20th Century Literature Archives - Words To That Effect

July 21, 2021February 14, 2024 Conor20th Century Literature, History, Science, Science Fiction

Ep 54: Underwater Civilizations & Homo Aquaticus

There is a complex and fascinating relationship between humans and the ocean. How do people and cultures across the world know and understand the sea, whether through myths and legends, trade or fishing, exploration or entertainment? This episode explores one particular aspect of all this: our relationship with the undersea, read more…

December 22, 2020February 14, 2024 Conor20th Century Literature, 21st Century Literature, Literature and Science

Ep 48: Fictions of Antarctica

The continent of Antarctica was only discovered two centuries ago, even if it had long been theorized. It’s a place shrouded in mystery with no human history and no permanent residents. It’s a land of superlatives: the coldest, the windiest, the driest continent. It is a grand scientific experiment, a read more…

December 8, 2020February 14, 2024 Conor20th Century Literature, 21st Century Literature, History, Science Fiction, Uncategorized

Ep 47: Alternate History

In one sense the alternate history tale is a very specific kind of story: a type of speculative fiction in which a certain, often key, moment of history has been changed. In another sense, though, alternate history has a much broader appeal. We are all curious, we all think about read more…

Weird Westerns - Words To That Effect Ep 46

November 24, 2020February 14, 2024 Conor20th Century Literature, Westerns

Ep 46: Weird Westerns

In a way it’s maybe strange that the western is such a prominent genre. Given it’s connected to such a specific time and place – the mid-to-late 19th century, American west – why are we all so familiar with the many tropes of the western? Cowboys and Indians, shootouts and read more…

March 11, 2020March 11, 2020 Conor19th Century Literature, 20th Century Literature, British Literature, History

Ep 43: Lost Books

There are countless great works of literature we have tantalising glimpses of, works we know exist but, as far as anyone can tell, have been lost to history. Huge swathes of ancient Greek literature, a vast Chinese encyclopedia, a lost Shakespeare play based on the story of Don Quixote. And read more…

January 30, 2020January 30, 2020 Conor19th Century Literature, 20th Century Literature, Science, Science Fiction

Ep 40: Time Travel Tales

Time travel fiction is a small subgenre of science fiction. Science fiction is a small subset of all the many genres and types of literature. Time machines and time travellers are a niche interest. And yet, in another way, all fiction is time travel fiction. All stories rely on time read more…

December 10, 2019December 10, 2019 Conor20th Century Literature, American Literature, Popular Culture

Ep 39: Edgar Rice Burroughs

Edgar Rice Burroughs is no longer a familiar name. Like many other authors, the fame of his greatest creation, in his case Tarzan, has long eclipsed his own. But Burroughs was far more than the creator of Tarzan. He was an early pioneer of science fiction, a master of the read more…

June 4, 2019June 4, 2019 Conor19th Century Literature, 20th Century Literature, 21st Century Literature, Irish Literature, Short Stories

Ep 34: The Art of the Short Story

There are the celebrated authors: Checkov, Joyce, Mansfield, Munro. There are the big questions: “what makes a truly great short story?”. “Where does the form originate?” “What can short stories do that other forms of literature can’t?” But before any of this, there’s a question that’s not that easy to read more…

May 21, 2019May 21, 2019 Conor20th Century Literature, 21st Century Literature, Fantasy, Television

Ep 33: The Noun of Nouns (The Rise of Modern Fantasy Literature)

What is Fantasy Literature? What do you think of, when you think of the genre of fantasy? Whether it’s fiction, TV, cinema, games, are there certain elements you need to have for something to be considered fantasy? Well, you might say fantasy is medieval, or at least set in a read more…

Golden Age Detective Fiction - Words To That Effect Ep32

May 7, 2019May 7, 2019 Conor20th Century Literature, British Literature, Crime, Detective Fiction

Ep32: Golden Age Detective Fiction

An English country estate. A detective pacing the room, explaining how they have solved the crime, revealing the solution to a puzzle and the clues which were there all along. It’s so easy to parody this scene because it’s so familiar. It’s Reverend Green in the drawing room with the read more…

February 25, 2019February 25, 2019 Conor20th Century Literature, American Literature, History, Science Fiction

Ep28: Pulp Fiction (Amazing Stories of the Sisters of Tomorrow)

If you want to understand how we ended up with anything from Star Wars to Star Trek, Superman to Batman, intergalactic travel to microscopic worlds, profound meditations on the nature of being human to thrilling tales about Martian princesses, you have to look at pulp fiction magazines. Argosy, Blue Book, read more…

May 7, 2018May 8, 2018 Conor19th Century Literature, 20th Century Literature, 21st Century Literature, Science Fiction, Utopia

Episode 18: What is utopia?

Utopian Literature & Utopian Journeys This is a story of three journeys, by three people, in three very different times. But each of the journeys ends in the same area in the west of Ireland. And each journey is founded on a search for a more perfect world, a search read more…

March 26, 2018 Conor20th Century Literature, American Literature, Literature and Science, Popular Culture, Science, Science Fiction

Episode 17: The 10% Brain Myth, from Self-Help to Pulp Fiction to Hollywood

Do we use only 10% of our brain capacity? (Hint: No) “It is estimated that most human beings only use 10% of the brain’s capacity. Imagine if we could access more of our cerebral capacity?” This is the central question of the 2014 Scarlett Johannson film, Lucy. And it is read more…

March 12, 2018March 13, 2018 Conor20th Century Literature, Science, Science Fiction

Episode 16: Transhumanism, Fiction, and Immortality

Technology, the future, and transhumanism This is an episode about who we are as humans. And, more importantly, where we are going. About a future in which technology and biology have merged in ways that are in equal part fascinating and terrifying. A future of unparalleled technological ingenuity, but one read more…

February 26, 2018February 26, 2018 Conor19th Century Literature, 20th Century Literature, British Literature, Detective Fiction, Victorian

Episode 15: The Scarlet Pimpernel & Baroness Orczy

The Scarlet Pimpernel The Scarlet Pimpernel is a character now long disconnected from his origins in a 1903 novel. The Pimpernel is a mysterious Englishman who uses elaborate disguises to heroically rescue French aristocrats from the guillotine during the French Revolution. Naming himself after a small red flower, the enigmatic read more…