Do You Even Lit?

IMMORTAL ASEXUAL CLONES: YES NO? Did aella's birthday gangbang generate positive externalities? Why is Cam's fridge full of dead chickens? These are the big questions of our age and we are the only ones brave enough to tackle them. Join us as we wrap up our discussion of Houellebecq's Atomised (also known as The Elementary Particles). The sexual marketplace has no safety net: Houellebecq says individualism devours the rational structures meant to protect us. Rich argues we've already mostly solved this problem in the economic realm. Sex is harder tho. Are there any positive-sum status games to play here?Why do we tolerate redistributive policy for wealth but not for sex? Is Freddie deBoer a hypocrite for clowning on incels?  Bruno visits the Lieu de Changement: A sex commune with much kindly compassion for the outcasts masturbating on the fringes. Could this scale beyond extremely rule-following Germans? Is enforced monogamy the real solution, or has that ship long since sailed? Houellebecq's rhetorical sleight of hand: is paternal love purely instrumental? Do hippies really have a direct lineage to sadists and serial killers? Is the hedonic treadmill of transgression a real thing? probably not but we love our cheeky boy. One trillion identical Cams: Michel's solution is to eliminate sexual reproduction, individuality, and desire entirely. Would this even work? Is H being serious or just proving the problem is insoluble? What happens to science and progress in a world with no genetic or ideological diversity? CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) penis size chat (00:05:41) Brave New World and other failed utopias (00:15:30) The intractable problem of inceldom (00:25:58) Sexual social democracy and compassion for the lone masturbator (00:37:22) Houellebecq's rhetorical sleight of hand (00:41:30) the hedonic treadmill of transgression: hippies to serial killers (00:47:25) positive externalities of aella's birthday gangbang and other status games (00:54:01) Rich rants about positivism and quantum physics woo (01:00:22) the third metaphysical mutation: asexual immortal clones (01:11:12) Next book announcement   WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde — Robert Louis Stevenson American Pastoral — Philip Roth

Houellebecq's 1998 novel Atomised (also known as The Elementary Particles) is prophetic, provocative and absolutely filthy. This chat covers the first ~200 pages: On the sexual revolution: Are inceldom and looksmaxxing the inevitable consequences of the intrusion of market forces into every facet of human society? If Clavicular did not exist, would it be necessary to invent him? Fertility crisis: Can we rely on new technologies to save us from population crash? Rich argues that this time might really be different; Benny is more optimistic. Do any of us really want to RETVRN to forced monogamy? Is liberalism at risk of extincting itself? Which cultures will win the memetic battle? ...and more   CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) Metaphysical mutations and historical determinism (00:08:00) Bruno the proto-incel and Michel the proto-asexual (00:15:30) Mother nature is Bad, Actually (00:21:50) Clavicular and the sexual marketplace (00:32:36) Enforced monogamy and slut shaming (00:42:30) The fertility crisis and population crash   WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: Atomised — Michel Houellebecq (part 2)

This week's between-novel quick read is Stefan Zweig's The Royal Game: A Chess Story, written in 1941, immediately before Zweig obliterated his map. We argue over the perfect answer to the 'desert island book' question, whether it's possible to fracture your own mind into pieces, why Cam sucks at chess, and whether we should pressure our kids to become pro athletes/chess prodigies/concert pianists.   CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) plot summary (00:05:43) What’s the perfect desert island book? (00:17:00) Tulpas and fractured psyches (00:26:10) Our own chess performance (00:34:56) On monomania and pressuring kids into sports/music/chess   WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: Atomised — Michel Houellebecq

Tell me if you've heard this one: A mentally unstable old man abuses his position of power to pursue his own personal agenda. He alternates between smooth talking—tremendous moxie, the best speeches—and threatening the LOSERS and HATERS who stand in his way. He runs roughshod over checks and balances, ignores the norms of civil society, and whips his followers into a fervour against an imagined enemy. In his egotistical mania, he takes down everyone else with him. We are talking of course about Herman Melville's MOBY DICK (chapters 81-135). Rich gets political: On Melville's egalitarian dream, the milk and sperm of human kindness, Ahab as demagogue, why the crew don't mutiny, parallels to the current political moment, and Latin America as a cautionary tale. Does Rich have a point here, or has he fallen victim to Ahab Derangement Syndrome? Benny is all symbolism-ed out: Bad omen after bad omen, we get it. We can see the ending coming a mile away. Has Melville created too rich of a feast for us? Does the explicit fatalism make Ahab a more or less interesting character? Did any of us feel any narrative tension in this last third of the book? What is with the pacing? What's it all about: Cam proposes the 'interpretation interpretation'. We talk about the limitations of Ahab's approach to meaning-making, vs Ishmael's more pluralistic approach. And our final thoughts on tackling this behemoth of a book.  CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) don’t cry for me argentina (00:07:30) what did we think of the final section? (00:16:02) What does it all mean? (00:20:30) Ahab vs Ishmael meaning-making project (00:28:23) overdosing on omens and symbolism (00:37:40) Pip the cabin boy (00:44:07) The milk and sperm of human kindness (00:47:48) Ahab the demagogue (00:59:18) Next book announcement   WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: The Royal Game — Stefan Zweig Atomised — Michel Houellebecq

Quick film review before we get back to the final part of Moby Dick. Guillermo del Toro's long-awaited Frankenstein adaptation is absolutely cleaning up in the Oscar nominations, including a nod for Best Picture. Benny and Rich make the comparison with Mary Shelley's source material and find it to be sadly wanting (altho we do have some nice things to say). On the dumbing-down of nuanced morality stories, and the ubiquity of daddy issues/therapy speak in modern media. Can't a guy just be a crazy hubristic scientist anymore??  Plus: a brief detour through the horror of quantum immortality. WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question. NEXT ON THE READING LIST: The final third of Moby Dick The Royal Game — Stefan Zweig Atomised — Michel Houellebecq

We continue our voyage with chapters 40-80 of Herman Melville's leviathan MOBY DICK. Talking nihilism and meaning-making, the deeper significance of making the whale white (seriously), the terrifying vastness of the ocean, animal welfare and charismatic megafauna, and whether we're OK with reading an abridged edition of the book.  In short: we're having a whale of a time. Tune in next week for our third and final instalment.  CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) They should make some kind of 'abridged' version of this book (00:12:21) BULKINGTON (00:19:18) Whiteness conceptual analysis (00:32:10) First whale encounter (00:41:51) The bloody, brutal business of the sperm whale fishery (00:52:32) Charismatic megafauna / animal ethics (01:00:48) Tashtego falls into a vat of sperm (01:10:02) Listener mail: Is it OK to use another man's Anki deck?   WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: The final third of Moby Dick ??

Starting the year off right by signing on for an epic voyage with Herman Melville's MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE, published in 1851, and widely considered to be the great American novel. It's quite the beast so we're dividing it into three parts, with this first convo covering chapters 1-40. Call me Ishmael: Dissecting the iconic opening line, why we love Ishmael as a narrator, on the optimal strategy for getting snuggly in bed, the precise nature of his relationship with (we claim) our fellow New Zealand native Queequeg, and the question of race and class politics onboard a whaling ship. The mysterious Captain Ahab: various ominous warnings, initial thoughts on Ahab's motivations, punching through the pasteboard mask, and a climactic ritual atop the Quarter-deck. Infamous infodumps: Benny's eyes glazed over at times, Cam skimmed the Cetology chapter, but Rich makes the case for soldiering through. Plus we look at some of the interesting formal choices Melville makes, the early seeds of modernism, and can't help but make some comparisons to Blood Meridian and Butcher's Crossing.   CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) Ahoy shipmates (00:03:20) Call me Ishmael analysis (00:11:33) NEW ZEALAND MENTIONED!!! (00:17:32) Race politics in international waters (00:23:51) Perilous adventures for young men (00:29:29) The infamous cetology chapter (00:34:44) Jonah and the whale/biblical allusions (00:42:20) We need to talk about Ahab (00:54:48) Infodumps, genre mashups and the roots of modernism (01:01:10) Listener mail: Adam G in NYC    WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: ??

The hosts dive into their experiences with a challenging Pynchon novel they couldn't finish. They debate if they picked the wrong book, question their comprehension, and ponder literary masochism. Exploring postmodernism, they discuss the purpose behind difficulty in writing. Comparing Pynchon and Wallace, they analyze themes of sincerity versus irony in literature. Their reflections on humor in dense prose and the merits of maximalism lead to a broader conversation about reading challenges and expectations in great literature.

Some festive chit-chat and navel gazing on the year that was.  CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) big tiddy goth gfs and rival podcast recs (00:10:09) DYEL wrapped stats analysis (00:19:39) Third best book of the year (00:23:41) Second best book of the year (00:29:01) Best book of the year (00:33:11) Biggest stinker of the year (00:40:13) Best non-book club book or blog (00:56:25) Favourite movie or TV show of the year (01:03:53) What we're gonna do differently next year WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: Moby Dick by Herman Melville

We've been making eyes at the postmodernists for a while, but up until this point have lacked the stones to go take a ride on daddy Pynchon's rocket ship. Now that we have a little experience we thought we were ready for a mature and sophisticated lover like Gravity's Rainbow (1973): 800 pages long, and widely considered to be one of the greatest novels of all time. ...we were not ready. It's right back to clumsy virginal fumblings as we attempt to decipher the first 100 pages. A shameful and frankly demoralising experience for the boys. Does it get easier? Please dear god let it get easier. CHAPTERS: (00:00:00) introductory fumblings (00:06:19) Rocket warfare (00:12:40) Pirate, ACHTUNG, and the Firm (00:17:14) Slothrop’s psychic schlong (00:22:58) Roger Mexico the statistician (00:30:12) Reverse causality (00:36:16) I didn't get that reference   WRITE US: We love listener feedback. Send us a note at douevenlit@gmail.com to correct our hot takes, add your own, or ask a question.   NEXT ON THE READING LIST: ???