Episode 13.5: Neuroscience with Gavrielle Farmer

April 27, 2020October 18, 2020 ~ Sharon

In this special episode, Sharon spoke with listener Gavrielle Farmer about breakthroughs in neuroscience in the early 20th century, contemporary conversations about brain chemistry and behavior in Sayers’ day, the evolving conversation around shellshock between the world wars, and more.

Charis and Sharon also catch up on each other’s lives during Covid-19 shelter-in-place.

The podcast is taking a short hiatus and will return in four weeks with an episode on FIVE RED HERRINGS.

Download the episode 13.5 transcript!

Shownotes:

Sharon and Charis note that neither STATION ELEVEN (Emily St. John Mandel) nor DOOMSDAY BOOK (Connie Willis) may be comforting pandemic reading. They do recommend TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG and HOGFATHER (Terry Pratchett) if you’re looking for an engrossing read that’s on the lighter side.
If you’re interested in learning more about milestones in the study of neuroscience, Gavrielle recommends this resource.
Gavrielle cited the following publications in our discussion:
-“Where Has Psychology Left Religion?” (1923), George Malcolm Stratton, The Journal of Religion Vol. 3 no. 1 p. 51-63
-“Psychology and Free Will” (1937), Aidan Elrington, Blackfriars Vol. 18 no. 205 p. 262-272
-“Has Psychology Failed?” (1935), Joseph Jastrow, The American Scholar Vol. 4 no. 3 p. 261-269
For more on our current understanding of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, you can find resources from the American Psychiatric Association and the US National Institute of Mental Health.
If you would like us to relay a question to Gavrielle on the topic of glands and neuroscience, you can email us at talkingpiffle AT gmail DOT com.

Episode 6.5: “The Locked Room” and Listener Q+A

December 30, 2019January 27, 2020 ~ Sharon

In this holiday episode, Charis and Sharon discuss “The Locked Room,” a Lord Peter short story that was just published for the first time in 2019. It appeared in BODIES FROM THE LIBRARY 2, edited by Tony Medawar. Special thanks to Tony Medawar and to Laura Schmidt, archivist at the Marion E. Wade Center at Wheaton College, for speaking with us about the background for anthology collection and the story manuscript respectively!

We also wrap up loose ends from our conversations about UNNATURAL DEATH by revisiting our talk about the racism in the book, quoting our favorite lines, and talking about the novel’s original US title. And we ring out the year by answering some questions submitted by our listeners!

Note: If you would like to remain completely unspoiled for “The Locked Room,” our discussion of the story starts at minute 19 and ends at 49:13.

Download the episode 6.5 transcript (prepared by Melanie Sliker)

(Thank you, Gabi Vicioso, for our special holiday logo!)

Shownotes:

This is Sharon’s “very lurid 1960s cover” of UNNATURAL DEATH:
The “lovely new covers” that Charis and Sharon are both slowly collecting are from Hodder & Stoughton.
Artist Cathie Bleck illustrated the mass market paperback covers for HarperTorch’s Lord Peter series in the early 2000s. This is her cover for UNNATURAL DEATH:
“That doesn’t make sense!” We are still very puzzled by this particular cover:

(We will also be posting more UNNATURAL DEATH covers on our Instagram!)
Here’s the transcript of Charis’s conversation w/ Tony Medawar.
We both adore A.S. Byatt’s POSSESSION, wherein the plot is kicked off by a researcher finding an uncatalogued letter in a library archive.
Charis brings up the following Sayers’ quote from ARE WOMEN HUMAN? in our discussion: “A man once asked me… how I managed in my books to write such natural conversation between men when they were by themselves. Was I, by any chance, a member of a large, mixed family with a lot of male friends? I replied that, on the contrary, I was an only child and had practically never seen or spoken to any men of my own age till I was about twenty-five. ‘Well,’ said the man, ‘I shouldn’t have expected a woman (meaning me) to have been able to make it so convincing.’ I replied that I had coped with this difficult problem by making my men talk, as far as possible, like ordinary human beings. This aspect of the matter seemed to surprise the other speaker; he said no more, but took it away to chew it over. One of these days it may quite likely occur to him that women, as well as men, when left to themselves, talk very much like human beings also.”
In “The Locked Room,” Peter compares Mrs. Deerhurst in his mind to Amelia Sedley from Thackeray’s VANITY FAIR and Cleopatra.
In response to a listener question about mysteries that replicate the feel of Christie and Sayers with fewer problematic bits, Sharon and Charis were both a bit stumped. But Sharon does recommend TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG by Connie Willis. We also bring up Garth Nix’s SABRIEL in response to a reader question.

Episode 3.5: THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY with Mo Moulton

November 8, 2019November 11, 2019 ~ Sharon

Welcome to a very special episode of As My Wimsey Takes Me! In this episode, historian Mo Moulton joins us to talk about their new book THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY: HOW DOROTHY L. SAYERS AND HER OXFORD CIRCLE REMADE THE WORLD FOR WOMEN. Mo tells us about the amazing individuals who made up the Mutual Admiration Society, their lives and accomplishments, and how this friendship influenced Sayers as a thinker and an author.

THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY is now available for purchase in the US and UK. Additionally, Mo will be on tour promoting the book. You can find more information about tour dates and locations on their website and in the graphic below:

Download the episode 3.5 transcript.

Shownotes:

“The Pound circle and the Hogarth Press“; Sharon’s referring to the wide-ranging influence of Ezra Pound and Leonard and Virginia Woolf during the Modernist period. Ezra Pound was a poet and editor who propelled writers like T.S. Eliot, James Joyce, and H.D. into the public eye. Leonard and Virginia Woolf, in addition to being accomplished critics and authors in their own right, also ran a literary press that shaped the Modernist canon through its publications.
Sexton Blake was a popular pulp detective fiction character during the era of Dorothy L. Sayers and the MAS.
ARE WOMEN HUMAN? is Sayers’ treatise on the essential personhood of women, originally delivered as a talk to a women’s society in 1938.
“RIP The Toast”; The Toast was one of the funniest and most feminist sites on the Internet until it shut down in 2016. Here’s a link to all of Mo Moulton’s writing for The Toast.
“RIP Readerville”; Readerville was the forum of readers, for and by readers, that was a formative part of Charis’ and Sharon’s “growing up on the Internet.” See this interview with founder Karen Templer and this New York Times article for more about Readerville.
Mo recounts the story of the “most beautiful and encouraging lemon” that Marjorie Barber sent to DLS in this lovely Toast article. Sharon has likewise treasured this most beautiful and encouraging lemon watercolor that Charis painted and mailed to her during a particularly difficult time:

A vivid watercolor of a lemon on a branch, surrounded by green leaves

About Mo: Dr. Mo Moulton is a historian of 20th century Britain and Ireland, interested in gender, sexuality, and colonialism/postcolonialism. They work as a Senior Lecturer in the History Department at the University of Birmingham, where they are the Director of the Modern British Studies Centre. Moulton earned their PhD from Brown University and spent several years working in the History & Literature program at Harvard University.

You can find Mo on Twitter @hammock_tussock and at their website, momoulton.com.