Save Me From My Shelf

Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. In our eighty-third episode, we continue a weekly, month-long miniseries on short narrative poems. Today we cover Samuel Taylor Coleridge's 1798 Gothic-Romantic-philosophical epic sea yarn, 'Rime of the Ancient Mariner'. We get amused by a bassoon and confused by the gloss, just as Coleridge intended. Probably.Cover art © Catherine Wu.Episode Theme: Mendelssohn, 'Hebrides Overture'.

Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. In our eighty-second episode, we start a weekly, month-long miniseries on short narrative poems, beginning with Alexander Pope's 1714 mock-epic, 'The Rape of the Lock'. Daniel is determined to not have wig-face, both our hosts share childhood hair-cutting trauma, and we learn that this is where fairies with wings comes from!Cover art © Catherine Wu.Episode Theme: Vivaldi, Concerto in D Major 1. 'Allegro'.

The thirty-third episode of SMFMS Bookends, the satellite show for Save Me From My Shelf. Here we read emails, answer listener questions, talk about what we're currently reading, watching, and playing, resuscitate the Bad Sex Awards™, and provide further outtakes and analysis cut from our Woman in White episode.

Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. In our eighty-first episode, we cover our first (and THE first) sensation novel, Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White (1860). Daniel gets pissed off at the narrative structure and the lack of concertinas, while Abby basks in the glow of some real bad biddies.Cover art © Catherine Wu.Episode Theme: 'Figaro' performed on the concertina by Daniel Jenkin-Smith

The thirty-second episode of SMFMS Bookends, the satellite show for Save Me From My Shelf. Here we read emails, answer listener questions, talk about what we're currently reading, watching, and playing, resuscitate the Bad Sex Awards™, and provide further outtakes and analysis cut from our Picnic at Hanging Rock episode.

Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. In our eightieth episode, we go to a new continent for the podcast (Australia) with Joan Lindsay's 1967 horror-mystery, Picnic at Hanging Rock. We do a combination Valentine's Day, summer, and Halloween episode as we talk about various teen lusts, revolting late-Victorian food, more revolting nature, and most revolting fake Australian accents.Cover art © Catherine Wu.Episode Theme: Royalty-Free Didgeridoo Music, courtesy of YouTube.