Episode 254: The Literary Life 2025 Season Preview

Summary

The Literary Life Podcast
Episode 254: The Literary Life 2025 Season Preview
Release Date: December 10, 2024

Host(s): Angelina Stanford, Thomas Banks, Cindy Rollins

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1. Introduction and Setting the Stage

The episode kicks off with Cindy Rollins emphasizing the podcast's mission beyond typical book discussions. She states, "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" (00:18).

Angelina Stanford welcomes listeners to a special episode featuring a live studio audience composed of Patreon supporters. She humorously references 80s sitcoms, setting a light-hearted tone for the session (01:28).

2. Reflections on 2024

Before delving into the 2025 preview, the hosts reflect on the past year. Angelina shares her apprehensions about continuing the podcast during Cindy's sabbatical but expresses gratitude for the audience's unwavering support. Thomas humorously critiques the podcast's fleeting position in podcast rankings, highlighting their achievement of reaching number three alongside prestigious platforms like the New York Times Book Review and NPR (18:16).

3. 2025 Season Preview

a. Format Changes

Recognizing that listeners lead busy lives, the hosts announce a shift in the podcast's structure. Instead of focusing solely on long book series, they will introduce more one-off and topical episodes to make content consumption more manageable for their audience (21:00).

b. Upcoming Books and Topics

Literary Lives Series:

• Dr. Ann Phillips: A deep dive into her journey from a homeschool student to a PhD holder, providing insights into her academic and personal growth (22:34).
• Natalia Testa: Highlighting Natalia as Angelina's "mini Me," the episode will explore her contributions and experiences (23:04).

Special Interviews:

• Peter Hitchens: Thomas Banks successfully secures an interview with the acclaimed English journalist, discussing his memoir The Rage Against God and other works. They assure listeners the conversation will steer clear of politics, focusing solely on literary topics (24:25).

Rebroadcasted Episodes:

• Tolstoy's "How Much Land Does a Man Need?": Exploring themes of ambition.
• Guy de Maupassant's "The Necklace": A favorite short story revisited.
• "Enchanted April": A perennial favorite, especially relevant for their upcoming online conference.

New Content:

• Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find": A two-part series introducing O'Connor's work and dissecting the complex short story.
• Rudyard Kipling's "The Jungle Book": Thomas expresses surprise they haven't covered Kipling before and anticipates engaging discussions (42:21).
• Edith Wharton's "The Age of Innocence": Delving into the Gilded Age through Wharton's lens, complemented by a discussion on its film adaptation.
• Christina Rossetti's "Goblin Market": An introduction to Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelites, aimed at poetry enthusiasts.
• Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World": Challenging common misconceptions and exploring the nuanced form of the novel.
• Molière's "Don Juan": Transitioning from play to opera, analyzing the adaptation process and its impact on storytelling.

Webinars and Conferences:

• 2025 Literary Life Online Conference: Themed "The Language Wars," featuring speakers like Dr. Ann Phillips, Jen Rogers, and keynote Dr. Michael Drought. The conference will explore the relationship between language and meaning, referencing Plato and Owen Barfield (35:26).
• Upcoming Webinars:
  • "The Tragedy of Darth Vader": Analyzing the Star Wars prequels as a Greek tragedy.
  • Saint Therese of Lisieux: A guest lecture by Thomas Banks and Michael Williams on the influential French nun.

c. Reader Engagement and Interactive Elements

• Reading Challenge: The 2025 challenge will be "Reader Choice," allowing participants to select from various past challenges, such as "Book of the Centuries" and "Bingo Cards," facilitating personalized reading experiences (52:36).
• Patreon Polls: Listeners can vote on future content, including choosing between Shakespeare's "Much Ado About Nothing" and "The Comedy of Errors" for upcoming episodes, fostering a democratic selection process (50:28).

4. Events and Classes

Summer Activities:

• Harry Potter Series: Rebroadcasting the series in preparation for a new mini-class covering books four and five, expanding on the previous coverage of the first three books.
• Victorian Lives Class: Thomas Banks introduces a new class focusing on prominent figures from the Victorian era, examining their political, artistic, and social contributions through individual lenses (51:49).

Publishing News:

• Dr. Baxter's "Why Literature Still Matters": Excitement builds as the book reaches the printing stage, with endorsements from Cindy Rollins adding to its anticipation. The book is set to be a highlight for the holiday season, with pre-orders available at a discount (08:25).

5. Conclusion

Angelina and Thomas express their enthusiasm for the upcoming year, reflecting on the rich lineup of books, webinars, and interactive content designed to deepen listeners' literary lives. They encourage continued engagement through Patreon and invite feedback to further tailor the podcast's offerings to their audience's interests.

Angelina closes with a heartfelt message: "Keep crafting your literary life, because stories will save the world" (55:52).

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Cindy Rollins (00:18): "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."

• Angelina Stanford (21:00): "I cannot believe that we're going into year six of the podcast."

• Thomas Banks (24:25): "We've agreed not to talk about politics, about anything other than politics. And we said, no, this is not a political discussion."

• Angelina Stanford (55:52): "Until next time, keep crafting your literary life, because stories will save the world."

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Additional Resources

• House of Humane Letters: www.HouseOfHumaneLetters.com
• Morning Time for Moms: www.MorningtimeForMoms.com
• Cassiodorus Press: cassiodoruspress.com
• Patreon: patreon.com/theliterarylife

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This summary provides an overview of Episode 254, capturing the essence of the discussions, upcoming plans, and the interactive nature of The Literary Life Podcast. Whether you're a long-time listener or new to the community, this preview offers a glimpse into a year filled with literary exploration and enriched reading experiences.

Transcript

[Cindy Rollins]

This is not just another book chat podcast. Lifelong reader Cindy Rollins joins teachers Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks for an ongoing conversation about the skill and art of reading. Well, explore the lost intellectual tradition and discover how to fully enter into the great works of literature. Learn what books mean while delighting in the sheer joy of imagination. Each week we will rescue story from the ivory tower and bring it to your couch, your kitchen, and your commute. The literary life is for everyone because in the words of Stratford Caldecott, to be enchanted by story is to be granted a deeper insight into reality. Join us for an ever unfolding discussion of how stories will save the world. This is the Literary Life Podcast.

[Angelina Stanford]

Welcome to a very special episode of the Literary Life Podcast. I am Angelina Stanford, and I'm here not only with the mysterious Mr. Banks, I am here with our live studio audience. Laugh track now. Applause track now. Yes, we are here with our live studio audience, our Patreon, where we are going to be talking about our preview of the 2025 podcast schedule. They're all excited. They're so eager. Look at them. But first, I have to confess that saying out loud, welcome to a very special episode. My mind immediately went back to, like, every 80s sitcom. Like, is this where you confront me because I'm popping caffeine pills to stay awake during finals week?

[Thomas Banks]

Sorry, that one was pretty. That was pretty darn obscure.

[Angelina Stanford]

There was a. Okay. There was a family. All right. Who remembers? There's a Family Ties episode where Alex P. Keaton took caffeine pills to stay. Okay, okay. I see hands raised. That's right. We're aging ourselves. That's right. So there was a. There was always that very. I don't know. For some reason, the 80s felt like our sitcoms had to have some kind of social conscious, and so they would always, like, have that intervention episode.

[Thomas Banks]

Like, I thought the charm of Alex P. Keaton was that he had no social conscious.

[Angelina Stanford]

No, listen, they always had the special. The very special episode. So, like, you have to confront me about my eating disorder or I cheated on finals, or I'm popping caffeine pills are, I got caught at school with a pack of cigarettes. See, those of you who are my age are, like, nodding along like, we know. We know. But fortunately, in the 90s, they came to their senses and there was no more of this. Like, can you imagine a very special episode of Seinfeld? You know, like, like, like Jerry and Elaine are confronting George about. You know, actually, they did a mock of that. They did. Do you remember? They did the Seinfeld episode on the intervention, and they made fun of the whole thing. They did an intervention? Yeah. So they kind of did a send up.

[Thomas Banks]

I think it's because music took it up for them.

[Angelina Stanford]

Social causes.

[Thomas Banks]

Well, like. Well, like REM did for, you know, Everybody Hurts and.

[Angelina Stanford]

Oh, I see, I see. Yeah.

[Thomas Banks]

Seems like a lot of those early.

[Angelina Stanford]

90S, a very special episode of the Office. Like, fortunately, they came to their senses and they still. I hated that as a kid. I just absolutely hated. Okay, Diana says Jesse and Full House was a high school dropout. Did they do a very special episode about stay in school kids? Oh, wow. There was a lot of don't do drugs episode. Like, a lot of don't do drugs episodes. Yeah. All right, well, this will not be any of those if you're at home.

[Thomas Banks]

This is really a downer already, this episode. It can only go up from here.

[Angelina Stanford]

That's right. See, that's my motto. Keep expectations low and then exceed expectations. That's how you keep them coming back for more. Right. All right, so today we are going to be talking with our live studio audience about the upcoming books for 2025. And I'm quite excited about what we have come up with. And like I told them before we pressed record, fake it if you're not happy. I want to see smiles. I don't want to see any, like, tears or anything. I will just lose it right here on the air. I. I need to have so much feedback that I have a total Sally feels moment. Again, you get this if you're a certain age, right? They like me. They really like me. See? Yes. Okay. I can tell how old everyone is by whether or not they got that joke. Okay, very good. Very good. All right. Okay. Naomi says she's been looking forward to this. Very good.

[Thomas Banks]

I think, like, a good definition of being classically educated at this point is just understanding, like, your. Your pop cultural references.

[Angelina Stanford]

It's true. It's true. That's right. All right, so a quick reminder before we jump in is that we have our annual House of Humane Letters Christmas sale going on now. And I know I don't have to tell the people in this virtual room with me because you've already made tons of purchases. You've already had your list. The second the Sal went live, you just. Boom, You're. You were in it to win it. But the rest of you guys get on it, right? This is it. This is it. In fact, just before we started the episode, Mr. Banks said to me, the Canadians and the Australians are racking up on the sales. And I gotta figure that's because of the exchange rate, right? Like finally you, finally you can afford some classes with the, with the sale. It's not our fault that the Canadian dollar is not strong. Don't take it out on us. It's not, it's not our fault.

[Thomas Banks]

In America, we've been doing everything, we can wreck the standing of our currency for so many years.

[Angelina Stanford]

Like we've done our best to just wreck the value of the dollar. Like you can't blame us. We've tried. We're, we're trying, we're trying. So yes, Christmas sale happening now. That will be till the end of the year. So you can go to HouseOfHumaneLetters.com and snap up at a 20% discount. All of those things you've been eyeing all year. The how to read fairy tales class, the how to read Harry Potter class, which was a huge success. A medieval cosmology bundle, Shakespeare bundles. Oh, just tons and tons of stuff. Anne's recent Plato webinar, Karita's recent how to Read a Symphony webinar, at least fantastic webinar last year, how to Read Star wars as a Medieval Romance is on sale now. So you can pick all of that up. And speaking of which, I know some of you already saw because you got the Patreon email about this, but speaking of which, at least Star wars webinar on how to Read Star wars as a Medieval Romance was such a hit. He did such a great job. I have spent the last year talking him into doing it again. And so this year I feel like it's an annual tradition now, I love it, to have some kind of film oriented webinar just a few days after Christmas. It just seems like a great time. And last year was so fun. We saw all of these families together on the camera, just completely geeking out. It was so much fun to watch that. So Atlee will be coming back. Exactly, Anne. For the post Christmas slump. So Atlee will be coming back on December 30th to discuss the prequels in a webinar called the Tragedy of Darth Vader. And we're going to be looking at the prequels as a Greek tragedy, the Fall of Darth Vader. So that is going to be a ton of fun and you're going to want to sign up for that and.

[Thomas Banks]

Other kinds of tragedy as well. Not just in the Greek sense, presumably.

[Angelina Stanford]

Well, we'll just have to wait.

[Thomas Banks]

We'll just have to wait and see.

[Angelina Stanford]

We'll just have to wait and see? And Mr. Banks, you have a webinar coming up next week, which will be this week when it airs. Forget we time travel on this podcast.

[Thomas Banks]

Yeah. I think this is probably the most. I think the most obscure subject we've done so far.

[Angelina Stanford]

We love your obscure topics. Yeah.

[Thomas Banks]

Our sometime associate, Michael Williams and myself, we will be giving a guest lecture on Saint Therese of Lesu, the. The Little Flower, and one of the kind of most important figures in French religious life in the last couple of centuries.

[Angelina Stanford]

Okay, look, See? Fiona and Katie both saying, cannot wait. So excited. They're so excited for the webinar. See?

[Thomas Banks]

Yeah. And it'll. We'll be talking about France in the 19th century, the odd place of religion in modern life, and other things as well. And yes, we'll be talking about a French nun, doctor of the church and saint.

[Angelina Stanford]

You guys totally know that Mr. Banks can make the most obscure things come to life and make you feel like. Right? Like, make you feel like, why didn't I know about this? This is so important and just blew my world wide open. So I expect really, really good things about that. And of course, we also have gotten Dr. Baxter's book to the printer. We did it. It is at the printer. Labels are being printed even now that as soon. I mean, I think the books are going to be hot when they get in your hands. Like, literally, as soon as they are out of the printer's hands, they are going to be boxed up and shipped. And I've. I've already had a rant to the Casiodorus Press team about if these books don't make it there on Christmas, it is the post office's fault. It's not ours. We're doing everything we can. So according to the post office website, it should be fine and we should get it for Christmas. So, like, just take it up. Take it up with the post office. Right. But we are so excited about Dr. Baxter's new book, why Literature Still Matters. And if you did not listen to our podcast interview with him a few weeks ago, please do. It was fabulous. He's also going to be appearing in a few weeks on Cindy Rollins podcast, too. She got a. A sneak peek, preview edition of the book. And she is very excited. Like, she messaged me and she was just. Cindy was ecstatic. Like, I adore this book. I adore this book. I want to send it to everybody. I know everybody's getting me this for Christmas. It's like, say it into the microphone, Cindy. Cha ching, cha ching. Right? Like, I need the Cindy Rollins Endorsement. And then Atlee said, cindy Rollins loves this book. She's like the Oprah Book Club of the homeschool world. That's right. Exactly. Exactly. So she's excited. We're all excited.

[Thomas Banks]

And you can make or break a book a presidential.

[Angelina Stanford]

It's true. The power, the power this woman has. That's right. That's right. She's moved from being the Farrah Fawcett of homeschool to the Oprah's book pick of, of the homeschool. Well, that's the kind of power she wields. But you can go to our brand new publishing house website, cassiodorus press.com and pre order that now it, it is coming soon and we simply could not be prouder of it. Happy about it. Andrew says, can I fix the Canadian postal strike? Unfortunately, no.

[Thomas Banks]

Magical pride.

[Angelina Stanford]

I've been on the phone with the ambassador. I've done what I could. Okay. But no, you're just gonna have to solve your own domestic problems. Okay. I'm just gonna say just deal with. We have our own postal issues. I'm gonna tell y'all a true story here just off the top of my cuff, because I get in front of my live audience and I immediately go into my standup routine. You guys know the Patreon knows. Just a few days. So it is December 4th today when we are recording this a few days ago. So this was on November 30th. My husband checks the mail and he comes to me and he says, oh, you. You got a letter in the mail. And I was like, oh, okay, thank you. And I opened it up and it's a birthday card from a student. It was lovely, except my birthday was a long time ago. And he says, what's the postmark on that? So I look at the envelope and it was postmarked October 11th. And I got it on November 30th.

[Thomas Banks]

No, it was in December.

[Angelina Stanford]

Okay, so December 1st. All right, so December 1st. October 11th to December. So then I went to a full on rant about how if there had.

[Thomas Banks]

Been food items, they would have gone back. Yeah.

[Angelina Stanford]

The U.S. postal system is an indication that we are a country in decline. I went to full rant, just full rant on this. But then I noticed the best part, the best part was that the post office had put its own stamp. Not a stamp like a postage stamp, but like a rubber stamp. Okay. You know, like a rubber stamp where it's postmarked. They had a special stamp that they put on this envelope. Get ready. Remember now, this was mailed October 11th. And I got it December 1st. That's right. I got December 1st. The stamp said, the US Postal Service is ready for this election. You can mail your ballot and feel secure that it will get there. And I'm like, what? By the next election? So maybe your vote will count 28. But by 2028, we will have your votes. Yeah, like, just. You can't make this stuff up. There you go. There you go. Good times. Us, the Postal Master general, is going to boycott this podcast. Yeah, I'm. Well, okay. I can live with that. I can live with that. All right, well, should we start talking about the 2025 preview? But before we do that, let's take a moment to reflect on 2024. Okay, Patreons, now is your chance to be heard. What were your favorite things we covered in the last year? Oh, Joan, right out of the gate with Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner. That is the first long.

[Thomas Banks]

You can tell us your least favorite things.

[Angelina Stanford]

No, absolutely not. You may not every. You love me. That's all I know, right? You can't tell me any of that. Howard's. Howard's in lots of Harry Potter. Murder Must advertise. Harry Potter. Agnes Gray. Yep. The Baxter interview. That was a great interview. Harry Potter. Tartu. Okay, nice.

[Thomas Banks]

Okay, that was my favorite book as well.

[Angelina Stanford]

Harry potter and murder. Ms. Advertise. Harry Potter was amazing. Howard's in. Yes. Harry Potter. Harry Potter. Harry Potter. I can't pick everything. That is the correct answer, Hannah. Everything. Very good. We loved Harry Potter. Murders. Mis. Advertised. Tartuffe. Tartuffe. Okay, Max says Tartuffe. Good man. Now, I asked you before we started recording, what was your favorite? And you said Tartuffe. Yep. Tartuffe. That was a Mr. Banks pick, and that was his favorite thing. And I am hard pressed to pick a favorite. Howard's Inn is such a favorite. But also Murder mis advertised. I mean, I saw so many new levels with Murder Must advertise since I had been researching for the upcoming Alice in Wonderland webinar. And I saw so, so much Alice in there. And after we did the podcast, well, Natalia and I literally fell down the rabbit hole. Right. Pun intended. And kept. We found a ton of Alice in Wonderland stuff. Like, I picked up a few more Dorothy Sayers books after the podcast, and there was so much Alice in Wonderland. So there'll be something. Yes, there is an upcoming Alice in Wonderland webinar. It will be announced in the next couple weeks. It's going to be in January, and it's called. Oh, I Don't want to get it wrong. What? It's called. Let me look it up. I don't want to get it wrong. It's called. Oh, I'm. This is making for riveting. Riveting.

[Thomas Banks]

Live Mad Hatters and other matters.

[Angelina Stanford]

No, no, no. It's got a really good. It's got a really good name.

[Thomas Banks]

Hang on, let me up off the top of my head.

[Angelina Stanford]

There you go. Let's just go with that. No, it is called I gotta go back in all my ATLI messages to find where I put it. Why don't you say something entertaining while I look this up?

[Thomas Banks]

When you put me on the spot, that becomes an impossibility.

[Angelina Stanford]

It is. It is, but I couldn't remember the subtitle. It's called Through a Looking Glass. Dimly Something Like Recovering the Wonder of the Alice Books. It's something. It's something like that. See, y'all caught me. Y'all caught me off the cuff. But it. Yeah, it's going to be amazing. It's going to be absolutely amazing. So that announcement will be coming up soon.

[Thomas Banks]

One of the most enduring comic writings of the 19th century, maybe the last couple of centuries.

[Angelina Stanford]

It's one of those things that, when it came out, like, kids just loved it and it was amazing. And 20th and 21st century audiences really, really struggle with it. And I think we're going to be able to talk about why that is, and it's because we've lost something as moderns. But it's going to be really good. I think you guys are going to really enjoy that.

[Thomas Banks]

It is one of those books, though, that has stood the test of time in the sense that we still can understand an allusion to it in another context, even if we've never touched the book ourselves.

[Angelina Stanford]

And once you know what to look for, you will see it everywhere. It turns out that C.S. lewis references Alice in Wonderland a whole lot. Yes. Diana says we need to recover the wonder of Alice. So many bad psychological interpretations. Yes. We will be addressing that.

[Thomas Banks]

Is C.S. lewis, the Matrix?

[Angelina Stanford]

Yep, exactly.

[Thomas Banks]

I just went from C.S. lewis down to the Matrix, but I had to bring that in.

[Angelina Stanford]

You did? Well done.

[Thomas Banks]

Follow the white rabbit.

[Angelina Stanford]

Follow the white rabbit. I think the biggest thing about 2024 was that we were on our own. Cindy was on her sabbatical, and we had to tell you guys. I was super nervous about doing it without Cindy. I actually. This is me being vulnerable in front of my live. Just. Just you, just my five closest friends. Definitely not the hundreds of faces smiling at me right now and the 14 people who listen to the podcast. But I was really nervous. And when Cindy said she was going to take the sabbatical, of course I was very supportive because I knew what was going on in her life and I really knew she needed to step back for her own health. But, but I said, I said to her, I was like, I don't think anybody's going to listen if you're not on the podcast. I was so nervous. So thanks for sticking around with us. And I really tried to bring our AAME this year. I worked really hard to make sure we filled the gap, but hopefully didn't embarrass us.

[Thomas Banks]

I thought we would, I thought we would survive, but in a, like, very sketchy sort of way. What, what I mean by that is I thought that our, like, the moral authority of the se was sort of vested in the woman that is Cindy Rollins. And with her being gone, like, we mostly have like, weird, sketchy people. But no, it's like, no, our audience has remained respectable and literate and, you know, they've, I think they've stayed with us. And yeah, it's not just like they've.

[Angelina Stanford]

Stayed with us because we've got some kind of Stockholm, a bunch of guys.

[Thomas Banks]

In like, sub basement apartments who have too many cats or something.

[Angelina Stanford]

Yeah, see, that's fair.

[Thomas Banks]

That was a weird thing to see.

[Angelina Stanford]

You guys in the chat box saying that you think we did a really good job. But of course you still miss Cindy. And yes, we, we miss her do. And we did have her a few times this year. And she will be coming back for our end of the year episode where we talk about our literary lives of 2025. She is definitely coming back on for that. We've already scheduled it so you'll be able to hear about how her ear has been going. And another big thing that happened in the podcast in 2024, which was quite unexpected to me because I never think about things like the ratings. And I forget that there's official sources out there who track how many people listen to podcasts. But when we did the Harry Potter series, we kind of broke the Internet and we hit number three on the podcast ratings. And I cannot believe that. I cannot believe that the top three were the New York Times Book Review, NPR, and then the Literary Life podcast. And that absolutely blew my mind. Blew my mind. Of course, I'm over here like, oh my gosh, we're number three, right behind New York Times Book Review at npr. My husband says, without a beat, well, that doesn't speak Very well for us that people found those guys more exciting than our podcast. And I was like, well, was I.

[Thomas Banks]

That much of a downer?

[Angelina Stanford]

You are such a dick. He always pulls me back down to earth. But then you said, take a screenshot of that and send it to my mother. That will, that will mean something to my mother. New York Times and npr.

[Thomas Banks]

Like, I will have justified my existence.

[Angelina Stanford]

Yeah, exactly. You know, like it was respectable. We were up there, you know, weren't up there with some.

[Thomas Banks]

No, but my dad was like, oh, yes, yes, that New York Times podcast is very good. Yeah.

[Angelina Stanford]

So that's right. That's right. We, we. It was a mark of respectability, standard.

[Thomas Banks]

Or measure against the gray.

[Angelina Stanford]

Like, you know, alien mysteries unlocked and then like the Lit Life podcast, why.

[Thomas Banks]

The moon landing was staged. They. They still beat us, probably. We're just trying to catch up with Joe Rogan.

[Angelina Stanford]

Exactly. Oh, yeah, right. Thank you, Natalia. She liked why read biographies and reading when overwhelmed. She really liked those. All right. Okay, so are we ready to start talking about our 2025 schedule? Okay, so I made the decision this year. Like, I, you know, we've been doing this a while now. We're going into year six. I cannot believe that we're going into year six of the podcast. And one of the things that I have noticed is, and this is totally fair, that everybody gets busy in their life and it can be hard to keep up with those long series on the podcast. And we definitely don't want anybody feeling like they're behind. I mean, you guys are intense. You're taking like 14 classes at a time listening to the podcast. Plus you've got your, your reading groups in the Patreon, you know, and then you're just following Dr. Baxter across the country in a very non creepy way. Like, you know, you guys are int. Y'all are very intense and, and I don't want you to feel overwhelmed. So we, we really talked about it and we made the decision to scale back on how many long books we did this year and instead have a lot more one off and topical shows. So we're still going to have some books, but we're also going to have a lot more one off topics that will make it a lot easier for you guys to keep up with. So let me start off by telling you some of the titles of some of the one off episodes. So of course we're going to bring you some literary life of episodes. And I thought after six years on the show, it was time to do the Literary Life of Angelina Stanford. And now everyone just booed me. I've been booed off the stage. No, not really. But yes. They're. They're booing me off the stage. They don't want that. Well, we had a Lit life of. We're going to be putting you on.

[Thomas Banks]

The couch, psychoanalyzing you, talking about your childhood.

[Angelina Stanford]

Can I bring in a special interviewer? I don't know if I want you to interview me.

[Thomas Banks]

Okay, yeah. I'll just be off in the background here.

[Angelina Stanford]

How can I talk freely if my husband's in the room?

[Thomas Banks]

It's true.

[Angelina Stanford]

Get Cynthia back over. That's a good idea.

[Thomas Banks]

That street runs both ways.

[Angelina Stanford]

So we're gonna do that. We're gonna do another Lit Life episode of somebody that has been often requested. We are gonna do the literary life of Dr. Ann Phillips. Ah. Okay. Now they're excited. Now they're excited. Where is she? She's hiding. She turned off her camera. No, there she is. We're gonna. That's right. We're gonna do the literary life of Dr. Ann Phillips. I think that'll be a fantastic conversation to find out how she went from homeschool student to PhD. Yes, it can be done. It can be done.

[Thomas Banks]

A lot of literary lives this year. Literary lives.

[Angelina Stanford]

We are also going to do. This is the first time we'll have done that we did a literary life of one of our graduates. But we've never before done a literary life of someone who's currently one of our high school students. And we were quite unanimous in our need to do this. You heard me talk about her constantly in the Murder Must Advertise episodes as you, My Mini Me. We even have the same birthday, y'all. It's ridiculous. She's actually my mini Me. The person who can give me all the good Dorothy Sayers research. That's right. We are going to do the literary life of Natalia Testa. That's right. I can't wait. It's going to be fabulous. I don't know if she's had a hard time keeping this secret, so. There, I've said it. Now you can tell everybody. Natalia, you can tell everybody. That's right. Janie just went crazy. Yes, everybody. They're actually crying for you, Natalia. I didn't get that kind of response. Oh, my God. Well, okay. That's all right. It's good for my ego to get a blow there. That everyone loves my mini Me more than me. That's it. America worships youth and I don't appreciate. Appreciate it?

[Thomas Banks]

Pretty much, yes.

[Angelina Stanford]

Okay. And then Mr. Banks has something to tell you. He has been trying to pin down this particular interview for what, two years? For two years. You've been telling for a while.

[Thomas Banks]

Yes.

[Angelina Stanford]

And I don't know, I was like, sure, knock yourself out, because this is a big name. And I was like, no, it's not J.K. rowling. Everybody settle down. Everybody said, it's not J.K. rowling. Settle down, settle down. I mean, please, Mrs. Joanne Rowling, if you. Anytime, just give me a call anytime, you know, contactmaeletters.com anytime, anytime. We'll bump anyone for you. We'll bump Thomas Banks. But anyway, and I said, just go for it. And I don't know how you. You got in touch with, like, several of his agents and publishers.

[Thomas Banks]

Yeah. So I, for a couple of years, I have been trying to snag an interview with the English journalist Peter Hitchens because I quite enjoyed his memoir, the Rage Against God, and I've read other of his books, too, and, you know, his journalism in the Mail on Sunday and other things for a while. But, yeah, finally I was able to get in touch with an agent of his and through that agent, through him. And yeah, so he is going to be. We haven't got a date yet, but early next year, it looks like.

[Angelina Stanford]

Very excited. Yeah, he hardly ever does podcasts. Yes, the big deal.

[Thomas Banks]

So, so anyway, so, yes, he's. He's generously agreed to appear on our show sometimes in the first couple of months of this next year.

[Angelina Stanford]

Yeah, we're quite, we're quite excited about that.

[Thomas Banks]

I think the fact that we agreed not to talk about politics, like contemporary.

[Angelina Stanford]

Politics to him, about anything other than politics. And we said, no, this is not a political.

[Thomas Banks]

We don't really care what you think.

[Angelina Stanford]

About books you read. He said, yes, I'm in. That sounds lovely. He said, very Britishy, you know, that sounds lovely. What? What? And, yeah, there you go. So we'll just swoon over his accent and try not to embarrass ourselves.

[Thomas Banks]

Actually, we're definitely not going to do that because I've, I've heard him interviewed by American journalists before and that really annoys him, I think, when I won't do it. Well, it was. Yeah. Anyway, that's.

[Angelina Stanford]

We might have a problem. You know, I'm autistic and I accidentally mimic people's accents all the time.

[Thomas Banks]

Try to tempt him to say fortnightly.

[Angelina Stanford]

Doing it just like, you know, cover my mouth and. Oh, yeah, be hard off to put like air blocking headphones on. All right. We also have another. A number of topical episodes. Oh, Shelley says, which books of his do we.

[Thomas Banks]

I really liked. I said his memoir, the Rage. Again, let me put that in the.

[Angelina Stanford]

Chat, but say it also for the microphone.

[Thomas Banks]

The Rage Against God.

[Angelina Stanford]

The Rage Against God by Peter Hitchens. Okay, how about some topical episodes that you guys have been asking for? And I. Oh, I got to see your faces because I think you're going to be excited about this. How about a total episode devoted to answering the question, what is the literary tradition? Oh, okay. Good response on that. Good response on that. Right. We'll try. We'll try to answer the question of what is the literary tradition that we're always talking about? That'll probably take 15 minutes, because I'll just say, I don't know. What do you think? And you'll say, I don't know, what do you think? And I will say, good night.

[Thomas Banks]

It will be like the vultures in the Jungle Book cartoon. Yeah.

[Angelina Stanford]

Okay. How about. How's. How's this to wet your whistle, this is not an education podcast. And yet it seems like we always kind of go back to what is education? What is classical education? How is what we're doing different from what other people are doing? What is, what is, what are, you know, what's our approach versus what goes by the name classical education? So how about an episode devoted to answering the question what is classical education? With a panel of speakers, Angelina Stanford, Thomas Banks, Dr. Ann Phillips, and Cindy Rollins. How about that? I think we might be able to fill up an hour or two trying to figure out what is classical education. All right. Oh, good, good. We're getting good response. Getting good responses. Okay, good. We also had the idea, well, this was another one of your picks. So Mr. Banks had the idea of what if we did an episode devoted to milestones of the literary life? And you were talking about how, like you said, for example, a milestone in the life of a reader is the first time you read a book that you don't like the characters.

[Thomas Banks]

Yes.

[Angelina Stanford]

And you're trying to figure out, like, how do I think about this? And tell us about your thoughts about this episode.

[Thomas Banks]

It's something that I've thought about. Well, kind of been forced to think about since, certainly since I became a teacher myself, where I introduce a book to a student. I'm. Well, I'll use one example. Maybe eight years ago, Seven or eight years ago, I was teaching the book Till we have faces by C.S. lewis, and I had this one class of students. It was one of those classes where everyone was really smart. All the students were really smart. And also really just kind of cynical and it was hard to impress them. And all of them really disliked the protagonist of Till we have Faces. All of them really disliked what's her name?

[Angelina Stanford]

Monsters?

[Thomas Banks]

Orwell or. Well, yeah, whatever her name is.

[Angelina Stanford]

She did. How to pronounce that. Yeah.

[Thomas Banks]

I can never remember. And I was trying to get them to accept the fact that a book that a really any story doesn't need to draw us in by introducing us to a character who is likable in every way. And it was hard to do. I think eventually I won at least some of them over. But that was a book where, like the first chapters, all of them thought that, yeah, this character is not interesting, they're boring, they deserve to suffer. I think entitled was a line, a descriptive that came up a lot anyway. So, yeah, learning to like books where we don't necessarily like the people. That would be one form or just like the subject in general is not one that interests us. I don't know, say if you're reading Tolstoy's War and Peace and you don't really have an interest in the Napoleonic wars in Russia, which is entirely fine. I mean, there's no reason arbitrarily why one should. But allowing for that, might War and Peace still have something to promise us.

[Angelina Stanford]

That's saying, oh, Van Gogh. Yeah, I don't really like sunflowers.

[Thomas Banks]

Do we even know that, like, the Trojan War happened?

[Angelina Stanford]

You know?

[Thomas Banks]

Well, if we don't. Yeah, I mean, like, it couldn't have been that important. Right. So where should we. Why should we read the Iliad? Yeah, but. Yes. Yeah, sure, sure.

[Angelina Stanford]

So Carrie says she learned this lesson from you by taking your early modern lit class where she read Wuthering Heights, where she did not like the characters but ended up really liking the book.

[Thomas Banks]

I actually. That's like another perfect example. That's that. And I've had better luck with that one generally, I think. But, yeah, usually there comes a point in teaching that book where everyone agrees that we don't care if Heathcliff lives or dies. In fact, maybe we would prefer it if he died. It's just to put that out there.

[Angelina Stanford]

We get that question a whole lot. Like, I see people posting that in the Facebook group all the time. Like, you know, I started reading Book X and I don't like these characters. These are. People are so unlikable. So, yeah, I'm hoping to address that and a few other other things, like how to. How to approach that in your life and that maybe reading books is not about whether or not you like the characters. That. And there. There might actually be a purpose to having unlikable characters. So more about that. All right. And then lastly, this, this idea for a show came from just our regular evening lives where we like to watch a lot of movies based on books. And we always are talking about which ones are good and which ones are not. And I thought it could be a really fun episode to have Atlee come on and we can discuss maybe each. Each top 10 list of literary film adaptations so we can talk about what will make a good adaptation and then throw out some titles of. Of movies that we really enjoy. And then, you know, you guys will have some picks for family movie night. We can maybe throw a few titles your way. Your son says it was hard to read the third Harry Potter because of Gilderoy Lockhart. No kidding. How about number five, I don't like Dolores Umbridge. Sometimes people will be like, oh, I can't read book X. These characters are so unlike them. When I'm like, you don't really think you were supposed to like Dolores Umbridge. Right? Like, she's the bad guy. Right. Anyway, Exactly. All right, now on to some titles. Oh, wait, no, sorry. First. Hi, welcome to My ADHD Brain, where you're getting the unedited version. And I'm just gonna hop around. Despite the fact that I had a giant arrow and star so that I would not forget to say this first. I did in fact, forget to say this first. We are also going to be more deliberate about picking out some of the best of series and using those, because we have been doing this for six years. We have a huge back catalog and we have a lot of new people to the podcast. And this will enable us to both revisit some old favorites and introduce them to some new audience members. And one of the reasons that we. That I moved this, this episode up in the calendar was because I hear from a lot of people, well, I want to know what books are going to be on the podcast so I can ask for them for Christmas. So this is it. You, you know, get your list as I give you these titles. So the best of that we're going to do this year, we are going to rebroadcast an episode we did on Tolstoy short story How Much Land Does a Man Need? And we'll have a PDF link to that story when that comes out. That was a really good one. We had a great conversation there about ambition, which always comes up again. And Again and again. Another favorite of mine, Guy de Maupassant's short story, the Necklace. So we'll revisit that one. We will also revisit in the month of April, the Enchanted April, which, as far as Thomas and I are concerned, is a yearly reread. That book. I just adore that book. So we'll revisit that.

[Thomas Banks]

Actually, last year for Christmas, you got me Elizabeth in her German Garden, which is also, I won't put it necessarily on the same level as Enchanted April, but that's a very fine comic novel, and especially if you're into gardening, it makes it all that much easier to get into it.

[Angelina Stanford]

Now, the reason we're going to rebroadcast that in April is because April is when we do our conference. And I can't both prepare a conference, talk and write and do the podcast. So shall I give you guys a sneak peek about what the 2025 Literary Life Online conference is going to be? The crowd is saying, yes. Okay. Yeah. What will it be?

[Thomas Banks]

I don't even know.

[Angelina Stanford]

The topic is. The topic is the language wars. And. And I should say, this has nothing to do with pronouns. This has to do with the relationship between meaning and language. And we're going to get into Plato, and we're going to get into Owen Barfield, and we're going to really get into where does meaning come from? And what is the relationship? Is language arbitrary? Is there some relationship between words and meaning? And why is that important? Who's the keynote speaker? Oh, they are. I will tell you in just a second. Settle down. The. The speakers are going to be none other than Angelina Stanford. No. No. Cheers for that. Thomas Banks. Two HHL people that, you know, we cannot not have when it comes to questions of language and meaning. Dr. Ann Phillips, Jen Rogers. And our keynote speaker is. They're all dying. I know the Patreon knows who this is because I love this guy and I talk about him. Constant. He may or may not have been a recent guest speaker in a House of humane letters class. Dr. Michael Drought, philologist, Anglo Saxon scholar. Yes, the crowd is going wild. If you're not going wild at home, you need to, because Dr. Drought is amazing, and I recommend his Audible series to everybody. His on the Anglo Saxons, on Norse mythology, on Tolkien. All of those are fantastic. He's got one on the whole history of the English language, and he has graciously agreed to be our keynote speaker. So I am very, very excited about. About that conference, and I think it's going to be very, very Timely. So that will be in April. In the summer, everybody's going crazy, crazy. Okay. In the summer, we're going to rebroadcast the Harry Potter series in preparation for the next Harry Potter mini class. So I will be picking back up the Harry Potter courses and we'll cover books so you can go get the first Harry Potter mini class on sale right now in the store. And then that covers books two and three. And we did book one on the podcast. And so next summer I will do probably two mini classes. One will cover books four and five, and the other one will cover books six and seven. And we'll get those finished. I'm. I'm looking forward to that. And we had such a great time doing that class. That was so much fun. And then I learned my lesson this year because this year for our Halloween pick, we did Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner. And then on the Facebook group, everyone was talking about Dracula. And I thought, why am I doing anything other than Dracula? So we will rebroadcast Dracula as our best of series in October. And for a lot of people, the Dracula series has turned out to be one of those total paradigm shifting things where they suddenly realize why it's important to read the old ways and what a difference that it makes. So we'll rebroadcast that. And lastly, we're going to rebroadcast our series on. We're going to rebroadcast our series on Experiment and Criticism. And how do we do that originally? It's been several years.

[Thomas Banks]

That was one of the first things we did.

[Angelina Stanford]

It's been several years. And what we're going to do then is rebroadcast the series. And we're going to come back and we're going to do a fresh episode called Revisiting Experiment and Criticism. And I'm going to add some new comments about it based on all the feedback I've got, all the places I see people get confused, all the questions that they have. I'm also going to give a whole bunch of context because I did a bunch of research in the last couple of years on exactly what was going on in C.S. lewis's life when he wrote Experiment and Criticism. And I know exactly who he's pushing back against, what books, all of those things. And I think it'll give some really.

[Thomas Banks]

Important Father Levis come into this.

[Angelina Stanford]

Oh, you know it. Will you? Absolutely.

[Thomas Banks]

The Confessions of Father.

[Angelina Stanford]

I'm gonna go. We'll go for the jugular with Father Levis. A lot of times people listen to the Experiment and criticism episodes and they, they get confused and they think, oh, well, he says we shouldn't be using literature. So does, does that mean do nothing? And no, those are not the only two options. So we will talk about more specifically what's going on and what does he mean and what does mean? Because, yeah, it's been quite a few years. So I feel like at least I've got four years of feedback and questions that people have had and places that they've misunderstood. And I thought, I mean, every time I get one of those questions in the Facebook group, always think I should just do another episode where I answer all of these questions rather than continuing to type them into, into the Facebook comments. So that's what we're going to do. Andrea says, what? I can be misunderstood on the Internet. Shocking. I know. The Internet is such a place for clarity. How could anyone misunderstand? I know. Shocking. Shocking. Okay, now here's another. We, we try to, we tried to be kind of strategic and have a variety of genres and a variety of time periods. We're also going to do something crazy this year and we're not only going to have one, we're going to have two American authors. That's right. I know the shock. The shock. I know just. Well, I mean, seriously, American literature is not worth anything. But we have two. We'll have two. Two. One is somebody that has been requested a bazillion times. We are going to do a Flannery O'Connor short story.

[Thomas Banks]

You might have to hold my hand.

[Angelina Stanford]

I will do. I will hold both your hands. We are going to do A Good man is Hard to Find. I have a whole Flannery O'Connor class, which is why I have never done one on the, on the podcast. But I thought, you know what, let's just, let's just do it. We get this question all the time. So we're actually going to do a two part series on her. One will just be a full episode of introducing you to Flannery Connor. Just, you know, wrap your head about what she's trying to accomplish, what she's about, probably quote from some of her essays and letters. And then the second one, we'll go through the short story, A good man is hard to find. A story which when you read it, will absolutely leave you scratching your head and saying, what did I just just read? But by the time we get to the end, I think you'll be pumped and maybe you'll be intrigued to read more and maybe you'll be intrigued to take my Flannery O'Connor mini class, which is on sale now for 20 off. Okay. So I'm looking forward to that. Okay, here we go. Some other ones. The next one is a Mr. Banks pick. So the Flannery O'Connor was my big. So the next one's a Mr. Banks pick. This is a childhood favorite of his that he cannot believe I have never read. What is it, my dear?

[Thomas Banks]

We're doing the Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling.

[Angelina Stanford]

Oh.

[Thomas Banks]

And actually this is one I'm.

[Angelina Stanford]

Yeah.

[Thomas Banks]

It's kind of surprising it took us this long to get to this and not just this book in particular, but we've. I think we've never done anything by Rudyard Kipling on this show.

[Angelina Stanford]

We have not. And you told me you thought that I was put off by the Disney, the Disney movie.

[Thomas Banks]

See, I really like the Disney movie. But maybe you are put off by it. But yeah, the book is, I think, someone who enjoys fables, who enjoys, you know. Yeah. Beast fables and fairy tales and coming of age stories. And you enjoy all of these things in there in your, in your way. I think, I think you'll like this book.

[Angelina Stanford]

Jessica says, well, this would be a good one for kids to listen to. Absolutely. We've been trying the last few years.

[Thomas Banks]

To run out into the wilderness and want themselves to be raised by wolves.

[Angelina Stanford]

You know, patience. I have not said the second American author yet. Patience. Patience. That was a teaser. Has the Internet taught you nothing? Has the advertising world taught you it's a tease? It's a tease to keep you hanging out?

[Thomas Banks]

Does the Internet teaches us to be patient? Obviously, yes.

[Angelina Stanford]

Well, I was going to say, does it, doesn't it teach you to be that you're going to be teased? But yes, we like to do a kids book every year. So this year we did Harry Potter. The year before that we did Kidnap. So we've, we've been trying to do a kids book. So this will be a kids book. You learned all your patience from Hayes? Yeah, I'd say so. Anne. Okay. The other American is A, a 20th century American author who writes about the Gilded Age. She is as close to America that America has to a nice female Victorian author. We were in unanimous agreement about this. We are going to read Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. Yes. And talk about the Gilded Age. It's a fantastic book. We'll have Atlee come on to talk about the film because it's a gorgeous film. Yeah.

[Thomas Banks]

I find I, I will admit, like, probably like many people, I saw the movie before I Read the book. If, actually, if. Well, maybe, I don't know, around in the 90s. Maybe you saw the movie, which is.

[Angelina Stanford]

Actually, I didn't see the movie till a long time after I read the book, but I loved the book. Yeah, I have read quite a bit of Edith Wharton, actually. I've been a fan of her since college.

[Thomas Banks]

We can talk about. We'll probably talk about her. She was friends with Henry James, and actually, she was. She was kind of responsible, not. Not solely, but kind of partially responsible for the fact that Henry James had a successful career as a writer. But we can go into that later on.

[Angelina Stanford]

Indeed we will. No, I. I enjoy her quite a bit. I've read a lot of her and I like her.

[Thomas Banks]

They both seem kind of more European than American.

[Angelina Stanford]

Both. Totally. Totally. I think the only American authors I'm interested in are basically English authors who just found their way, regional authors who.

[Thomas Banks]

Write Southern Gothic stuff.

[Angelina Stanford]

But that's because Flannery. Flannery Connor's just medieval. She's. She's going to be medieval. You'll see. You'll see my approach to her. She calls herself the. The Aquinas of Southern literature. I mean, I think we can. We can go with a. Okay, the Southern Gothic Thomist here. I cannot. I cannot keep up with the. With the chat. Book. Book. Oh, Natalia. Madeline Lingle is basically an inkling. Okay. Like, she doesn't even count as American. She's not American, actually. What is she, Swiss? She went to a Swiss boarding school. Like she doesn't even count. Okay, now what's next? All right, we still wanted to do another long poem. We felt like that was a good thing to keep doing, dipping our feet into the. The poetry waters. And So I asked Mr. Banks to pick a long poem.

[Thomas Banks]

And you said, goblin Market by Christina Rossetti. I said that very spontaneously.

[Angelina Stanford]

Asked to give, like, the Academy Award winning envelope. And the winner is.

[Thomas Banks]

You know, that was one of my life's exact aspirations right there.

[Angelina Stanford]

Exactly. All right, the people are excited about Goblin Market. Yes. We're gonna read Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti. Yes. All right.

[Thomas Banks]

Which if you've never. If you've never read any poetry by any of the Pre Raphaelites, then that would actually be a very good place to start it.

[Angelina Stanford]

All right. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to that. Next up is a book that we often get. We hear people talking about, and over and over, I think, oh, gosh, you guys have completely misunderstood this book. You do not understand this book. People are saying, oh, it's depressing. It's this and that. They just don't understand the form. And so I am hoping very much to be able to open up this book for you. We are going to do Brave New World, and we're gonna hopefully show that it's not what you think it is. It is not what you think it is. It is not depressing. It is not any of those things. You just have to understand the form. And there's. Oh, gosh, it's hard to keep this under my hat. There are so many things that are gonna blow your mind about who Aldous Huxley is and who he knew and was influenced by what he's trying to do. And once you understand the form, it is just going to absolutely blow your mind. Oh, Grace is asking for a sneak peek. No, no, no, no, no. All right. And you might have heard us talk about this spontaneously on the air for the Tartuffe episodes where we talked about, what if we did another moliere play? So Mr. Banks suggested that we do Don Juan. So, yes, Don Juan by Moliere. So another French play. And I'm pretty sure we have roped Karita into coming onto the podcast to talk to us about the Mozart opera based on Don Juan. And what I thought would be cool about this is that we've had a lot of episodes where we've talked about, how do you translate one work of art from one style, one genre, to another genre? Right. So how do you take a work of literature and turn it into a film? And we've talked a lot about how you approach that. So I thought it'd be really cool to talk about that in terms of how do you take a play and turn it into an opera? How does that change it? How do we translate it into something else? So that's going to be a ton of fun. And I know that we're all going to learn so much. We're all going to learn so much. Everybody's saying, oh, she has to do it now. She has to. It's. She said it. It's live. It's a live episode. There's no editing. You can't do it. There's absolutely nothing. Here we are. Okay. And lastly, this one's going to be Patreon pick. Now, don't worry, we're not going to vote tonight, but I'm going to tell you your choices and the Patreon, and this will be all levels of Patreon. So we're going to put. Put. We'll put a poll out on our Patreon and If you desperately want to be able to vote, you can go and join the Patreon right now to do that. And this vote will be up until the end of the year so everybody has a chance to think, debate, threaten each other on discord. You know, try to come up with, like, block voting monopolies. I mean, don't mail your ballot in. You remember the story? Yeah, exactly. Don't mail your ballot in. But we were talking about that we absolutely wanted to do another Shakespeare play, and last time we did a tragedy. And so we want to do another comedy, and we started tossing around different titles, and I thought, well, let's just let the Patreon choose. So you guys get to pick for your Shakespeare comedy. Would you like us to do Much Ado About Nothing? This is going to be an impossible choice, y'all. Or Titus Andronicus or the Comedy of Errors. So Much Ado About Nothing or the Comedy of Errors. And we're just going to let y'all start. Oh, already the chat box is blowing up. It's blowing up. It's going to be two very different things. With Comedy of Errors, we'll talk about the Roman influences and Plaudus and Terence. But Much Ado About Nothing, we'll have much more fairy tale, comic structure, medieval cosmology. So there you go. You just ugly laughed out loud over Titus Andronicus. Yeah.

[Thomas Banks]

I've seen that performed live. It's. Yeah, it's. It's. No. There's. There's no undisturbing way to do Titus Andronicus.

[Angelina Stanford]

I see that. Political parties are already forming. No corruption, guys. No, but, I mean, it's Christmas, so you don't have to call it a bribe, but if there. If a Christmas present arrives and there's just a title of a Shakespeare play in the Christmas present, it. No one has to know. No one has to know. Exactly. Isaiah says that's too hard. I don't know which one to pick exactly. I don't either. All right, well, gang, that is our 2025 preview. What say you? Is this good? Is this. Is this a good batch? You guys feeling good about this? I'm looking forward to it. I'm gonna have to let Natalia do her interview, like, immediately. Although she'll probably die if I say, oh, we'll do it December 2025. No, no, she' she'll never make it.

[Thomas Banks]

Right?

[Angelina Stanford]

I think it's going to be really good. Will we do a read along with the Shakespeare? Yes, we will. Yes, we will. We didn't. We haven't done one of those in a while. So yes, we'll do a, a read along. Another free read along of whichever Shakespeare play we choose. And, and yeah, of course we're going to have a bunch of webinars coming up and fun and exciting summer. Did you want, did you want to give them a sneak peek about your summer class? This totally off the cuff.

[Thomas Banks]

Yeah. Okay. So I have not. We're not advertising this yet. It's not for sale or anything like that. But I am going to be teaching a short class a week, maybe, maybe eight or nine days. We'll see on eminent Victorian lives. And I will, I, I don't have a final list of people drawn up yet, but I will be talking about political, artistic, military, social reforming and other sides of Victorian life. All of them sort of seen through the lens of a particular figure. So. Victorian lives. Yeah.

[Angelina Stanford]

Cool. The way you described it to me. Each day would focus on a different person which would allow you to have a different way into Victorian life. It was very cool and the list is very cool. I put you on the spot and it's, it's, it's still a work in progress. But yes, I'll be, I'll be covering the last four Harry Potter books over the summer and he'll be, he'll be doing that and then who knows what Jason will be doing. Dr. Baxter, there will be a pretty exciting excite and I'm not. You can, you can't get it out of me. I'm not going to tell you what it is. But you just wait until we make our official announcement about the next year long class doctor Jason Baxter is going to teach. I'm, I'm just saying you might want to pick up some extra shifts at work over the holiday because you are absolutely gonna not want to miss this. Like maybe kids just open up like a gift wrapping station on the side of the road instead of a lemonade stand. Like just we'll wrap presents and you know when, when my kids were really. I have a daughter who is like such an entrepreneur. Whatever this girl does in life, she's going to be a success. When she was like six years old, I kid you not, she, she made a stand outside of our house on the road where she sold acorns. Okay, seriously, she sold, she sold bags of acorns. And watching this six year old girl put the hard sell on people who stopped. I remember, I'm, I'm like looking out the window and this old guy is like, acorns? What am I supposed to do with that. She goes decorative Thanksgiving centerpieces. And he was like, okay, I. I can't. Okay. And he bought. He bought several bags. And I was like, this child is amazing. She can. She can sell anything. So there you go. Sell your bags of acorn horns because you are going to want to get Dr. Baxter's class, I'm telling you. We squealed with delight when we were, when we came up with this. So this is going to be. This is going to be amazing. You guys are going to be very excited. We don't have anything else even remotely close to this that we've done before at hhl. So this is going to be brand new. Yes. So those of you who showed up late for the live session, don't worry. This has all been recorded and you can, you can catch the record recording. Oh, yes. I have to ask, will there be a 2025 reading challenge? You know, and I had a big note about that and then I forgot to tell it. What we decided to do this year for the reading challenge, since we have so many of them, is this year, the reading challenge is reader choice. So you can choose any of the back reading challenges that we've done, and those will all be linked in the show notes. So we have our book of the centuries. We have our bingo cards. We had our 2 for 22 and our 20 and 20. So with all the different categories. So you'll be able to just pick any one of those this year. So. Yes. Well, thanks guys for listening to the podcast and supporting the podcast. Thank you guys at home for listening. We are very excited about the 2025 lineup and I hope that you guys are too. So next week we will pick back up up with Act 4 of Oscar Wilde's Ideal Husband. And Atlee's going to come on and we're going to talk about some of the film adaptations, the film versions of this fabulous play. Are we ready to sign off?

[Thomas Banks]

I think so.

[Angelina Stanford]

All right.

[Thomas Banks]

Thank you all very much.

[Angelina Stanford]

Well, until next time, keep crafting your literary life, because stories will save the world.

[Cindy Rollins]

Thank you for listening to the Literary Life podcast brought to you by our loyal patreon sponsors. Visit HouseOfHumaneLetters.com to find Angelina and Thomas and to sign up for our newsletter with podcast schedules and more. And keep up with Cindy at morning time for mom. Join the conversation at our member only Patreon forum or our Facebook discussion group. Visit patreon.com theliterarylife to find out how you can sponsor this podcast and get great bonus content. Don't forget to subscribe, rate and review.

[Angelina Stanford]

And check out our sister podcasts, the.

[Cindy Rollins]

New Mason Jar and the well Read Poem. And now for a poem read by poet Thomas Banks.