Rituals Beyond Belief

Sean Illing speaks with poet and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht, whose new book The Wonder Paradox asks: if we don't have God or religion, what — if anything — do we lose? They discuss how religion accesses meaning — through things like prayer, ceremony, and ritual — and Jennifer speaks on the ways that poetry can play similar roles in a secular way. They also discuss some of the "tricks" that poets use, share favorite poems, and explore what it would mean to "live the questions" — and even learn to love them — without having the answers.

Host: Sean Illing (@seanilling), host, The Gray Area

Guest: Jennifer Michael Hecht (@Freudeinstein), poet, historian; author

References: 

• The Wonder Paradox: Embracing the Weirdness of Existence and the Poetry of Our Lives by Jennifer Michael Hecht (FSG; 2023)
• Doubt: A History by Jennifer Michael Hecht (HarperOne; 2004)
• Rainer Maria Rilke, from a 1903 letter to Franz Kappus, published in Letters to a Young Poet (pub. 1929)
• Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman (1855)
• "Why do parrots live so long?" by Charles Q. Choi (LiveScience; May 23, 2022)
• "The survival of poetry depends on the failure of language," from The Tree of Meaning: Language, Mind, and Ecology by Robert Bringhurst (Counterpoint; 2009)
• "Traveler, There Is No Road" ("Caminante, no hay camino") by Antonio Machado (1917)
• "A Free Man's Worship" by Bertrand Russell (1903)
• Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority by Emmanuel Levinas (1961)

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This episode was made by: 

• Producer: Erikk Geannikis
• Engineer: Patrick Boyd
• Editorial Director, Vox Talk: A.M. Hall

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