Bad Dads: Cannibals

Explicit content warning

09/18/23 • 29 min

There are many ways of eating your child, but only a handful of reasons one might do so. In this edition of PODRE: Bad Dads, Chris & Brad search for answers in the literature of the Italian Middle Ages and in the 9th circle of hell of our own current politics. As ever, we bring you the baddest dads of yesterday, today, and tomorrow here on PODRE. Don't be one of them!

Brad Franco's book on Siena is here.

The Count Ugalino episode of Dante's Inferno, along with excellent commentary and some fun images, is here on Columbia U's frankly badass Digital Dante resource.

Dante & an Egg, by friend of the pod John Harvey, can be found here.

Get ready for more Monday bonus drops this fall, and make sure you're subscribing to PODRE so you never miss an episode.

Brad Franco's book on Siena is here.

The Count Ugalino episode of Dante's Inferno, along with excellent commentary and some fun images, is here on Columbia U's frankly badass Digital Dante resource.

Dante & an Egg, by friend of the pod John Harvey, can be found here.

Get ready for more Monday bonus drops this fall, and make sure you're subscribing to PODRE so you never miss an episode.

Previous Episode

Bad Dads: Greeks!

Writer, professor, and gourmand John Harvey returns to PODRE for a very special edition of Bad Dads. Chris, Brad, and John look to their beloved poets of ancient Greece to determine which is worse: being a deadbeat dad, murdering your father and marrying your mother, or simply swallowing your children whole without even so much as a nice sauce or side vegetable. We also reach back into the past to hear Julian at age three teaching his mother the plot of The Odyssey (professors' kids: what are you gonna do?) in this full Greek immersion experience of PODRE.

If you're in the market for a new translation of Homer's Odyssey--and you probably are--you'll want to get a copy of Emily Wilson's superb and modern version, published in 2018 by Norton. Wilson is the first woman translator of Homer's poems, and her much-anticipated Iliad will be out this fall.

https://www.emilyrcwilson.com/the-odyssey

Julian's board book is available here. Thanks Uncle Mik!

Please go to our website and sign up to join our email list so we can be in touch when season 2 is set to premier.

Next Episode

THE PODRE REVIEW Issue 1 (with Kaveh Akbar)

PODRE's newest bonus miniseries (yes, our highly-anticipated literary salon) kicks off with guest Kaveh Akbar, all-world poet and author of PILGRIM BELL and the forthcoming novel MARTYR, here to discuss poets who can handle the rock, the enduring cultural significance of The Simpsons, and three poems about fatherhood that will make your heart swell bigger than the rim when Steph Curry's on one of his heaters. It's basketball season. It's poetry season. It's PODRE, from the logo, BAAAAANG!

In case you're a little confused as to what's happening in the special show intro, here you go.

Each of Kaveh Akbar's several magnificent books can & should be purchased at the website of the man himself, here.

Marvelous poet and friend of the pod Hayan Charara's books, including his newest collection, can be found here.

Robert Hayden's incredibly rich body of poetic work is worth owning in this handsome volume.

Please head over to the website or find us on social media so you can see the gorgeous PODRE Review Issue 1 cover art made by David Wojciechowski.

And here are the poems we discuss on the episode: "Ode to an Abandoned House" by Hayan Charara. "Those Winter Sundays" by Robert Hayden. And "Learning to Pray" by Kaveh Akbar.

PODRE - Bad Dads: Cannibals

Transcript

Chris: Dads. They've been around since the beginning. But what do we really know about them? It's time to start asking questions. I'm Chris Brunt. This is PODRE.
Chris: We're back from Italy. Siamo tornati a casa. L'Italia è finita. We had nearly a month over there, writing and exploring and coming to know the European mind. That overlay of the ancient world with the medieval, with the ultra modern, that can be dizzying and profound. But mostly you just stand there, take a picture with you