Recall This Book

Is Thomas Piketty the world’s most famous economic historian ? A superstar enemy of plutocratic capitalism who wrote a pathbreaking bestseller, Capital in the 21st Century? Or simply a debonair and generous French intellectual happy to talk redistributive justice? Join this 2020 conversation with John and Adaner Usmani (star of RTB’s episode 44: Racism as idea, Racism as Power Relation) to find out.Why did we invite him? John thinks nobody is better than Piketty at mapping and explaining the nature and origin of the glaring and growing inequality that everywhere defines wealth distribution in the 21st century—both between societies and within them. His recent magnum opus, Capital and Ideology. ask what sorts of stories societies (and individuals within those societies) tell themselves so as to tolerate such inequality—and the poverty and misery it produces. Or even to see that inequality as part of the natural order of things.Why did he accept our invitation? A mystery, but who are we to look a gift economist in the mouth?Mentioned in the EpisodePhilip Larkin, “Why aren’t they screaming?” (from the poem “The Old Fools”)Bonus: Here is John’s question about his favorite writer, the one Adaner teased him for not asking:“Mr. Piketty, you are interested in hinge points where people cease being captivated by one ideology and begin seeing differently (might one also say, begin being captivated by another ideology?) In 2014, Ursula le Guin said:‘We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art, the art of words.‘Can I ask how that resonates with your argument about the rapid changeability of economic paradigms–and moral paradigms for justifying inequality–in Capital and Ideology? “Read transcript here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our Recall this Buck series, back in 2020 and 2021, explored the history of money, ranging from the earliest forms of labor IOUs to the modern world of bitcoin and electronically distributed value. We began by focusing on the rise of capitalism, the Bank of England, and how an explosion of liquidity changed everything.We were lucky to do so, just before the Pandemic struck, with Christine Desan of Harvard Law School, who recently published Making Money: Coin, Currency, and the Coming of Capitalism (Oxford University Press, 2014). She is also managing editor of JustMoney.org, a website that explores money as a critical site of governance. Desan’s research explores money as a legal and political project. Her approach opens economic orthodoxy to question by widening the focus on money as an instrument, to examine the institutions and agreements through which resources are mobilized and tracked, by means of money. In doing so, she shows that particular forms of money, and the markets within which they circulate, are neither natural or inevitable. Christine Desan, “Making Money“ Ursula Le Guin The Earthsea Novels (money hard to come by, but kinda cute) Samuel Delany, the Neveryon series (money part of the evils of naming, slavery, labor appropriation) Jane Austen “Pride and Prejudice“ Richard Rhodes, “Energy“ John Plotz, “Is Realism Failing?” (on liberal guilt and patrimonial fiction) William Cobbett, “Rural Rides” (1830; London as wen) E. P. Thompson, “The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century” (notional “just price” of bread) Peter Brown, “Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350-550 AD” Chris Vanden Bossche, “Reform Acts“ “Sanditon” on PBS (and the original unfinished Austen novel) Still from “Sanditon” Margot Finn, “Character of Credit“ Thomas Piketty, “Capital in the 21st Century“ L. Frank Baum, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” (1900) Leo Tolstoy “The Forged Coupon” (orig.1904) Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Bottle Imp” (1891) Frank Norris, “The Octopus” (1901) D. W. Griffith, “A Corner in Wheat” (1909) Read the episode here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Way back in 2019, Elizabeth and John were already thinking about collaboration. Here they speak with Jared Green and explore The Electro-Library, a podcast he co-created.Elizabeth, Jared and John play snippets from a recent Electro-Library episode on the decidedly non-podcasty topic of photographs, and use it as a springboard to discuss the different aesthetic experiences of radio, television, film, reading, audiobooks, and podcasts. Which are the easiest and which the hardest artworks to get lost in? Would Frankenstein’s monster be more popular as a podcaster than as a YouTuber? (The answer to that one seems most likely to be yes).The conversation then turns to the difference between artworks that slide in at the ear and those that come in by eye. What kind of world-building is going on on Recall This Book? Which podcasts are like a Wagnerian gesamtkunstwerk and which are more Schubertian, semi-detached and conversational? Then, in Recallable Books, Jared recommends Barthes’s Camera Lucida, Elizabeth recommends the work of Sarah Lewis, and John recommends the Habitat podcast.Discussed in this episode: Lapham’s Quarterly The Lover, Marguerite Duras “The Photograph,” Umberto Eco Various audiobooks, John Le Carré Collected Poems, Prose, and Plays, Robert Frost The Most of P.G. Wodehouse, P.G. Wodehouse “The Dead,” James Joyce Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, Alison Bechdel Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography, Roland Barthes Aperture 223, “Vision and Justice,” ed. Sarah Lewis The Habitat Read the episode here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Francisco del Pino is a widely celebrated composer from Buenos Aires, and currently a Ph.D. candidate in Music Composition at Princeton University. John fell in love with Francisco's music (during his own semester there) when he heard a piece based on the poetry of his longtime friend Victoria Cóccaro.Recall This Book seized the chance to speak with del Pino (in John's weirdly resonant office) about composition and collaboration.Listen to all of Decir on New Amsterdam Records.You can hear more of the music on Spotify, Band Camp and even on his You Tube channel.J. S. Bach: Reasons to be interested in late almost abstract or even inhuman pieces (e.g. 1747Musical Offering.) that may have been written without any particular instrument in mind.John brings up whale songs, thinking of the memorable 1979 National Geographic record he listened to as a kid.Read the episode here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Aside from being John’s (younger, suaver and beardier) brother, what has the inimitable David Plotz done lately? Only hosted “The Slate Political Gabfest“, written two books (“The Genius Factory” and “The Good Book“) and left Atlas Obscura to found City Cast.So, when John called him up in April 2020 for the Books in Dark Times series, what was his Pandemic reading? The fully absorbing “other worlds” of Dickens and Mark Twain tempt David, but he goes another direction. He picks one book that shows humanity at its worst, heading towards world war. And another that shows how well we can behave towards one another (and even how happy we can be…) at “moments of super liquidity” when everything melts and can be rebuilt.He also guiltily admits a yen for Austen, Rowling, and Pullman–and gratuitously disses LOTR. John and David bond about their love for lonnnnnnng-form cultural history in the mold of Common Ground. Finally the brothers enthuse over their favorite book about Gettysburg, and reveal an embarrassing reenactment of the charge down Little Round Top.Mentioned in this episode: Charles Dickens, “David Copperfield“ J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Hobbit“ Mark Twain, “Huckleberry Finn” (1884) Barbara Tuchman, “The Guns of August” (1962, but about 1914) Emily St. John Mandel, “Station Eleven” (2014) Jon Moallem, “This is Chance” (March 2020; on the great Alaska earthquake) Isabel Wilkerson,. “The Warmth of Other Suns” (2010) (David delightedly discovers it on his bookshelf..) J Anthony Lukas, “Common Ground” (1986) (the mothership of the long-form cultural history that DP and JP both adore) Jane Austen, “Pride and Prejudice” (1813) J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter series Michael Shaara, “The Killer Angels” (1974) Read the transcript here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steve Fainaru and his brother Mark Fainaru-Wada wrote a bestselling and award-winning book (and accompanying PBS documentary series) about the NFL coverup of concussion trauma, League of Denial. This conversation inaugurates an occasional Recall this Book series on collaborative work: who does it well, what makes it succeed, why can't grumpy isolatos like English professors get with the program?The brothers generously praise the colleagues and mentors who helped them on their way. They also dig into questions of trust between collaborators and constant choices reporting and writing entails. Some stories are dogs, some are "unmakeable" and some you can't see; how do you recognize the situation and cope?Almost as afterthought, they lay bare the amount of persistent, patient long-term conversation and relationship-building that goes into finding out the truth behind events that powerful organizations. Steve explains the reporting behind his 2008 Pulitzer-winning stories about American private contractors during the invasion of Iraq. Basically, "institutions react institutionally." Then the tricky question of how to be a football fan in the concussion era arises.Mentioned in the episode:  Phil Bennett a mentor for Steve. Lance Williams journalist, partner, source-maintainer: inspiration for Mark. The memorable newspaper advisors who shaped Mark and Steve in their high-school gig at the Redwood Bark: Sylvia Jones and Donal Brown. Plus: Stand by for more of their work on the NBA in China.... Read and listen to the episode here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For the RtB Books in Dark Times series back in 2021, John spoke with Elizabeth Bradfied, editor of Broadsided Press, poet, professor of creative writing at Brandeis, naturalist, photographer.Her books include Interpretive Work, Approaching Ice, Once Removed, and Toward Antarctica. She lives on Cape Cod, travels north every summer to guide people into Arctic climes, birdwatches.Liz is in and of and for our whole natural world. Did poetry sustaining her through the darkest hours of the pandemic? What about other sources of inspiration?Mentioned in the episode: Eavand Boland, “Quarantine” (from Against Love Poetry; read her NY Times obituary here) Maeve Binchy, “Circle of Friends“ Sherwood Anderson, Winesburg, Ohio Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology Louise Gluck Averno and Wild Iris Brian Teare, Doomstead Days Derek Walcott, “Omeros“ W. S. Merwin, “The Folding Cliffs” Natasha Trethewey, “Belloqc’s Ophelia“ Yeats, “We make out of the quarrel with others, rhetoric, but of the quarrel with ourselves, poetry.” Nest, Eggs and Nestlings of North American Birds (Princeton Field Guides) Trixie Belden Shel Silverstein Lois Lowry, “The Giver“ Liz equates poetry and Tetris Leanne Simpson, “This Accident of Being Lost“ Elizabeth Bradfield, “We all want to see a mammal“ Listen and Read Here: Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"For me, there is something so solid and comforting in stone" says Sassan Tabatabai in our conversation, and in his poem "Firestones" the words roll, weigh and satisfyingly click together.FirestonesI was collecting rocks on the Cardiff coast,a testimony to centuries of siltleft on the shore, of sediment pressed into stone:sandstone, shale, tufa, travertine, jasper, flint.There was the stone that knew the sadness of the sea,that saved its secrets. It was pock-marked with holesand lay half-buried in sand eager to savethe ocean's spray, like tears, in its miniature pools.There was the stone that always rolled in place.It had rolled round and round with each wave,desperately trying to control the tide.The was the stone that shoe rings upon ringsplaced by the seas over the years,that kept time for the Pacific.There were stones that breathed sulfur,that sparked when they touched.Unremarkable in luster or shine, theywere the lovers of the ocean, firestoneswhose sparks were not dampened by salty waves(but they only made sense in pairs).And there was this one, more white,more brilliant, more polished than any stone.But it was once upon a shell;it needed centuries to become stone.It was a counterfeit firestone:it did not breathe sulfur, it could not make sparks.I traced my steps back along the Cardiff coastand the stones I returned to the sands.The ocean's secrets would be well-kept by the stones:its tears would be stored in pools,its tides kept in check,its years measured in rungs.But love itself I could not leave on the beach.I kept the firestones.Discussing this poem with Sassan, we touched on Scholar's stones came up and also Gerard Manley Hopkins's journals full of words/names.From here we moved to other poems and poems and Sassan's work in different languages (Persian, English), poetic traditions (haiku, Sufi poetry, ghazal) and activities (writing, translation, teaching). His dissertation on Persian poet Rudaki is mentioned. His "messy" practice across these many boundaries expresses a kind of playful profusion, ultimately rooted in sound, word, and the music of the lines.*Qazal*As a boy, I waited for the smile to appear in you.Listened for echoes of the sigh I could hear in you.You are the mirror where I have sought the beloved:Her hyacinth curls, a nod, a wink. a tear, in you.In the marketplace you can learn your future for a price.They are merchants of fate; I see the seer in you.What had been buried under the scriupture's weight,Its truth, without words or incense, becomes clear in you.They who bind you on the altar of sacrificeHide behind masks; don’t let them smell the fear in you.As I approach the house lit by dawn's blue light,Step by step, I lose myself, I disappear in you.We closed out our talk with a reading of Sassan's translation of David Ferry's "Resemblance" (also featured in episode 55), with the Persian and English stanzas alternating.Sassan's book Ferry to Malta will be out in April, and you can hear him read and discuss his work April 27th at Brookline Booksmith.Read the transcript here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On a blustery fall morning back in 2019, RTB welcomed Christine Walley, anthropologist and author of Exit Zero: Family and Class in Postindustrial Chicago. In the early 1980s Chris’s father, along with thousands of other steel workers, lost his job when the mills in Southeastern Chicago closed. The book is part of a multimodal project, including the documentary film, “Exit Zero: An Industrial Family Story,” (with director Chris Boebel) and an NEH-funded digitization project of the Southeastern Chicago Historical Museum, a community-based archive of materials related to the neighborhood.How can academics begin conversations about class and deindustrialization with those most negatively affected by the precarious economic present? What is the secret to unpacking the great diversity hidden behind the phrase “white working class”? This episode’s signature RTB move (fleeing the present, only to discover echoes of its misery back in the past) takes us to Elizabeth Gaskell’s novel North and South, published in 1854 just as industrialization in the North of England was taking off.In Recallable Books, Elizabeth lingers in England’s North to recommend George Orwell’s The Road to Wigan Pier. Chris points out how Jane Addams’s Twenty Years at Hull House (though perhaps patronizing in some ways) shows us 19th century projects for combating the dislocation and suffering of deindustrialization. John goes against type by anteing up the most current of our recallable books, Joseph O’Neill’s The Dog.Mentioned in this episode: Exit Zero: Family and Class in Postindustrial Chicago, Christine J. Walley The Jungle, Upton Sinclair Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Benedict Anderson Chicago School of Sociology Suspended Dreams: the Afterlife of Memory in Photographic Album, Martha Langford Trump’s Election and the ‘White Working Class’: What We Missed, Christine J. Walley North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Ottessa Moshfegh Give a Man a Fish, James Ferguson The Human Condition, Hannah Arendt The Road to Wigan Pier, George Orwell Twenty Years at Hull House, Jane Addams The Dog, Joseph O’Neill Listen to the episode here:Walley Transcript Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John and Elizabeth, in this special Centennial episode of Recall this Book, explore spectral radiation with Ryo Morimoto, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Princeton University. His new book Nuclear Ghost: Atomic Livelihoods in Fukushima's Grey Zone (University of California Press, 2023) is based on several years of fieldwork in coastal Fukushima after the triple disaster of earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear accident. Ryo's book shows how residents of the region live with and through the "nuclear ghost" that resides with them.The trio discuss ways that residents acclimatize themselves to the presence of radiation, efforts to live their lives in ways not only shaped by catastrophe and irradiation, and the Geiger counter as a critical object.Ryo relates the astonishing--but when you stop to think unsurprising—fact that "once you have [a Geiger counter] you actually want to see higher scores."Mentioned in this episode: Paul Saint-Amour, Tense Future Arkady and Boris Strugatsky Roadside Picnic Tarkovksy, Stalker (the film) Stalker (the video game) Haruki Murakami 1Q84 Pat Barker The Ghost Road Read the episode here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices