Welcome to Shorts, a miniseries where we interview the publishers of new and daring work. This week we're talking to Eric Obenauf, who, along with his partner, cofounded the small, Ohio-based press Two Dollar Radio. We hear how their youthful idealism has evolved over the years, find out what kind of writing piques their interest, and discover which of their books Barry Manilow might enjoy.

In this extended teaser, we share the first three of seven "chapters" discussing one of the foremost Chinese classical novels, Dream of the Red Chamber by Cao Xueqin. With over 400 characters, the novel details everyday life in the Qing dynasty as well as some of the most extraordinary scenes put to paper.

It's our longest episode ever. Hear the complete version on our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Dylan and Kassia return to discuss Castle Gripsholm written by Kurt Tucholsky and translated from German by Michael Hofmann. The novel tells the story of "the Princess" and her lover on holiday in Sweden. It's a simple summertime fairy tale ... or is it? We talk about metafiction, love and friendship, and the book's sly critique of 1930s Germany.

The Last Sane Woman review: https://therumpus.net/2024/07/16/the-archive-as-potters-field-hannah-regels-the-last-sane-woman/

NYRB Classics film adaptations list: https://letterboxd.com/greenchile42/list/nyrb-classics/

And finally, our Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Dylan and Kassia read Strange Pilgrims, a short story collection suggested by a listener.

To hear the full episode, join our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Dylan and Kassia discuss Howard Sturgis' 1904 novel Belchamber. It follows the coming of age of Sainty, a not-so-average English boy who prefers needlepoint to riding and Tennyson to girls. We talk about the novel's interweaving of comedy and tragedy, the nature of being a sissy, and, of course, Henry James' famous critiques.

If you want to hear extra episodes, explore our Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Screenwriter Howard A. Rodman joins us to discuss Jean-Patrick Manchette's Skeletons in the Closet, translated from French by Alyson Waters. This is a private eye novel set in Paris after the failed revolution of May 68. We talk about Manchette's playfulness with genre, the brutal yet slapstick violence in his books, and his collapse of high-versus-low distinctions.

Check out our Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Tolkien enthusiast Alex Cuellar joins us to discuss The Silmarillion. One of us has to test the limits of our edurance for the fantasy genre.

To hear the full episode, sign up to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Leaf by Leaf host Chris Via joins us to discuss John Ehle's 1964 novel The Land Breakers. It is a story of love, sacrifice, and survival in an unspoilt Appalachian landscape. We talk about the book's nuanced character development, the violent birthing pangs of early America, plus the similiarities and differences between Ehle's bear hunt and Melville's whale watch.

Explore our bonus material here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

In this clip, we hear about how McNally Editions editor Lucy Scholes came to rediscover English author Kay Dick and her dystopian novel They.

To listen to the full conversation, check out our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Author Linda Rosenkrantz joins us to discuss her 1968 "reality novel" Talk. In the summer of 65, Rosenkrantz took a tape recorder to the beach and documented her friends' conversations. She later shaped the transcripts from that trip into a sharp, funny, and unusually revealing book. We speak with her about her contrasting experiences with publishing then and now, her artistic inspirations, other tape recording projects, and more.

Explore our Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Novelist Amit Chaudhuri joins us for a wide-ranging conversation as his first three books (A Strange and Sublime Address, Afternoon Raag, and Freedom Song) are republished as NYRB Classics. We talk about his uneasy relationship with the realist novel, the literary market's distortions of value, and the role place plays in his creative project.

To hear the full episode, join our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

In this brief clip, publisher Kate Macdonald shares the story of writer T. H. White's most beloved dog, Brownie. In the full episode, we talk about Sylvia Townsend Warner's approach to biography, White's Arthurian cycle, and the unglamorous side of being an author.

To listen, join our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

We discuss Patrick Hamilton's 1947 novel The Slaves of Solitude with Spinster September creator Nora. The story concerns Miss Roach, an unmarried woman scraping through WWII on the outskirts of London. The episode covers the meaning of spinsterdom, Hamilton's black humor, and how crisis skews perspective.

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We are joined by author Helen Macdonald to discuss T. H. White's The Goshawk, originally published in 1951. In this conversation, we talk about the devotion required to train a hawk, what one learns during the process, and how White's book haunted our guest.

For more on White's biography, join us on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Writer Patrick Preziosi rejoins the show to talk about an Italian favorite: Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's The Leopard. In this clip, we talk about the Sicilian prince's strange path to publication and how his other short works illuminate this masterpiece. Listen to the full episode to hear our thoughts on Visconti's film adaptation, Lampedusa's prose, and what it's like to read the novel in Sicily.

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Writer Bijan Stephen joins us to discuss David R. Bunch's short story collection Moderan. In Moderan, people replace their "soft parts" with metal and devote their lives to making war. We talk about Bunch's satire of the international order, his wildly innovative use of language, and his commitment to depicting a utopian hellscape.

Read Bijan's article on Moderan here: https://dirt.fyi/article/2022/06/the-future-is-moderan

Check out Chris Lee's fantastic travelogue: https://chrisleefrancis.com/books/eastwards-and-far/

And, as always, we would love to have you over on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Poet and writer Alina Stefanescu joins us to discuss her own pantheon of "tortured poets" in the wake of a pop star's adoption of the phrase.

Check out Alina's writing here: https://www.alinastefanescuwriter.com/

To hear the full episode, become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

After mentioning the book in our Mary Olivier episode, writer and librarian Nancy Pearl returns to discuss Ruth Adam's I'm Not Complaining, one of her favorite Virago Modern Classics. In this clip, Nancy talks about the novel's unique angle on the Great Depression.

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Writer and co-host of the Vollmannia podcast Ryan Alexander joins us to discuss Moravagine, first published in 1926. The novel was written by Blaise Cendrars (given name: Frédéric-Louis Sauser) and translated from French by Alan Brown. The plot involves a monstrous criminal who, once released from a mental hospital, goes on a worldwide killing spree before returning to Europe to fight in World War I. We talk about the book's unique representation of violence, its social commentary on misogyny and antisemitism, and the false promises of progress.

Check out Ryan's excellent show here: https://vollmannia.buzzsprout.com/

And, for two more book-related episodes a month, our Patreon is a steal: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Enjoy this clip from our bonus episode covering Celia Dale's sinister novel A Spring of Love with culture critic Andrew Male. The book is being reprinted by Daunt Books in September and is available for pre-order now.

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In this bonus episode, we speak with writer and editor Anthony Garrett about Atmospheric Quarterly, the new literary magazine he co-founded. Read it here: https://www.atmosphericquarterly.com/

Author Laila Lalami joins us to discuss Tayeb Salih's novel Season of Migration to the North translated from Arabic by Denys Johnson-Davies. We talk about the book's postcolonial themes, its treatment of women's roles, and transformation of the Western canon.

Read more about our guest's work here: https://lailalalami.com/

Want to support the show? Explore our Patreon tiers here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Max Lawton joins us to discuss his new translation of Vladimir Sorokin's Blue Lard, a controversial Russian novel originally published in 1999. We talk about where this book fits into Sorokin's varied career, its irreverent treatment of political and literary icons, and the spirit of freedom that permeates every page.

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We test Dylan's theory that all stories can be classified as either an Iliad or Odyssey by going through the list of NYRB Classics that we've covered. 

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In this bonus teaser, we discuss a work of experimental poetry chosen by a patron.

Explore the hidden character of the vowels here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Writer and translator Frank Wynne joins us to discuss The Radiance of the King written by Camara Laye and translated from French by James Kirkup. We talk about the book's hilarious absurdity, reversal of Western tropes, and mysterious ending.

Read more about our guest's work here: https://www.terribleman.com/

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This Valentine's Day, we decided to revisit a romantic classic that one of us hates and the other loves. Will the cynic be persuaded to change their heart?

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Chris Clarke joins us to discuss his new translation of Raymond Queneau's The Skin of Dreams. This delightful novel follows the wild imaginings of a daydreamer as he ventures from his dull reality in the outskirts of Paris to the glamorous heart of Hollywood. We talk about the challenge of rendering the original's linguistic playfulness in English and how Queneau's love of cinema helped inspire the book's form.

Designer Katy Homans reveals the secrets behind those iconic NYRB Classics covers, and we find out what color Edwin Frank hates the most.

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In this episode, Kassia and Dylan discuss the Japanese novel Tun-huang written by Yasushi Inoue and translated by Jean Oda Moy. This work of historical fiction imagines how a trove of early Buddhist sutras came to be hidden in caves along the Silk Road for centuries. We talk about the book’s criticism of education, bureaucracy, and materialism, as well as the significance of freedom, preservation, and translation.

Interested in supporting the show? Check out our Patreon page here: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Chapo Trap House co-host Will Menaker joins us to talk about Moby-Dick by Herman Melville. Recorded amid a marathon reading of Melville's masterwork, we discuss the book's prophetic vision of America and the popular culture that it spawned. Will reads from his favorite section of the novel and gives a pitch for why it should be read today.

To listen to the full episode, head over to our Patreon page and subscribe: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

This episode was recorded before a live audience at the New Bedford Whaling Museum during their annual Moby-Dick Marathon. We spoke with Tim Marr and Wyn Kelley of the Melville Society Cultural Project about Melville: A Novel written by Jean Giono and translated from French by Paul Eprile. Giono's "novel" was originally conceived as a preface to his French translation of Moby-Dick. Our conversation covers Giono's imagined vision of the great American author, the struggle to create art, and the role of an ideal reader.

We have more special Moby-Dick content coming soon on our Patreon! Check out our page here: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Book blogger, podcaster, and Ivy Compton-Burnett admirer Simon Thomas returns to discuss his work with the British Library Women Writers series and his favorite book in it: O, the Brave Music by Dorothy Evelyn Smith. We talk about the ethics of censorship in republishing and what makes this coming-of-age story so strangely uplifting despite its tragic elements. Toward the end, we debrief last summer's NYRB Classics bracket championship.

To listen to the full episode, head over to our Patreon page and subscribe: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Writer and filmmaker Tariq Ali joins us to discuss Muhammad written by Maxime Rodinson and translated from French by Anne Carter. We talk about Rodinson's Marxist perspective, how the biography works as an "antidote" to far-right sentiment, and what it means to read it during a war in Gaza.

Check out our Patreon here: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Author, journalist, and critic Renata Adler joins us in person for a discussion of her novels Speedboat and Pitch Dark, both reprinted as NYRB Classics. We also talk about her career in journalism, reactions to criticism, and thoughts on persona.

In this enlightening conversation, we talk to scholar Dan Sinykin about his book Big Fiction, which details the rise of conglomeration in American publishing and its impact on the kind of fiction that gets written, released, and acclaimed. We were delighted to hear his insights into the founding of the New York Review of Books, Renata Adler and Elizabeth Hardwick's use of autofiction, and the current spate of literature in translation.

To listen to the full episode, head over to our Patreon page and subscribe: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Poet Diane Mehta joins us to discuss Dante's Inferno translated by Ciaran Carson. We talk about our guest's ongoing Dante project, the multiple levels the text works on, and how, in the Florentine's view, the greatest sins stem from a lack of love.

We recently launched a Patreon featuring two exclusive bonus episodes a month! Check out our three patron tiers (Minor Work, Instant Classic, and Magnus Opus) here. And be sure to grab Tiny Extravaganzas (we especially love "Shredder") and read more about our guest's work here.

Returning guest Michael Barron joins us to discuss Roberto Bolaño's "curio" published near the end of his life. We talk about Bolaño's universe, his unromantic youth, and why this is the only book that doesn't embarrass him. To hear the full episode, head over to our Patreon page and subscribe: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

In this taster for the Patreon, Dylan and Kassia compete to draft their four favorite books covered on the show thus far. If you're interested in more lighthearted episodes like this, please consider trying out a subscription here: patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Writer Esther Allen joins us to discuss her translation of Antonio di Benedetto's Zama, an Argentine existential novel originally published 1956. We discuss the intricacies of translation, the author's repudiation of the idea of a historical novel, and Lucrecia Martel's 2017 film adaptation of the story. Listeners unfamiliar with the plot may want to read the book (and watch the movie) before tuning in.

References:

Burton Pike
The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil
Jorge Luis Borges
Julio Cortázar
The Silentiary
The Suicides
César Aira
Roberto Bolaño
The Sound of Music
Werner Herzog
Aguirre, the Wrath of God
"Sensini" by Bolaño
Guido Boggiani
Canaan Morse
Peach Blossom Paradise
Waiting for Godot
Samuel Beckett
Daisy Rockwell
Benjamin Kunkel
In a Lonely Place
"Benito Cereno" by Herman Melville
Juan José Saer
Federico Fellini
Roberto Bolaño's Fiction: An Expanding Universe by Chris Andrews

Find us on Twitter or Instagram.

Writer and editor Michael Barron joins us to share this short story collection from Julio Ramón Ribeyro. We discuss issues of class, the stereotyping of Latin American literature, and what it means to be "speechless." This book is one to be shared. Pass it on.

Read more about our guest's work here.

References:
Alejandro Zambra
Gabriel García Márquez
Jorge Luis Borges
Franz Kafka
Julio Cortázar
Mario Vargas Llosa
The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Katherine Silver
Calvin and Hobbes
Tár

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Author James Kelman joins us to discuss James Hogg's The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, originally published in 1824. It tells the story of a staunch Calvininst who is lured into a killing spree by a mysterious, shapeshifting being. We discuss the novel's unusual structure, moral ambiguity, and mixture of genres. Kelman offers historical insight into the book's philospophy and places the work in a modern, international context.

References:
Andre Gide
Franz Kafka
The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides by James Boswell and Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland by Samuel Johnson
The Collected Letters of James Hogg
The Brownie of Bodsbeck
John Brown
William Blake
Edgar Allan Poe
Robert Louis Stevenson
Dracula by Bram Stoker
Samuel Beckett
The Castle
The Trial
Peggotty in David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
Immanuel Kant
David Hume
Adam Smith
Francis Hutchinson
James Clerk Maxwell
Hegel
Karl Marx
Soren Kierkegaard
Rene Decartes
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Blackwood's Magazine
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Francisco Goya
William Wordsworth
Strange Case of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde
How Late It Was, How Late
Robert the Bruce
Goethe
Albert Camus
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Jack Kerouac
Knut Hamsun
Lucinda Williams
Tom Leonard

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Writer and scholar Sheridan Hay joins us to discuss The Other House by Henry James. An unusual work for the author in that it contains his only murder, we analyze the novel's theatrical inspiration, bizarre tone, and gruesome climax. Please be wary as we wound up spoiling this one earlier than we normally do.

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Writer and critic Patrick Preziosi joins us to discuss Cesare Pavese's The Moon and the Bonfires, translated from Italian by R. W. Flint. The story features a nameless narrator who returns to his native Italy from America in the wake of World War II. We talk about the ghosts of the past, the cyclical nature of violence, and the innate desire to find one's home.

Be sure to follow Patrick on Twitter here.

References:
Jean-Marie Straub and Daniele Huillet
Natalia Ginzburg
Family Lexicon
A Private Affair by Beppe Fenoglio
The Little Virtues
Jacques Tourneur
The Business of Living or The Burning Brand
The Selected Works of Cesare Pavese
The House on the Hill
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
Michaelangelo Antonioni
Jean-Patrick Manchette
Muriel Spark
Conversations in Siciliy by Elio Vittorini
Alina Stefanescu

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Musician and author John Darnielle joins us to discuss A House and Its Head by Ivy Compton-Burnett, a wickedly funny novel first published in 1935. We talk about how Compton-Burnett's family background did or did not shape her style, explore the influence of Greek drama on her approach to narrative, and try to understand why we find her characters' conversations about horrific acts so hilarious.

Pre-order the new Mountain Goats album and check our their tour dates here.

References:
The Life of Ivy Compton-Burnett by Hilary Spurling
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Mikhail Bulgakov
Jack Kerouac
Francine Prose
Devil House
Immanuel Kant
Jacques Derrida
Joan Didion
Propagandhi
Robert E. Howard
Wolf in White Van
Universal Harvester
Minotaur by Benjamin Tammuz
Europa Editions
Robert Liddell
Elizabeth Taylor
Jane Austen
Charlotte Brontë
J. D. Salinger
Charles Dickens
Yasujiro Ozu
Seinfeld
Michael Fengler and Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Why Does Herr R. Run Amok?
On the Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles
Medea by Euripides
Oedipus Rex by Sophocles
Seven Against Thebes by Aeschylus
Geoffrey Chaucer
A Compton-Burnett Compendium by Violet Powell
Anthony Powell
Mary Olivier: A Life by May Sinclair
Thomas Hardy
"Notes on Camp" by Susan Sontag
John Waters' Polyester
Edward Albee
J. M. Synge
Mother and Son
Virago Modern Classics
More Women Than Men
Oscar Wilde

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

In this episode, we break from our usual format and discuss a recent "literary" road trip through New England. We share our thoughts on the Moby-Dick-centrism of Herman Melville's Arrowhead and on Edith Wharton's humble writer's retreat The Mount, which could reasonably accomodate a pod of whales, not to mention Henry James, Howard Sturgis, and friends. In Lennox, we run into the owner of The Bookstore, who was recently the subject of a bittersweet documentary entitled Hello, Bookstore.

To hear all this and more, check out our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84429384

Washington Post books editor John Williams joins us to discuss... John Williams' Butcher's Crossing, orginally published in 1960. The story, set in the 1870s, follows a Harvard dropout as he attempts to find a truer version of himself in the West. We talk about the book's challenge to Emersonian transcendentalism, American rapaciousness, and Western archetypes. (And worry not, we don't play the theme to Star Wars.)

References:
Stoner
William Maxwell
Henry James
Jean-Patrick Manchette
Eve Babitz
Barbara Comyns
Tove Jansson
Natalia Ginzburg
Sylvia Townsend Warner
Albert Bierstadt
Anthony Mann
Budd Boetticher
The Coen brothers
Clint Eastwood
"Nature" by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Fred Schneider
The Confidence-Man by Herman Melville
Kurtz from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
John Ford's The Searchers
John Wayne
Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
"Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving
Edward Abbey

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Writer and poet Vivek Narayanan joins us to discuss L. P. Hartley's The Go-Between. We talk about how Hartley, in this novel about a schoolboy's loss of innocence at the turn of the 20th century, explores childhood guilt and dramatizes the act of memory.

Follow Vivek on Twitter, and find out more about his work here.

References:
Ali Smith
Valmiki
Virginia Woolf
The Boat
Eustace and Hilda
Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
Fredoon Kabraji
Lagaan
The Ashes
The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Kim McNeill joins us to dicuss Thus Were Their Faces, a collection of short stories written by Silvina Ocampo and translated from Spanish by Daniel Balderston. We explore Ocampo's various renditions of cruelty, trace themes and motifs across her career, and use the F-word (feminism).

Follow along with Kim's splendid #NYRBWomen23 project here.

References:
The Levant Trilogy by Olivia Manning
The Tale of Genji
Pilgrimage by Dorothy Richardson
A Chill in the Air by Iris Origo
More Was Lost by Eleanor Perenyi
Sylvia Townsend Warner
Robert Walser
The Corner That Held Them
Sur
Victoria Ocampo
Jorge Luis Borges
Adolfo Bioy Casares
City Lights Books
Forgotten Journey
The Promise
Norah Lange
Mariana Enriquez
Remedios Varo
Helen Oyeyemi
Virginia Woolf
"Borges and I"
The Invention of Morel
Lucrecia Martel
Read Cynthia Duncan's article here
Ezekiel
Mary Olivier: A Life by May Sinclair
James Joyce

Find us on Twitter or Instagram, and click here to view our most up-to-date episode schedule.

Writer Valerie Stivers joins us to discuss Elizabeth David's Summer Cooking. Originally published in 1955, this cookbook celebrates the fleeting freshness and enduring joy of the summer season. We seek the origins of David's refreshing approach to cooking, ponder the uses of food photography, and learn how Valerie's David-inspired menu came together.

Find all of our guest's Paris Review columns here, and read her reviews for Compact Magazine here.

References:
Nikolai Gogol
Richard Brautigan
Writing at the Kitchen Table by Artemis Cooper
Norman Douglas
Antony Beevor
Giovanna Garzoni
Victoria Granof
Rachel Roddy
Erica MacLean
Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan
Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child

Find us on Twitter or Instagram to join in on our #SummerofDavid. Here is our most updated episode schedule. To purchase books we've covered, please visit our digital bookshop. Buying them here helps to support the show.