Critical Readings

Lady Bertilak de Hautdesert Tempts Sir Gawain

CR Episode 114: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Part III

31 January 2022 Critical Readings

The panel reads the third part of “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”, with particular attention to the juxtaposition of the forest hunting, killing, and skinning/gutting scenes with those of courtly love in the luxurious bedchamber of Sir Gawain.

CR Episode 113: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Part II

24 January 2022 Critical Readings

The panel reads the second part of “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”, and examines the theological significance of the seasons, the detailed military fortifications of Castle Hautdesert, and the appearance of the beautiful Lady Hautdesert.

CR Episode 112: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Part I

17 January 2022 Critical Readings

The panel reads the first part of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, providing an overview of the formal aspects of the poem, the history of the manuscript (Cotton Nero A.x), theories about authorship, and analysis of the poem’s titular, veridian symbolism.

CR Episode 111: Light Verse of Ogden Nash

10 January 2022 Critical Readings

The panels searches for a smile / And dwells with Ogden Nash a while. / Some lines are light and some are scary / But the formal aspects rather vary. / Most of them rhyme in a manner relaxin’, / But the metrics range from good to absen’.

CR Episode 110: The Poetry of Langston Hughes

3 January 2022 Critical Readings

In the first podcast of 2022, the panel reads five poems spanning the entire poetic arc of Langston Hughes, from the famous lines of “I, Too” to the scenes of the “Lincoln Theatre”, before ending with the Christmas message of “Shepherd’s Song”.

CR Episode 109: H.M.S. Pinafore

27 December 2021 Critical Readings

In a special, Christmas episode, the panel reads selections from W. S. Gilbert’s libretto to H.M.S. Pinafore, and discusses how they are representative of Gilbert’s penchant for comic ‘topsy-turvy’ plots which include keen-eyed social commentary.

CR Episode 108: William Carlos Williams and Minimalism

20 December 2021 Critical Readings

The panel reads “The Red Wheelbarrow”, “This Is Just to Say”, and “Gulls” by William Carlos Williams and discusses both their connexion to the Imagist and Modernist movements of the early twentieth century, and their complexity in relation to Minimalism.

CR Episode 107: The Poetic Satire of Jonathan Swift

13 December 2021 Critical Readings

The panel reads three of Jonathan Swift’s poems which satirise responses to the inescapable facts of human biology, and focuses on their depictions of privacy and separation, essential human dignity, and cultural attitudes towards sexuality.

Sir Walter Scott, by Sir Thomas Lawrence FEATURED

CR Episode 106: Scott’s The Lady of the Lake

6 December 2021 Critical Readings

The panel reads extended selections from each canto of Sir Walter Scott’s narrative poem, “The Lady of the Lake”, highlighting Scott’s interest in reviving the medieval, the importance of history to his work, and his use of varying poetic forms.

CR Episode 105: The Poetic Arc of Ted Hughes

29 November 2021 Critical Readings

The panel reads a selection of poems by Ted Hughes compassing the scope of his poetic oeuvre, from the early and animalistic imagery of “The Jaguar” to the modernist scenes of “Here Is the Cathedral”, before concluding with the confessional “Last Letter”.

CR Episode 104: Form and Detail in the Poetry of Richard Wilbur

22 November 2021 Critical Readings

The panel reads four poems by Richard Wilbur, “Love Calls Us to the Things of This World”, “A Baroque Wall-Fountain in the Villa Sciarra”, “Mind”, and “Year’s End”, particularly examining the intricacy of their details and their formal attributes.

CR Episode 103: Robert Louis Stevenson’s Songs of Travel

15 November 2021 Critical Readings

The panel traces themes of wanderlust, resignation, wistfulness, lonliness, and fatalism in six poems excerpted from Stevenson’s Songs of Travel, including “The Vagabond”, “Bright Is the Ring of Words,” “Whither Must I Wander”, and “The Woodman”.

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