Podcast Benomtad

Pornography participates in beauty, but also is consumptive, and especially, unappreciative.  This is contrasted to Odysseus' paise of Nausicaa in his speech to her, without the ritual supplication at...

20 Jul 5min

Odysseus, when he sees nubile and beautiful Nausicaa when he washes up on shore at the beginning of Book 6, does not try to capture her in any way.  This in a time with raiding parties and the famous ...

13 Jul 8min

Man is he who suffers, and Odysseus is the man “of twists and turns,” the builder and destroyer, the journeyer trying to reach his beloved homeland.  Here Ian and I discuss what draws this man forward...

4 Jul 1h 29min

A dying queen demands that her husband remarry only someone as beautiful as she.  After the mourning period, his advisors scramble around to find a new monarch, but the king’s eye alights on his very ...

3 Jul 1h 19min

Why do we like folktales and myths?  I think one reason is that they help us learn to pay attention to instinct.  It’s not that I don’t think rationality is important–it is a key to a wise life.  But ...

30 Jun 7min

The Virtue of Beauty, the Beauty of Virtue: A king is cursed to live as an old man with his servant– now animal attendants–until they are saved by one with kindness for all life.  A poor woodcutter go...

14 Jun 26min

In “Fight Club,” the protagonist tries to find meaning in life through filling his life with purchases.  But that doesn’t give him fullness–he feels dead.  So he goes to cancer support groups, and the...

6 Jun 7min

Zombies are everywhere in our culture, in movies and shows, and even in real life, on zombie walks.  They’ve gone from being an object of horror to one of fascination, one that seems to reflect someth...

27 Mai 1h 31min