Entitled Opinions (about Life and Literature)

Professor Watkin is a Senior Lecturer in French Studies at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. At its broadest, his research explores how people make sense of the world, and how they interact with ideas and positions different from their own. His previous publications include: “Phenomenology or Deconstruction?”, “Difficult Atheism”, and “French Philosophy Today: New Figures […]

With our recording studio at KZSU temporarily closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, professor Robert Harrison has decided to open the Entitled Opinions Happy Hour Bar, offering up some small shots of poetry, on the house! We inaugurate our happy hour this week with a few choice lyrics from Jimi Hendrix. If you are interested […]

This show is a recording of an online meeting that was held on Sunday April 5th, 2020. In this discussion professor Robert Harrison speaks on Boccaccio's Decameron, with particular emphasis on the following novelle: Second Day, story #5; Third Day, story #1 and story #10; Fourth Day, story #5; Fifth Day story #9; Sixth Day, […]

In this episode, professor Robert Harrison reflects on the ways in which the present Coronavirus pandemic gives new resonance to Boccaccio’s Decameron, which was written in the immediate aftermath of the Black Death of 1348.  This monologue was recorded from Robert’s home. It will be followed in a day or two by the recording of […]

In this episode, professor Harrison reflects on the symbolism of willows and their connection to thresholds. He includes discussions of Japanese willow stories, Algernon Blackwood, and poems by the pre-rafalite poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti and his sister Christina Rossetti.

Pau is a graduate student in the ILAC (Iberian and Latin American cultures) department at Stanford University. He recently submitted his dissertation, and he will be graduating this year (2019). Pau has studied Philosophy, History, Greek Tragedy and Cinema. He has published three books about his travel experiences and one on the relation between archaeology […]

Marisa Galvez is Associate Professor of French at Stanford University. She specializes in medieval literature and culture, especially the lyric and romance of Continental Europe during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Her scholarship focuses on such topics as crusade, performance, and the European lyric tradition from the Middle Ages to the present day. Her forthcoming […]

In this episode filmmaker and author Werner Herzog discusses his remarkable book “Of Walking in Ice”, first published in 1978. The audio in this show is a recording of a live event that took place at Stanford University on May 7, 2019. Discussing this book with Herzog are professors Robert Harrison and Amir Eshel. Werner […]

In this episode professor Harrison reads from Lawrence Ferlinghetti's poem “Time of Useful Consciousness”, published in 2012. Ferlinghetti turned 100 years old on March 24, 2019.

Kai Carlson-Wee grew up on the Minnesota prairie. He received his BA in English from the University of Minnesota and his MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His first collection of poems, RAIL, was published by BOA Editions in 2018. He is currently the Jones Lecturer in Poetry at Stanford University. Kai […]