tender, pale Pierrot? “Since both of them delight, if I must choose I win a matchless mate, But by that very winning choice I lose— I pause, I hesitate, Putting decision off,” says Columbine, “And while I hesitate, they both are mine.” Book List: An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde
Don Juan by Moliere
Don Juan by Lord Byron
Enthusiasm by Ronald Knox
Support The Literary Life: Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us: You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/
Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let’s get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB -
“Tartuffe” by Moliere, Introduction and Acts 1 & 2
This week on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks delve into a new literary series as we read the comedic play Tartuffe by Jean-Baptiste Moliere. If you want to listen in to the read along of this play, you can view replays on the readings on the House of Humane Letters YouTube channel. Thomas begins the conversation on this play by setting up the cultural and literary context in which Moliere was working, as well as some more biographical background on the author and actor himself. Angelina points out some differences between satire and didacticism. She and Thomas also talk about the influence of Roman comedy in Moliere’s playwriting.
Angelina introduces Act 1 with a question of how Moliere shows the audience what to think of Tartuffe before the character himself ever comes on stage. Thomas talks a little about the characters we first meet, and Angelina highlights the references to enchantments as they read through key portions of these opening scenes. Join us again next week when we will finish up this entertaining play!
If you weren’t able to join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination“, you can still purchase the recordings and find out what you missed! Also, don’t miss the launch the HHL publishing wing, Cassiodorus Press! Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.com to stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up!
Commonplace Quotes: He had the comic vision of himself as well as of the rest of humanity. He might mock the vices of the world, but he could also mock himself for hating the world, in the spirit of a superior person, on account of its vices.
Robert Lynn, from his essay “Moliere” in Books and Authors We think old books are strange; but we are the aliens.
Dr. Jason Baxter The Burial of Moliere By Andrew Lang
Dead–he is dead! The rouge has left a trace
On that thin cheek where shone, perchance, a tear,
Even while the people laughed that held him dear
But yesterday. He died,–and not in grace,
And many a black-robed caitiff starts apace
To slander him whose Tartuffe made them fear,
And gold must win a passage for his bier,
And bribe the crowd that guards his resting-place.
Ah, Moliere, for that last time of all,
Man’s hatred broke upon thee, and went by,
And did but make more fair thy funeral.
Though in the dark they hid thee stealthily,
Thy coffin had the cope of night for pall,
For torch, the stars along the windy sky!
Book List: Menaechmi, or The Twin-Brothers by Plautus
Code of the Woosters by P. G. Wodehouse
Support The Literary Life: Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us: You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/
Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let’s get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB -
Fairy Tales and Children’s Literature with Dr. Vigen Guroian
Welcome to a new episode of The Literary Life podcast and an interview with special guest Dr. Vigen Guroian, retired professor of Religious Studies and Orthodox Christianity at the University of Virginia and author of twelve book and numerous scholarly articles. Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks discuss with Dr. Guroian the new edition of his book, Tending the Heart of Virtue. They start out talking about how the first edition of this book came about, which leads into a discussion about the current approach to fairy tales and children’s stories in both academia and the publishing industry.
Other topics of conversation include the problem with reducing stories down to a moral, story as mystery, the place of fairy tales in classical education, and the Biblical literacy of the authors of fairy tales. Dr. Guroian also shares his thoughts on people like John Ruskin and Rudyard Kipling. Finally, he shares some suggestions on finding good editions of fairy tale collections. (Scroll down for links to his book recommendations.)
Commonplace Quotes: It seems to me appropriate, almost inevitable, that when that great Imagination which in the beginning, for Its own delight and for the delight of men and angels and (in their proper mode) of beasts, had invented and formed the whole world of Nature, submitted to express Itself in human speech, that speech should sometimes be poetry. For poetry too is a little incarnation, giving body to what had been before invisible and inaudible.
C. S. Lewis, from Reflections on the Psalms Reason is the natural organ of truth, but imagination is the organ of meaning.
C. S. Lewis Inertia has served them so well that they did not know how to relinquish it.
E. M. Forster, from Pharos and Pharillon “Happy children,” say I, “who could blunder into the very heart of the will of God concerning them, and do the thing at once that the Lord taught them, using the common sense which God had given and the fairy tale nourished!” The Lord of the promise is the Lord of all true parables and all good fairy tales.
George MacDonald, from The Elect Lady The Spring By Thomas Carew
Now that the winter's gone, the earth hath lost Her snow-white robes, and now no more the frost Candies the grass, or casts an icy cream Upon the silver lake or crystal stream; But the warm sun thaws the benumbed earth, And makes it tender; gives a sacred birth To the dead swallow; wakes in hollow tree The drowsy cuckoo, and the humble-bee. Now do a choir of chirping minstrels bring In triumph to the world the youthful Spring. The valleys, hills, and woods in rich array Welcome the coming of the long'd-for May. Now all things smile, only my love doth lour; Nor hath the scalding noonday sun the power To melt that marble ice, which still doth hold Her heart congeal'd, and makes her pity cold. The ox, which lately did for shelter fly Into the stall, doth now securely lie In open fields; and love no more is made By the fireside, but in the cooler shade Amyntas now doth with his Chloris sleep Under a sycamore, and all things keep Time with the season; only she doth carry June in her eyes, in her heart January. Book List: Tending the Heart of Virtue, 2nd Edition by Dr. Vigen Guroian
Reflections on the Psalms by C. S. Lewis
Pharos and Pharillon by E. M. Forster
The Elect Lady by George MacDonald
The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin
The Lost Princess or The Wise Woman by George MacDonald
The Victorian Fairy Tale Book ed. by Michael Patrick Hearn
The Classic Fairy Tales ed. by Iona and Peter Opie
The Classic Fairy Tales ed. by Maria Tatar
Brothers Grimm: Selected Tales trans. by David Luke
The Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm trans. by Jack Zipes
Hans Christian Andersen: The Complete Fairy Tales and Stories trans. by Erik Christian Haugaard
Den Lille Havfrue og andre historier/The Little Mermaid and Other Stories by Hans Christian Andersen, trans. by Tony J. Richardson
Hans Christian Anderson: Fairy Tal -
“Best of” Series – Why Read Old Books, Ep. 80
Today on The Literary Life Podcast, we bring you another episode in our “Best of” series in which Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks discuss the importance of reading old books. They begin the conversation by addressing head on the idea that old books are irrelevant. They touch on the fact that when we use the phrase “old books” we mean not just any piece of literature from the past, but those which have stood the test of time.
It’s not too late to join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination” happening this week! During the live or later series of webinars, we will seek to dis-spell the Myth of Modernity and gain eyes to see and ears to hear Reality as it truly is. Speakers include Jason Baxter, Jenn Rogers, and Kelly Cumbee, in addition to Angelina and Thomas.
Commonplace Quotes: So, when his Folly opens
The unnecessary hells,
A Servant when He Reigneth
Throws the blame on some one else.
Rudyard Kipling I am informed by philologists that the “rise to power” of these two words, “problem” and “solution” as the dominating terms of public debate, is an affair of the last two centuries, and especially of the nineteenth, having synchronised, so they say, with a parallel “rise to power” of the word “happiness”—for reasons which doubtless exist and would be interesting to discover. Like “happiness”, our two terms “problem” and “solution” are not to be found in the Bible—a point which gives to that wonderful literature a singular charm and cogency. . . . On the whole, the influence of these words is malign, and becomes increasingly so. They have deluded poor men with Messianic expectations . . . which are fatal to steadfast persistence in good workmanship and to well-doing in general. . . . Let the valiant citizen never be ashamed to confess that he has no “solution of the social problem” to offer to his fellow-men. Let him offer them rather the service of his skill, his vigilance, his fortitude and his probity. For the matter in question is not, primarily, a “problem”, nor the answer to it a “solution”.
L. P. Jacks, Stevenson Lectures Most of all, perhaps, we need intimate knowledge of the past. Not that the past has any magic about it, but because we cannot study the future, and yet need something to set against the present, to remind us that the basic assumptions have been quite different in different periods and that much which seems certain to the uneducated is merely temporary fashion. A man who has lived in many places is not likely to be deceived by the local errors of his native village; the scholar has lived in many times and is therefore in some degree immune from the great cataract of nonsense that pours from the press and the microphone of his own age.
C. S. Lewis To Walter de la Mare by T. S. Elliot
The children who explored the brook and found
A desert island with a sandy cove
(A hiding place, but very dangerous ground,
For here the water buffalo may rove,
The kinkajou, the mungabey, abound
In the dark jungle of a mango grove,
And shadowy lemurs glide from tree to tree –
The guardians of some long-lost treasure-trove)
Recount their exploits at the nursery tea
And when the lamps are lit and curtains drawn
Demand some poetry, please. Whose shall it be,
At not quite time for bed?…
Or when the lawn
Is pressed by unseen feet, and ghosts return
Gently at twilight, gently go at dawn,
The sad intangible who grieve and yearn;
When the familiar is suddenly strange
Or the well known is what we yet have to learn,
And two worlds meet, and intersect, and change;
When cats are maddened in the moonlight dance,
Dogs cower, flitter bats, and owls range
At witches’ sabbath of the maiden aunts;
When the nocturnal traveller can arouse
No sleeper by his call; or when by chance
An empty face peers from an empty house;
By w