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Secret Life of Books

Sophie Gee and Jonty Claypole
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  • CHAQUE SEMAINE

Every book has two stories: the one it tells, and the one it hides.The Secret Life of Books is a fascinating, addictive, often shocking, occasionally hilarious weekly podcast starring Sophie Gee, an English professor at Princeton University, and Jonty Claypole, formerly director of arts at the BBC. Every week these virtuoso critics and close friends take an iconic book and reveal the hidden story behind the story: who made it, their clandestine motives, the undeclared stakes, the scandalous backstory and above all the secret, mysterious meanings of books we thought we knew.-- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org-- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio: https://patreon.com/SecretLifeofBooks528?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLinkinsta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  1. Joe Hill on American Horror

    -2 J • ABONNÉS UNIQUEMENT

    Joe Hill on American Horror

    This week’s subscriber bonus is a chat with a giant of contemporary horror writing in America, Joe Hill. Joe is the author of novels Heart-Shaped Box, NOS4A2, The Fireman, and King Sorrow, for which he was on book tour as we recorded. He's the author of short story collections, 20th Century Ghosts (from which the mega Black Phone franchise is adapted), and the much-loved comic series, Locke & Key with illustrator Gabriel Rodriguez. Joe Hill changed his name from King to Hill so he could make it as a horror writer for the correct reasons — because his father is the Father, the Godfather, and the God of contemporary American Horror, the great Stephen King himself. In this episode, Sophie talks to Joe about The Reformatory, the acclaimed contemporary African-American horror novel by Tananarive Due. Joe tells us what it was like growing up with Stephen King as his father, and why King Sorrow is as much a love story as horror novel. Books Mentioned: Tananarive Due, The Reformatory Joe Hill, King Sorrow, Strange Weather, Locke & Key Stephen King, ‘Salem’s Lot, The Dead Zone, Gerald’s Game Oliver Burkeman, Mediations for Mortals Charles Portis, True Grit J.R.R. Tolkein, The Hobbit C.S. Lewis, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe Richard Adams, Watership Down T.H. White, The Once and Future King Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian John D. McDonald, The Executioners (and the film adaptation Cape Fear), the Travis McGee Mysteries. Bram Stoker, Dracula.

    39 min
  2. American Horror 2: Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin

    -2 J

    American Horror 2: Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin

    Chocolate Mouse, anyone? Rosemary’s Baby was a smash hit on release - the best selling horror novel of the 1960s, eventually selling over 4 million copies. The year after publication it was adapted into one of the greatest films of the decade - directed by Roman Polanski with Mia Farrow as the eponymous heroine.   At first glance, it seems that Ira Levin’s story was at odds with the prevailing spirit of free love - read the room, baby! But as we’re going to find out - the secret of Rosemary’s Baby is that it perfectly captured the spirit and anxieties of the age. Ira Levin would repeat the trick with the Stepford Wives in 1972 and The Boys From Brazil in 1976, but Rosemary’s Baby is his masterpiece. A book which is simultaneously an outlandish fantasy and one of the greatest novels about coercive gaslighting relationships.  Sophie and Jonty ask a tough question: is Levin's depiction of a coercive relationship just too real? Do we come away feeling that Rosemary has real power and agency that speaks to us now, or is the book's depiction of domestic violence and misogyny and trapped in its own cultural moment just as much as the stuffed mushrooms and Gibsons the couple consume on the fateful night that the horror takes hold? Content Warning: the book and film — and this conversation — contain descriptions of sexual violence, rape and abusive relationships. Books and Film Referred to: Ira Levin, Rosemary's Baby Roman Polanski, Rosemary's Baby F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby Jane Austen, Emma J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye Tom Wolfe, The Bonfire of the Vanities Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre Adrienne Rich, "In the Evening" Valerie Solanas, SCUM Manifesto Andrea Dworkin, Women Hating Julia Kristeva, Powers of Horror -- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org -- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio and get bonus content: patreon.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast -- Follow us on our socials: youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts insta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/ bluesky: @slobpodcast.bsky.social Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    52 min
  3. American Horror Bonus: Ruth Franklin on writing "Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life."

    22 OCT. • ABONNÉS UNIQUEMENT

    American Horror Bonus: Ruth Franklin on writing "Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life."

    Ruth Franklin, the critically acclaimed writer and journalist, was galvanized by her love of The Haunting of Hill House to tackle a full biography of the brilliant but until recently overlooked genius of American Horror. The result is a literary and biographical triumph. Ruth comes on the show to take us through Jackson's early years, her marriage and life as a mother of four, leading to her writing some of the greatest novels of 20thC America. Part of our mini series on American Horror for Halloween, this conversation is a treat and an education for our subscriber community. Further Reading: Ruth Franklin, "Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life"

    38 min
  4. American Horror: The Haunting of Hill House

    21 OCT.

    American Horror: The Haunting of Hill House

    Who's afraid of American horror? Sophie and Jonty, for starters. To celebrate halloween, SLOB is taking a deep dive into three classics of the American Horror genre. We've chosen novels published after 1945, and we're asking how the war - and its many aftershocks and resonances in American domestic and political life - transformed horror as a literary genre. We won't spoil the surprises by telling you all the titles ahead of time. But be warned: read and listen at your own peril. We’ll be looking at these books in chronological order. The first is Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, published in 1959 and is now considered one of the most influential horror novels of all time. It is beautifully written, incredibly funny and genuinely scary. It's imbued with a spirit of cynicism and evil. As a result it disorientated many readers who knew Jackson not as a horror writer, but for her charming memoirs about life as a housewife in 1950s suburbia. Join us as we enter the locked gates of Hill House and explore how this gripping, poignant, strange — and above all, scary — ghost story took shape and how Shirley Jackson came to be regarded as one of the greatest mid-century American writers. Further Reading and listening: Shirley Jackson, "Life Among the Savages" (1953) Shirley Jackson, "The Haunting of Hill House" (1959) Shirley Jackson, "We Have Always Lived in the Castle" (1962) Ruth Franklin, Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life, 2016 On the Road with Penguin Classics Halloween episode with Ruth Franklin: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-haunting-of-hill-house-with-ruth/id1549179379?i=1000633191567 -- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org -- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio and get bonus content: patreon.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast -- Follow us on our socials: youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts insta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/ bluesky: @slobpodcast.bsky.social Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1 h 11 min
  5. SLOB Reads: The Sonnet

    16 OCT. • ABONNÉS UNIQUEMENT

    SLOB Reads: The Sonnet

    This week, Sophie and Jonty dig into William Wordsworth's extraordinary 1802 sonnet Composed Upon Westminster Bridge. Like Coleridge's sonnet from 5 years earlier, it's straight out of the Romantic playbook: lyrical, meditative, and in praise of landscape. But the big surprise is that the landscape is that of the rapidly industrializing city of London, and not the Lake District, where Wordsworth wrote most of his major poems. And despite its soft, unassuming subject matter, this sonnet gets straight to the heart of the biggest events of the time. The French Revolution and the descent into political violence; the Napoleonic Wars and the fragility of world peace; the rise of empire and Wordsworth's debt to the great political poets of the past. Not to mention the unspoken story of Wordsworth's illegitimate child, and his straight-steal from sister Dororthy's own description of the scene. Tune in for the thrills and spills behind this Romanic sonnet.

    35 min
  6. Montaigne pt2: A Montaigne out of a mole hill (with Rowan Tomlinson)

    14 OCT.

    Montaigne pt2: A Montaigne out of a mole hill (with Rowan Tomlinson)

    Jonty and Sophie were separated by an ocean while Sophie and her family went back to New York and Jonty stayed in Sydney - so they made lemonade out of life's lemons, and created two miniature episodes about the great 16th-century French essayist Michel de Montaigne. Montaigne isn't just any old essayist — he's the man who invented the form, with three volumes of brilliant, surprising, constantly fresh and astonishingly modern sallies on every possible topic. To introduce Montaigne and unpack his brilliance and immense influence, Sophie talked to the Renaissance scholar Stephen Greenblatt. Meanwhile, Sydney-side, Jonty had a conversation with the historian and writer Rowan Tomlinson, a specialist on Montaigne and Renaissance studies at the University of Bristol. They take the Montaigne chat in many unexpected directions, and Jonty initiates discussion of the Reformation off his own bat, with Sophie nowhere to be found. Further Reading: The Complete Essays of Michel de Montaigne, (Penguin 1993) Sarah Bakewell, How to Live: Or A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer, (2011) -- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org -- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio and get bonus content: patreon.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast -- Follow us on our socials: youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts insta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/ bluesky: @slobpodcast.bsky.social Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    49 min
  7. Montaigne pt1: Climb Every Montaigne (with Stephen Greenblatt)

    14 OCT.

    Montaigne pt1: Climb Every Montaigne (with Stephen Greenblatt)

    Sophie talks to one of the world's leading literary scholars, who co-founded a whole branch of literary studies known as "The New Historicism," before reinventing Shakespeare for new generations of readers, and then turning the Roman poet Lucretius into an (almost) household name. Stephen Greenblatt is professor of English at Harvard University, he's a Pulitzer Prize winner and the author of Will in the World, The Swerve, and a host of other acclaimed and brilliant books. Most recently he's the author of Dark Renaissance, the story of Shakespeare's rival and shadow double, Christopher Marlowe. But today he talks about the writer he turns to whenever he thinks about what makes the Renaissance so distinct a period -- the age in which Europeans truly became modern. That writer is the great French essayist Michel de Montaigne. Montaigne is a stealth heavy-hitter, an MVP of classic literature who is now all too rarely read. To explain what makes Montaigne's influence and legacy so important, and why he's truly one of the GOATs, Sophie and Jonty have decided to bring you two companion conversations with a pair of very different scholars. Further Reading: Stephen Greenblatt, ed. Shakespeare's Montaigne: The Florio Translation of the Essays (2014) Stephen Greenblatt, Dark Renaissance: The Dangerous Times and Fatal Genius of Shakspeare's Greatest Rival (2025) Stephen Greenblatt, The Swerve: How the World Became Modern (2012) -- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org -- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio and get bonus content: patreon.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast -- Follow us on our socials: youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts insta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/ bluesky: @slobpodcast.bsky.social Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    35 min
  8. SLoB's Four (literary) weddings and a funeral

    6 OCT.

    SLoB's Four (literary) weddings and a funeral

    The label says what's in the tin: Secret Life of Books dives deep into weddings and funerals in literature, asking why they become iconic moments to hang a story on. Family strife, betrayal, love, passion, disappointment and hope are all bound up in these major life events where we see characters' true colors and desires writ large. -- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org -- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio and get bonus content: patreon.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast -- Follow us on our socials: youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts insta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/ bluesky: @slobpodcast.bsky.social Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1 h
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À propos

Every book has two stories: the one it tells, and the one it hides.The Secret Life of Books is a fascinating, addictive, often shocking, occasionally hilarious weekly podcast starring Sophie Gee, an English professor at Princeton University, and Jonty Claypole, formerly director of arts at the BBC. Every week these virtuoso critics and close friends take an iconic book and reveal the hidden story behind the story: who made it, their clandestine motives, the undeclared stakes, the scandalous backstory and above all the secret, mysterious meanings of books we thought we knew.-- To join the Secret Life of Books Club visit: www.secretlifeofbooks.org-- Please support us on Patreon to keep the lights on in the SLoB studio: https://patreon.com/SecretLifeofBooks528?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLinkinsta: https://www.instagram.com/secretlifeofbookspodcast/youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@secretlifeofbookspodcast/shorts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Informations

  • Création
    Sophie Gee and Jonty Claypole
  • Années d’activité
    2024 - 2025
  • Épisodes
    111
  • Classification
    Tous publics
  • Copyright
    © 2025 Secret Life of Books
  • Site web de l’émission
    Secret Life of Books
  • Fournisseur
    Sophie Gee

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