Just Listen Podcast

55 episodes - English - Latest episode: almost 4 years ago - ★★★★★ - 2 ratings

Readings in American Literature

Books Arts
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Episodes

Just Listen Podcast: The Necklace

September 16, 2018 19:00 - 45.5 MB

Famous for its surprise ending and the author’s majestic use of irony, “The Necklace” remains a favorite story in anthologies and textbooks for its eminent readability. The moral of Guy de Maupassant's short story is to be happy with what you have.

Just Listen Podcast: Transcendental Wild Oats

September 12, 2018 19:00 - 27.4 MB

Louisa May Alcott, most famous for her coming of age novel Little Women, wrote in a variety of genres to support her family, including humor. As a child of the famous education reformer Bronson Alcott, she was dragged along to take part in a communal living experiment spearheaded by her father and including such luminaries as Mr. and Mrs. Nathaniel Hawthorne. “Transcendental Wild Oats” is a satirical account of that tiny community’s first year, taking a tongue-in-cheek look at living an “i...

Just Listen Podcast: My Dead Brother Comes to America

August 18, 2018 06:00 - 38.6 MB

Joseph Katz, writing under the pen name of Alexander Godin, immigrated to the United States from the Ukraine with his family in l922. “My Dead Brother Comes to America” was published in 1934 and included as part of The Best Short Stories of the Century. Written at a time of large European immigration to the United States, the story highlights the arrival of immigrants to America through Ellis Island.

Just Listen Podcast: The Happy Prince

August 17, 2018 21:00 - 50.6 MB

The fairy tales of the notorious Oscar Wilde are considered by many to be among his best writings. Today we consider two stories that fall somewhere in the area of fairy tales, love stories, children’s fables, and didactic tales for adults. We begin with “The Happy Prince,” a story about an unlikely friendship between a tiny bird and a beautiful statue…

Just Listen Podcast: The Story of an Hour

August 16, 2018 06:00 - 18.2 MB

"The Story of an Hour," by Kate Chopin, was controversial by American standards of the 1890s because it features a female protagonist who feels liberated by the news of her husband's death. In her book Unveiling Kate Chopin, Emily Toth argues that Chopin "'had to have her heroine die' in order to make the story publishable." “The Story of an Hour” is considered by many to be a hallmark of early feminist fiction.