This week we're discussing C.P. Snow's influential 1959 lecture 'The Two Cultures', on the growing division between literary and scientific intellectuals:

"So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had."

Why do literary types tend to be Luddites? Is it kinda good that hubristic tech bros refuse to read the classics? Has the gap narrowed or widened in recent decades? How closely does The Two Cultures map onto the stemcels vs shape rotators meme? And of course Cam analyses the various status dynamics at play.

Trickling out episodes atm while Rich is on paternity leave. Normal service will resume shortly

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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:

• James Joyce - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
• Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood

Back to the novels. This week, the DYEL boys decide to try Butcher's Crossing, the first novel from John Williams, the author famous for writing the so-underrated-it-might-be-overrated-but-probably-is-now-just-correctly-rated novel Stoner. As to be expected, it's not on the same level of Stoner but we still enjoy it.

Decline of the buffalo: Rich reminds Cam that we already had this discussion in our episode of Blood Meridian but Cam forgot it and found himself in new disbelief on the staggering decline of the North American Bison.

Emerson and finding yourself: It turns out Rich went through an Emerson phase. Well, actually more of a Thoreau phase but the both had three names and wrote around the same time so it counts. We discuss Emerson's idea of transcendence and whether this novel is meant as a refutation or embodiment of it.

Miller: Not on the level of the Judge in Blood Meridian but a memorable character in his own right. Rich has some small gripes with his characterisation.

CHAPTERS

(00:00:01) Intro (00:06:10) Summary (00:07:53) Emerson's transcendentalism (00:17:30) American Buffalo: Decline, hunting, skinning (00:26:02) Miller's stoicism and characterisation (00:34:24) Schneider's empty (Chekhov's) gun (00:41:18) Does Miller's motive make sense? (00:46:26) Lesser work to Stoner (00:48:54) Anti-Emerson (00:53:02) Ending and nihilism (01:00:15) Outro and next picks

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We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.

NEXT ON THE READING LIST:

• James Joyce - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
• Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood

The Do You Even Lit boys put down the heavy tomes and choose a short story. Well, we're not sure if it counts as a story. Maybe a thought experiment? This week we’re talking about one of our favourite authors: Jorge Luis Borges. We read The Library of Babel, Borges’s classic meditation on infinity (well, not infinity exactly — but an almost-might-as-well-be infinity). There are a lot of books.

Nonsense: Not to complain about pLoT hOlEz, but we take slight issue with the fact that it's no feasible for a librarian to find any coherent passages, even if the library contains everything collectively.

How would you know? We worry about the metaphysical horror of not being able to know you found the book with all the codes in it even if you found it. We're reassured by reminding ourselves that we won't stumble across

The library: How are the hexagons actually connected? Can you piss off the railing? Was it designed to be pissed off? And if you jumped, which book would you bring on the way down?

CHAPTERS

(0:11) Banter and boners (2:13) Thought experiments vs short stories (4:28) Summary (06:07) How many books is it really? (08:23) It'd all be nonsense, practically speaking (10:23) Metaphysical layers 1 and 2 (18:06) the real world website (21:10) Falling down the shaft (27:06) No author doesn't quite hit the same (39:06) How do they have history? (44:30) What does the library look like? (47:25) Multiverse (59:03) Wrap up

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NEXT ON THE READING LIST:

• Butcher's Crossing - John Williams
• James Joyce...