In 1939, Dorothy Thompson was on the cover of Time, the ‘First Lady of American journalism’ and a major celebrity. By 1945, she’d been widely dismissed as a crank.
Deborah Friedell joins Tom to discuss Thompson’s enormous influence in interwar America, and her idiosyncratic mix of prescience and short-sightedness.
Find further reading on the podcast page: ht ... Show More
Oct 29
How Prediction Markets Work
According to their boosters, prediction markets such as Polymarket or Kalshi are ‘global truth machines’; their detractors say they’re just a glorified form of gambling. Either way, they’re zero-sum games with, as Geoff Mann put it recently in the LRB, ‘few winners and many loser ... Show More
1 h
Oct 24
Ulysses: James Joyce's properly obscene book
Tom McCarthy, writing in the LRB, described James Joyce's Ulysses as a ‘heavy book, a book full of weight, a fallen book’; a ‘properly obscene book’; ‘a book in which the central stake is the coming into being of the book itself’; a book for which ‘people should desist, once and ... Show More
53m 35s
Oct 22
How Fredric Jameson became Fredric Jameson
Perry Anderson once wrote that in Fredric Jameson’s account of postmodernism, ‘the vocation of Western Marxism has reached its most complete consummation.’ Praising the ‘spacious rhythms’ of his ‘complex, yet supple syntax’ and ‘sudden bursts of metaphoric intensity’, Anderson al ... Show More
53m 25s
Jun 2024
Hitler’s Olympics, Part 1: The Blue-Eyed Tornado
In the early 1930s, Adolf Hitler granted a rare interview to the American journalist Dorothy Thompson. When Hitler later came to power, and prepared to stage the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Thompson’s warning about the man she’d met would frame the central debate over the games: Should ... Show More
35m 39s
Apr 2021
Secret affairs & famous lovers
In this episode of Thick & Thin, we take a look at the life of Hollywood’s once leading lady, Katharine Hepburn. Initially despised by many for her distinctive speech and quirky mannerisms, Katharine became known all over the world for her independence, sharp intelligence, and he ... Show More
49m 15s
Feb 2020
George Sand: Novelist, Muse and Gender Bender
She was an incredibly famous writer of incredible output. Her behavior and personal style were almost as talked about as her novels, and these factors combined made her into a figure that was admired by many, despised by some, and completely fascinating. Learn more about your ad- ... Show More
41m 15s