It's our season finale, and it's a doozy. We explore two texts: Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Shadow" and Ursula K. Le Guin's essay "The Child and the Shadow," which gives an analysis of the fairy tale. We also pull in many of the s

Shang Dynasty Tomb Art: Ancient shamanism for dummies

Apr 16th, 2021 1h 4m

This week we travel back to the Shang Dynasty of China, where we examine tomb art and the lives of the shamans and kings who interpreted the cracking of oracle bones and presided over human sacrifices. Find the images we discuss on our instagra

Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Sexual Awakenings

Apr 2nd, 2021 52m 13s

Today we're trying something new, and discussing a movie that shaped our childhood, even though it was an utter box office flop. It's Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, which came out in 2003 under DreamWorks Animation, and it's a swashbuckling

The Queen of Spades: Close encounters with ghosts and frenemies

Mar 19th, 2021 1h 23m

The Queen of Spades is a fantastic and spooky little tale from Russian literary great Alexander Pushkin. In this episode we enter his magical world of 1830s St. Petersburg, where we attend lavish balls, play cards late into the night, yearn, po

Queer Love: In which Herman Melville is gay and we don't even make a Moby Dick joke

Mar 5th, 2021 1h 2m

In this episode we explore two epistolary romances: one between 17th century samurai and the other between two American writers, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville, with forays into Kabuki theater, scented gel pens, and an honorable mentio

The Uncanny: A Freudian analysis of a certain Netflix show about fairies

Feb 20th, 2021 1h 9m

In a loose continuation of our discussion of "The Sandman," in this episode we delve into the bizarre, fantastical, and spooky world of Sigmund Freud's theories, and find that even though he is both ridiculous and unscientific, there is still

The Sandman: in which we propose Zoolander as the new romantic

Feb 4th, 2021 1h 13m

In this episode we discuss The Sandman, the 1816 short story by ETA Hoffmann. The story has had a substantial influence on fantasy and horror genres, as well as on early psychoanalysis, and as you’ll soon hear, we just love it. It’s full of fun

Howl's Moving Castle: in which we mostly discuss Howl's suits

Feb 2nd, 2021 57m 20s

Howl's Moving Castle is a Studio Ghibli classic, but it was originally based off of a book by the British author Diana Wynne Jones, which happens to be very dear to our hearts. Here we expound on how much we love it, how funny and how insanely

The Illiad: in which Achilles is mad

Feb 1st, 2021 1h 2m

Here we kick off our first episode of Credo Quia Absurdum! This week, we are analyzing a classical text, the Iliad. We talk about the story, the history, and our favorite homeric moments. Content warnings: Some discussion of violence, gore, dea

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