Welcome to The Librarian Is In, The New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next.

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Hey all! This week Frank and Rhonda are up to their ears (eyes?) in all sorts of fiction! 

Frank picked up a book that's long been on his to-read list, a historical fiction book called Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yorcenar. 

Both an exploration of character and a reflection on the meaning of history, Memoirs of Hadrian has received international acclaim since its first publication in France in 1951. In it, Marguerite Yourcenar reimagines the Emperor Hadrian's arduous boyhood, his triumphs and reversals, and finally, as emperor, his gradual reordering of a war-torn world, writing with the imaginative insight of a great writer of the twentieth century while crafting a prose style as elegant and precise as those of the Latin stylists of Hadrian's own era. (Publisher summary)

 

Rhonda picked up what may be one of W.E.B DuBois' only science fiction stories. She read the short story "The Comet" which she found in the anthology Darkwater: Voices From Within the Veil.

 

 

 

 

 

Next week Frank and Rhonda will be reading a book of poetry: 

American Primitive by Mary Oliver 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Tell us what everybody's talking about in your world of books and libraries! Suggest Hot Topix(TM)! Send an email or voice memo to podcasts[at]nypl.org.

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Transcript

[Music]

[Frank] Hello, everybody, and welcome to The Librarian is In, the New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next. I'm Frank.

[Rhonda] I'm Rhonda.

[Frank] Hello, Rhonda.

[Rhonda] Hello, Frank. How you doing?

[Frank] I'm good.

[Rhonda] Good.

[Frank] Yeah. I feel good. A little overwhelmed.

[Rhonda] I know.

[Frank] A little overwhelmed, but I mean just to drill it down just overwhelmed with my reading schedule because I have book discussions, and then the podcast, and then, you know, I'm always trying to -- because I'm such an anxious reader sometimes. Like I just need to focus on one book like I've always said, and I sort of got [inaudible] up with a couple of reading commitments that are pleasures, pure pleasures, but and then, you know, when you decide to read a book, you don't know what you're -- at least I don't. I prefer not to. I don't know what I'm getting into per se. Like I don't know what it's going to require of me. And the book I read for that I wanted to read for this podcast was a lot more challenging than I thought it would be.

[Rhonda] Oh.

[Frank] I mean I don't know what I thought it would be, but it required a focus that was as any listener of this podcast would know is in quite short supply in my brain sometimes so --

[Rhonda] I feel like that's everyone right now, though.

[Frank] Well, good. Actually, you know, usually, I like to be unique and special, but now I'm glad you actually said that because it made me feel like I sort of knew that was true. Everyone is a little foggy.

[Rhonda] Oh, yeah.

[Frank] And overwhelmed, and maybe now with a sense of relief. But I don't know. So, yeah, it was a shalong [phonetic] as they say in French.

[Rhonda] I -- why haven't I heard that word? What does it mean?

[Frank] No, I just made it up. I'm saying a challenge in a French accent like the --

[Rhonda] Oh, I thought you [multiple speakers]. No, I feel the same way. My mind has been all over the place, which I will also talk about when we get to why I chose the book that I chose.

[Frank] Really?

[Rhonda] Yeah. Yes. It's been a struggle.

[Frank] A lot of meaning. A lot of meaning. I mean like, you know, we don't have to be coy about it, and I don't have to go first, but like I read a book that I had read -- that I had never read but has been on my list literally for like since college.

[Rhonda] Whoa.

[Frank] Like a billion decades. It's a fairly famous book. It is a famous book called The Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar, published in 1951, and it's about a Roman emperor, and I really wanted -- it came in my mind amongst other titles of I think I was casting about for a book on leadership. I wanted to read a book on a leader. I wanted to read a book that I've heard was well-reviewed and revered and might have something to say about what it is to be in charge of a people, of a country, that kind of thing. So I read Memoirs of Hadrian. And it -- it's -- there's so much in there. There's so much in there.

[Rhonda] Oh, [inaudible].

[Frank] So, I don't know. What about you? Where are you? Where are you?

[Rhonda] So I'm gonna say the book. OK. So I, you know, I don't know if you've had this experience, but I know you've had some like reading commitments, but kind of in the past two weeks since we talked, I think my mind has kind of been all over the place and like you said kind of had it in trouble focus, so I actually started like three different books [multiple speakers]. And I couldn't just -- I couldn't focus on like one book. Like I couldn't focus on a novel. Like I just couldn't get through the whole thing even though the books that I started were good books, and they were popular books, and I was enjoying them, but I just couldn't focus. I couldn't get -- I couldn't commit to like a long story. So I chose a short story that I focused on because I've been doing a little bit of research on W.E.B. Du Bois and I found in one of his books that he had written a science fiction story, which I thought was very intriguing that Du Bois had written science fiction [multiple speakers].

[Frank] Really?

[Rhonda] Yeah. It was a story called The Comet. And, again, like you said like there's a lot in the book that you chose, but I feel like even though this story is really short, it's actually like ten pages, there's a lot packed into this short story, but it's Du Bois, so I'm like, OK, that makes sense. But [multiple speakers].

[Frank] I'm gonna jump in here.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Because as we were saying before we got on is that it doesn't matter really the length of a book. It may -- I tell the patrons all the time it matters like that it suggests to you and what's packed in it and what the author is trying to do because like we were saying like, oh, let's do poetry because it's short. And then you start reading the poem, and like when I read Deaf Republic, the long-form poem, it was -- I read it like a couple of days before the podcast, and there's so much there that I couldn't really focus on it, and I did a terrible podcast about that book because I -- I was sort of still at sea about what I thought about it because there was so much there.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] So it's not about length. Size doesn't matter here. But tell me a little bit about W.E.B. Du Bois.

[Rhonda] So, yeah, Du Bois was kind of one of those, you know, titans in African American history because, you know, he was one of the founders of the NAACP, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and he was just kind of -- he was a pan-Africanist working in Ghana. He wrote kind of his -- I guess what's become part of the can in the souls of black folk. But he was a very prolific writer. He wrote for the Crisis Magazine, which is the magazine of the NAACP. He attended Fisk and Harvard and the University of Berlin and just kind of there for the early 20th century at every pivotal moment of the early civil rights and the anti-lynching movement.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] And he actually, I believe, yeah, he died in Ghana. He ended up leaving and going and living in Ghana, but, you know, he was just a very, very prolific writer. He came up with the idea of The Talented Tenth, talking about the importance of education and the leadership of those people who have had this education. So, you know, he's just -- there's a lot to Du Bois. You know he's been -- he wrote so much, but most people I think know the souls of black folk [multiple speakers].

[Frank] I didn't know he was such a writer that he diversified into science fiction.

[Rhonda] I think most people don't know that.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] Because I definitely didn't know that. And I don't -- and honestly, I don't know if he has written any -- I don't believe he's written more science fiction. It could just be this one story.

[Frank] Really?

[Rhonda] Yeah. But I like --

[Frank] I [inaudible].

[Rhonda] This little -- this -- like you said, how he has diversified --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] The type of writing he's done.

[Frank] How did you come across this story?

[Rhonda] So it's in an anthology of his called Dark Water, which is a collection of his writings that he published, and it's kind of, you know, from different, from the Atlantic that he wrote for, from the Crisis. There's some poetry that he wrote that's in here, and then the very last thing that's in this anthology is The Comet, the short story. And people call Dark Water kind of, I guess, the sequel, the follow-up to Souls of Black Folk. It was written about ten years after Souls of Black Folk came out. It's -- the whole title is Dark Water: Voices from Within the Veil. And --

[Frank] Within the Veil?

[Rhonda] Within the veil, and that's a reference from Souls of Black Folk that I remember.

[Frank] Oh.

[Rhonda] Kind of writing from behind the veil. And I'm not gonna try to go too deep into that because I just -- I don't know as much about Du Bois as I probably should. But this is -- and some people call this his militant sequel to souls of black folk, but so I was kind of going through this and found The Comet. Yeah. So I don't know. Should I jump into it, or should we start with The Memoirs --

[Frank] Of Hadrian.

[Rhonda] -- of Hadrian.

[Frank] Do you -- here we go with our polite sort of, "No, you go," "No, you go."

[Rhonda] I know. I don't know. I'm --

[Frank] Do you want to go first? I hate this you go first, then I'll talk. It's a conversation. We're sitting at a café table. We're having a coffee. So it's not like, "Do you want to go first?" You'd just be talking, right?

[Rhonda] I know.

[Frank] So get out of my way. I'm gonna talk first.

[Rhonda], OK. Let's hear about the Memoirs of Hadrian.

[Frank] I'm just gonna do it.

[Rhonda] Do it.

[Frank], I know. I hate that sort of like, "Do you want to go first?" Yeah, I -- well, I always say this, but I hope like we'll be long-winded about it. I could just be like short-winded about it, and then you could talk about Du Bois. But like I said, I wanted to read about a leader -- I hate the word leader though, in a way because it implies -- I don't know what it implies. I don't somehow like what it implies, but there are leaders, I guess literally. So I wanted to read about one, and I always heard about this book, and I just thought it would be sumptuous and well-written. And it's by Marguerite Yourcenar, who is French. And she's the only woman who is admitted into the French Academy because of this book and like a real literary hoity-toity establishment in France. And she translated it, though, in collaboration with her partner, Grace Frick. So the translation issue, she was also involved in the translation, which also pleases me because when you're reading translated works, we've talked about this before, you're almost reading another author's view on another author's writing. So she wrote it over a period of 25 years or more. And, honey, it shows because it's like each page is -- and this is what I meant about length and when you take on something, and I think on a lot more than I could chew. But each page is like sort of packed with insights and meditations on everything from cooking to running a country or running an empire or rights of civilians or, you know, your constituents. After 20 pages, I literally -- like my eyes would sort of glaze over because I couldn't take it in. Like I was -- it was a lot. So I really -- but I liked it. I could only read in 20-page increments, and then I needed to pause and like ruminate and just breathe. So I didn't set myself up for a lot of time. It's a book that you could pick up almost anywhere and start reading because of it's format and because of its direction. And what its format basically is Hadrian the Emperor is a monologue. It's in the form of a letter he's writing to Marcus Aurelius, who will eventually be a successor of Hadrian as a ruler of the Roman Empire. So it's all his voice, first-person talking to ostensively Marcus Aurelius but really talking to all of us. So and it's just about here's my life, I was born, I did this, and now I'm on my way to die because he's writing it sort of on his death bed. So once you get the general idea, it's gonna be like an emperor's journey. You sort of -- and there's a lot of mention of like different sovereignties and states and battles and things like that, that to me, in my head, which I have a hard time with like battles and politics, like I never understand like, wait, how did they take over that plot of land again? Like who has deceived who, or who -- how did this actually happen? Like politics is hard for me to understand even though it's essentially just like interpersonal relationships writ large in a way. But so Hadrian was born in 76 A.D., so he was primarily -- he was an emperor in the second century, which is like almost 1,000 years ago. It's amazing to think. And Marguerite Yourcenar wrote there's very little known about Hadrian. There are not a lot that survives. There are a couple of famous works that were written contemporaneously. Anyway, that -- do you get the back story?

[Rhonda] I do. So since there's not a lot written on it, she has, I guess, used some artistic license to fill in points?

[Frank] Great question because that's the [multiple speakers] whole thing about historical fiction because it is a novel.

[Rhonda] Right. OK.

[Frank] Is that she did like oodles and oodles and oodles of research over 25 years like she considers herself having done the job, done the work, but in any historical novel there is an element of creative license. There sort of has to be depending on the authors imperative -- like are they -- how much they want to take license with and how much they don't. And she felt she hued very closely to history. So there's not a lot of first-person narrative about Hadrian himself that he wrote. Like I said, there's some contemporaneous stuff and, of course, history. It's like digging. You dig. You do a lot of research. But, yeah, like, you know, she can't know what he was thinking at any given moment. She can't know about he felt about a certain battle. I mean, there are decisions to be made, and that's an interesting process to read about because we'll never know really unless I guess some archeological discovery emerges, which I don't know will happen. So Hadrian was considered like one of the good emperors. His reign, which was about 20 years from 40 to 62, and he died at 62, was like a good one. Not like Nero, which was like debouched and violent and horrible. And Hadrian made some good choices in that -- at least I thought so like when he took over the Empire because the Empire stretched from like Britain, down to Egypt, you know, over to the east, he actually divested the Empire of certain provinces because he felt he couldn't manage them.

[Rhonda], OK.

[Frank] Anyone who is a manager will sort of get -- like, but yet it seems scandalous because you sort of want the most power you can get, and then you just figure out how to work it.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] It takes a wise manager to sort of say like, you know what, I can't take that on. It's like the power of saying no. I can't take that on because it's gonna be too much, and I want to focus on the people that are, you know, in this part of my empire and not -- because it -- before he took over, his predecessor had taken -- annexed these sovereignties to add to the Roman Empire, and then Hadrian took over, and he was like, "No, it's too much. I don't need to deal with that." And so it was controversial. I mean what I find interesting about -- and I said this before too, being a manager of a facility and a staff is like being an emperor or a president or a ruler in some ways, much smaller. It's the same issues you have to deal with, pleasing your constituents, getting something to run well. And you know there's all kind of managers and things like that. So like how Hadrian, how one makes one's choices because in those days, which 1,000 years ago he also in the same -- on the other hand, executed a whole bunch of administrators in the empire that he felt were against him.

[Rhonda] That's [inaudible].

[Frank] Right?

[Rhonda] I feel like this is the story you hear about a lot of Roman emperors. I wonder if that was normal --

[Frank] But he wasn't like --

[Rhonda] -- a lot of people.

[Frank] He wasn't considered one of the bad ones, but yet that's what's challenging to talk about this because he was -- there was a benevolence, but like in any leader's life or any ruler or president, prime minister, whoever is designated the person in charge, there's never gonna be an unequivocal agreement in how they performed.

[Rhonda] No.

[Frank] There's always gonna be something that doesn't please someone, of course. So and also culture of the times, like what does that mean? Because --

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] Hadrian also expounds about women and slavery, and he talks about how he thinks it's absurd that women don't have control over their lives or have any degree of power because, as he has experienced it, women have a great deal of power in daily life -- in life. So he gave women rights of property-owning and administering of money. Plus, he also made it illegal to force a woman into marriage against her will.

[Rhonda] Oh.

[Frank] Which was apparently before that acceptable.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] But then you, again, ask the question when you really think of that, it's something we think about today like what gives someone the right to decide OK I'm gonna let you have rights, basically saying I'm gonna let you have rights. And in those days he -- an emperor was practically a diety. It was like a god.

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] Certainly deified after they died. They built temples to them, and it was like they're celebrities, but yet when you really think about it, it's like we're letting someone -- we're almost agreeing to say, OK, we're gonna put you in charge, and we're gonna trust you're gonna administer rights to us fairly, but we're ultimately gonna have to accept it if you do in some ways. Hadrian called it, which it keeps coming to mind, a regulated liberty, which is a really interesting concept because he also talks about slaves. And he said, you know, slaves have to have a say in their life and in their country in the empire because he felt, and this is like a managerial 101 that if they weren't -- didn't have buy into their life, then they wouldn't care. And if they did have buy into their life, it would only add to the greater glory of the empire meaning -- it did -- and I guess in some ways it doesn't matter if a slave cares or not because they're a slave, and they're told what to do, but he was concerned with their psyche that they would be satisfied and motivated. I mean, doesn't that sound like kind of manager your employees in one easy lesson?

[Rhonda] Yeah. And -- yeah, go ahead. I was just thinking about -- OK.

[Frank] But -- but, yeah [multiple speakers].

[Rhonda] There's a lot here. I'm gathering my thoughts. Go ahead.

[Frank] Yeah. Yeah. Gather. Gather. Because then to continue with what I said about how someone regulates liberty, but yet he still believed fully in slavery.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] Meaning people were slaves from all over the empire or whoever they conquered, so yet he wanted them to have rights, but yet they were still known and considered to be slaves. I mean there's a scene where he's -- Hadrian is going to the office to like, you know, write a dictate or something, and one of his assistants annoys him and usually does annoy him, but that day he annoyed him particularly well, awfully, and he raised his -- Hadrian raises his hand to strike the slave/assistant and hit him in the eye or in the face, and he says, "Oops, I didn't realize I had a pen or stylus in my hand," and it basically puts out the slave's eye, the assistant's eye. But then Yourcenar what followed after is that Hadrian felt terribly about it, and when the slave came back to work he goes, you know, "How much to get it cost to, you know, get your eye taken care of, and what can I do to make it up to you?" He actually says -- he actually says this to the slave. Isn't he sweet?

[Rhonda] Yeah. Sure.

[Frank] The slave is actually -- Yourcenar writes that the slave says, "Well, I'd rather have my eye back.

[Rhonda] Agreed.

[Frank] And Hadrian goes -- basically is sort of like watch yourself, you know, [multiple speakers] I'm trying to make amends here, but watch yourself because nobody has, you know, sometimes stuff happens and deal with it. You know, so it's like what an interesting power relationship that we experience all the time in lots of ways about like he felt emboldened enough to say, "Well, I'd rather have my eye back" like to be snarky.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] Basically, Hadrian could have had him executed immediately for whatever reason he wanted in those days. That could easily happen, but he didn't do that like other emperors did, even though, of course, he did execute people. And this is the core. Did you want to say something? Like you were gathering your thoughts, or do you want me to keep barrelling on?

[Rhonda] I was just thinking [inaudible] in terms of slavery. I don't -- I think I don't know a lot about what slavery was like during the Roman Empire. And I'm assuming that maybe they saw their slaves as humans, and maybe that has something to -- I don't know. There's -- you know, I was just thinking about reading about leaders as we said, it's so important to kind of understand what the times were like to really understand the person and the leadership. So those were just thoughts that were going through my head as we were talking. But go ahead.

[Frank] Yeah. I mean, it definitely seems that Hadrian and, you know, a lot of leaders throughout history thought slavery was a necessity [multiple speakers] to get things done. That is, it was something that had to exist to get things -- and also as a message to enemies. A whole bunch of things. You know, yeah, well, I was gonna divert, but I won't, as a message to enemies and also as a way to get things done cheaply.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] But he, you know, is considered benevolent in that he felt that they had to have some rights and buy-in to the society in which they were enslaved, but ultimately they were enslaved. So it's an interesting journey in this book to find out what this guy was really like -- like what really motivated him because he -- like I said before, he could have executed the sassy slave, that's a terrible thing to say, that he knocked his eye out if he felt like it because he could. And there can be consequences.

[Rhonda] Of course.

[Frank] But it wasn't just like rampant -- well, it was rampant brutality, but you never know when the consequences will come. Like sometimes an enemy will -- it will turn the tide, and they'll go after you if they didn't like what you did so like people. So what makes him him. And what's interesting -- and what makes him benevolent? Like why would he do the things he did because he is considered good and what motivates him. And what's interesting is that he doesn't seem to be motivated, Hadrian, from reading this book by altruism or doing -- like that he wanted to do good for people. It was -- and it wasn't even a moral imperative per se. Or maybe it verges on a moral imperative. It was more just like a dispassionate -- like he was so detached in a way from people that he could almost do what he did because there was no crazy passions fueling him in terms of one way or the other. You could say that. Or you could say it was just a brain -- his mind impelled him to do right or as right as he could by people because that was something his mind compelled him to do, and he didn't, in quotes, have a choice. Like with -- so he did a lot of good as I somewhat delineated but also could do whatever he want like he did execute people. He did feel like he could strike an assistant if he was annoying him. You know, he certainly had a million mistresses and had a wife he didn't really get along with. It was, of course, like a political match and could do what he want, but like that sense of -- there is a sense, and that was -- that goes back to why it was tough for me to read because I sort of realize I get into passionate people reading about them. And he really is a sort of detached -- he doesn't -- he didn't care about the love of the either. Like he wasn't doing it for that motivation, but it's hard to figure out what he was doing it for. It was almost just like a belief, and it was almost second-hand. Like you just felt it was almost -- it was an absurdity to not do what he saw clearly before his eyes, which was other people existed outside of himself and therefore were entitled to some degree the same rights according to everyone else. And this book is interesting because it doesn't really deal with an inner life, and maybe that's why I'm struggling because it doesn't deal with his inner life per se. It's more like the pontifications and meditations --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] Someone who is in charge without a lot of revelation of what's impelling him inside. I mean, you know, you could write about a leader and say they did this, they did that, but they succeeded, they failed, but, you know, he was still a person and, you know, and [inaudible], and he also knew that. Like he knew that he shouldn't be deified because he's just a human being like a peasant, but he did allow himself to be considered to be god-like because, hey, why not?

[Rhonda] Right. I mean, he was a god technically by the people, right?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] So that's what they considered emperors.

[Frank] Yeah, and, you know, he [multiple speakers]. Wait, what?

[Rhonda] I'm assuming that he also believed that then?

[Frank] Well, that's what I was going to say is that he didn't believe it fully, but yet you -- he -- you cannot remain unchanged if everyone around you for 20 years is basically revering you and considering you god-like. You cannot. Like his striking of the assistant of the abuse of whoever he felt like was not on his side. I mean, like you have to have a sense of that deification. And also, I think he -- part of his personality craved that. Oh, there's a great quote, which I find so interesting because it may be the closest the capture a motivation. He says about his hunger for power, he says, "I needed to be assured or reigning. Meaning I needed to be -- it needed to be shown to me that I was fully in charge. That I was reigning the empire." He needed that in order to capture the desire to serve. Isn't that cool? Because when we think of people who serve like people who serve the community or --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] -- people whose jobs or purposes are to serve others, we think of it as very philanthropic and altruistic, and it very well may be in lots of people. He -- and this is what makes the book intriguing is that -- and this is what's very much -- what's dense about the book too is that in the one sentence or one paragraph, he will say a thing and then will qualify it with something else. So he never quite says, "This is who I am." He'll say, "This is who I am, but I'm also possibly this." And like it's exhibited in this statement like how many people can -- I don't think I could like figure out about themselves like I need to be fully in charge, and I crave complete domination, and only when I'm assured of that complete domination can I actually serve you. I mean, how many people would sort of say that's my motivation to serve you --

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] -- because I'm fully in charge, and I can chillax because I know that I'm in charge, whereas most people would be like I empathize with people, I care about people, and I want to help them.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] I've actually always secretly thought a lot of people that do help other people. I mean, like we do, we're librarians, secretly like being that dominant figure. I mean, it's nothing bad to say. It's just interesting to say. Or it could be bad if it's abuse, but I found it very -- like for someone to realize that about themselves is pretty sort of interesting, right? Don't you think?

[Rhonda] It is. It's --

[Frank] Does it bother you?

[Rhonda] You know, I think it's complicated because I don't know how Hadrian came into power, but it seems like the, you know, people who want, especially political leaders and political types, I just find it always kind of intriguing what their motivations are because in my opinion, I think that's a job that I would actually never want.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] To be in a, you know, a place of political leadership because I feel like you have a very specific type of personality, but I do think it probably is that mix of, OK, I want to have this power of being a leader of this large group of people, but at the same time there might be some element of public service to it as well. So --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] So, you know, thinking about people who are in these roles --

[Frank] I know I always want to find out how they did what they did, how they became what they became, and, you know, look at their childhood. And that doesn't always really -- that's never a through-line necessarily between childhood and what you become as an adult. We might force it there, but I don't -- I'm not sure it's realistic all the time.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Because I feel like you come into the world with some proclivity towards something, and your life can mitigate that or exacerbate it as it does. But I like -- what I do like personally is that unexpected but honest statement that to our brain now it doesn't sound very nice to say I needed complete domination in order to serve, and he certainly did serve. He traveled more than any other Roman Emperor because he wanted to be on the people. He wanted them to see them, and he knew by -- but he knew by then seeing him all the time he would have greater power over them because he wasn't remote, and they could play while the cats away kind of thing.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] And it wasn't just like a sybarite in Rome just enjoying this cosmopolitan life there. He was like on the road with the military all the time of the people. But, again, an imperative of his own. I think he -- I think he, in a way, was so resistant to the idea of anyone dominating him --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] That he needed to feel completely and solely in charge, but yet that dominance turned into a benevolence of sort rather than a cruel reign, you know? I mean, but, again, you're right, how does one become who they are?

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] I really think there's an area that we could never know that's just that confluence of genetics, upbringing situation, and --

[Rhonda] Yeah, and just the culture that they're in, you know? The Roman Empire and all that that entailed, you know? And being -- yeah. It's just --

[Frank] You have to -- I mean, but, yeah, but that's a good point because we don't know it was exactly like, but you're in a world where the emperor has a lot of power to do whatever they feel like. There aren't as many checks and balances on them beyond almost like subterfuge, and like, you know, they'll poison you in your sleep, which is probably a pretty powerful deterrent.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] But yet you could say execute, kill, banish. I mean, there's a story where he had a woman banished because she treated her slaves badly because he didn't like the fact that she was abusing them for no reason other than just to be cruel. And so he was like, "You're out." He didn't kill her, but he banished her. I mean, like things like that. Like that, when you really think of these specifics, it's like crazy. But he has some -- just to top it off, he has some, well, interesting quotes that I had noted that I thought were salient for today. He said, "If you show tolerance for fanatics, it can strew this as sympathy to their cause," which is an interesting -- I mean do you realize how much is in that statement? Like if you show power --

[Rhonda] There's a lot, and it sounds like something a leader would say, you know?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] There's some insight that they would have.

[Frank] They construe this as sympathy to their cause. And he does say something which is very much like applicable to any era. He goes, "Political newcomers, people new to the political scene were not so different from the rulers. They were chiefly less soiled by actual possession of power." So he's basically saying by possession of power, you're going to get corrupt [multiple speakers].

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] And so there was really no difference except they just hadn't had experience of power yet, so they weren't quite as dirty. I mean stuff like that that's, so it's a journey that takes time, this book. There's also like a very famous sort of companion he had, like a young boy who became his companion in later life. And Antinous who died mysteriously or was killed himself, and then for reasons not fully known but much talked about Hadrian deified this peasant boy all over the Empire, and the images of Antinous are some of the only surviving sculptures and images from the Roman Empire because he did so much of them. It is said like, you know, and it ties into what I was analyzing Hadrian before is that he could have been able to sacrifice the boy to Hadrian because there was also a belief that one person's death could lead to another person's longevity, and of course, that person's longevity would be the Emperor or Antinous killed himself for that reason. So and then, out of almost delayed gratification, Hadrian deified this kid because he felt so close to him when he was alive but couldn't fully express that because he didn't like feeling emotionally dominated by any particular feeling. It became an almost like exuviation after Antinous died of that need to honor him. So, I don't know. I always say I don't know. I don't know. But it's a complicated book. And it's also just -- when you think have -- I'll finish with this. Like when you think you understand him, you get a whole new passage that sort of illuminates another aspect of his personality. And you're like that, doesn't jive. Then you get this fair-minded loving or interesting person who loved the arts, and then you -- he's like, "Yeah, and I executed X, Y, and Z." And then you have -- like you said, I have to think about -- we have to think about the culture, which, but still it's a lot to wrap your head around.

[Rhonda] It sounds like it. I have to commend you for jumping into that book during a -- this day and age.

[Frank] Thank you [inaudible].

[Rhonda] Yeah. There's a lot there.

[Frank] Anyway.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank], I know. And, you know, I'm always wanting to challenge myself even though I'm like ten steps from the grave, for god sakes.

[Rhonda] No, but I've always kind of had an interest in the Roman Empire, but definitely Hadrian is one that I did not know. I mean, I've heard of Hadrian's Wall. I know that that was [multiple speakers].

[Frank] Yeah, it was one of the things that he built as a barrier of the empire from, you know, the outside forces.

[Rhonda] Yeah. But he [multiple speakers].

[Frank] But [multiple speakers].

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] He's far removed from the ones that I think more people know of like Nero and --

[Frank] Caligula.

[Rhonda] Caligula and all [multiple spealers].

[Frank] Yeah, because he wasn't a crazy debouched creep.

[Rhonda] Yeah. Yeah. So --

[Frank] He could get it on when he felt like it, but as an emperor is entitled to do.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] But primarily was a peaceful reign. There were no wars when he was in charge. You know, he was more about fortifying the empire as it was, but there were -- he did not cause wars. He wanted to stop them, actually. He just thought it was just like a waste of time. One more point, I'm sorry, and I keep going on because that's another thing. When you think you're actually doing a good thing like he -- much is made of this in the book, you think you're doing a good thing by saying I'm not going to start wars with people, we have a huge Empire, we're going to maintain the Empire and make everyone's quality of life better. I think that's a great thing. Who could argue with that, right? The military were pissed at him because they were like, now we have no opportunities, we're not doing what we're trained to do. We're just gonna sit around and just protect the barriers? We want to go to war. That's our job. And so he had a problem with the military for a while, and that's partly why he traveled so much. He was like always with the military because he was like, you guys, I want to show you you're appreciate, but we're not going to war. And they were sort of a little resentful. I mean, you can't please everybody, Rhonda.

[Rhonda] Right, no, you can't please everyone. But and, again, thinking about the significance of the military in that time period, I could see how that could ruffle some feathers. There's a lot. There's a lot of interesting history here.

[Frank] Thank you.

[Rhonda] To dig into.

[Frank] All right. Now we need to know about Du Bois' science fiction [multiple speakers].

[Rhonda] Du Bois' science fiction. So, yeah, let's do this. The -- like I said, the story is in his anthology or collection of writing, Dark Water Voices from Within the Veil. And it's the last -- and I actually haven't read the rest of it. I was just kind of flipping through, and I saw this, and it just kind of intrigued me, and I planned on going back, but I don't believe that all -- that these writings are related to each other. They are publications from different magazines and things that he had written for, and then he has poetry, and then he has this short story called The Comet. And this was written, I think, around 1919. So about ten years after, like I said, The Souls of Black Folks, so --

[Frank] It's also right in the middle of a pandemic.

[Rhonda] Exactly. Right in the middle of a pandemic, yes.

[Frank] And the end of World War 1. OK.

[Rhonda] And the end of World War 1, which is interesting because none of these things are in the story.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] But yet all of that was happening at the time. So it was a really -- yeah, like you said, a very interesting time. So the story basically starts with this man who I guess is our protagonist, and we don't know his name. They just call him The Messenger or The Man. And he's a black man. And it does take place in New York City. And, you know, we start with him walking to work, and he's a messenger, I guess in a bank or some kind of big institution like that. And you kind of feel -- get the feeling of his -- on his walk to work and kind of seeing his thoughts that he's kind of definitely unhappy or really kind of disgruntled about his place in the world, kind of talking about how he's invisible, how no one really sees him, and then as he's having these thoughts walking to work, kind of you hear -- he picks up little pieces of conversation on the street, and everyone is talking about the comet. Like this, comet is going to come that afternoon at like noon, and everyone in New York City is going to be able to see this comet, and everyone is excited about the comet. And so he kind of picks up this piece of conversation, but he, himself, is not really thinking at all about this comet. And he goes to work, which I said, it doesn't really say what he does, but, you know, the manager of whatever this place is is telling him, you know, you have to go to this vault and kind of get this, these things for us. And apparently, this vault is like old and dirty, and he's thinking, "Of course, they're going to send me. No one cares about -- you know, I'm insignificant, so of course, I'm the one sent to this vault." And he goes into the vault to do whatever they're asking him to do. And, of course, that's when the comet hits. And, you know, he hears the loud boom, and he's coming out of the vault, and it's just carnage, right? There's just dead bodies everywhere.

[Frank] Oh my god.

[Rhonda] No one is alive. And I am going to digress a little bit here. I don't know if this is the beginning of this type of story, but this is something that in popular culture, especially for those who love like foreign science fiction, is not kind of an uncommon storyline.

[Frank] No, I kept thinking of that famous Twilight Zone episode.

[Rhonda] Yes, exactly. That was the first thing I thought of when he goes into the vault.

[Frank] And it's the end of the world.

[Rhonda] Yeah. Exactly.

[Frank] And when he comes out, it's like everyone is gone. And actually, it's that one where he then can now read every book in the world because he always just wanted to read books.

[Rhonda] Right, and then there's this [multiples speakers] ending.

[Frank] And then, right, and then he drops his glasses on --

[Rhonda] He breaks his glasses.

[Frank] He can't read because his glasses are destroyed, and he has nothing but time and books. It's terrible.

[Rhonda] I know.

[Frank] But that's what I was thinking when you were talking. So anyway, all right. So --

[Rhonda] I thought of that too. And I also thought of the 1980s horror film Night of the Comet. I don't know if you saw that one --

[Frank] No.

[Rhonda] And it's very similar that this comet comes and basically destroys everyone except for these teenagers. It's an '80s horror film.

[Frank] It's always teenagers.

[Rhonda] Yeah, the teenagers. And like the few people who have been exposed to it and survived, of course, are like these weird monster things. It's, you know, I don't know. But it made me think of that. So anyways, so he's in this -- he comes out, and it takes him a while to kind of realize what has happened, and then he kind of says, OK, I have to pull it together because there's something I have to do. And we don't know what it is, but you kind of assume that, OK, maybe he has someone that he is looking for. And he goes, and he's like, OK, I have to get myself together, and he goes into this restaurant to eat, and you see this kind of throughout the story that he has these flashes of what it was kind of like as -- to be I guess a black man in America like he'll go into this restaurant to take food, and he thinks, you know, just yesterday they would've never, ever let me in here. And he has these kind of flashes as he's going through because he's like, OK, I have to get to Harlem. I'm gonna take the train, and he's like, wait a second, I'm gonna take a car because, you know, there's cars on the street. So he gets a car, and he's starting to drive, and then he hears like these cries for help. And someone else is alive. And it turns out that -- so he stops, and he goes to look for this woman, and it's a white woman. And a white woman who is very kind of wealthy and privileged, and she was in a dark room kind of, you know, developing some film, and she survived. So we have this 1919 only people left on Earth, it's this very wealthy white woman and this black man, the messenger. So there's already a lot --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] To digest just right there with like, OK, here are the last two people.

[Frank] Yeah. By the way, there was a movie from the '50s called The World of Flesh and the Devil about the end of the world, and the two survivors were Harry Bellafonte and Inger Stevens, a white actress. I wonder if they borrowed from that story. But anyway, now [multiple speakers], we've got these two set up. OK.

[Rhonda] Yeah. So and then we kind of begin to see the evolution of their thought process through the story. So first, they're just so happy to not be the only two, right? So they're not immediately thinking about, oh, this is a very wealthy white woman, and this is a black man, and they're not adhering to what the culture norms would probably be during that. You know?

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] He probably had to, you know, show a difference to her, but she's like, you know, you have to take me to find my father. And he's like, "No, but we're going to Harlem first." So that might have been -- so at the beginning they're kind of not behaving as they probably would --

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] In the -- under the normal circumstances. But then, you know, so they go to Harlem, they go to find her father, and they just can't find anyone. And they're driving around, and they're just -- they can't find anyone, so they decide to go to, again, this is 1990, this place where they have switchboards, I guess, where you would make all the phone calls. And then tried to reach people across the world, and they can't reach anyone. And this is kind of a turning point, I guess, for both of these characters because he becomes just overwhelmingly depressed, and she begins to kind of think, well, if we're the only two left, and I'm here with this man, but not only is he a man, he's a black man, and he has different blood, and he has different, you know, almost like a different species, and I can't live here with him, and I have to run. And she's really terrified. And she -- even, in the beginning, she says that she doesn't really think of him as human. She says you know, oh, you know, he's acting like a man, or he's acting kind of like a human. She kind of says these things thinking like, oh, this is really odd that he's behaving like a normal person would be behave. This is supposed to be, you know, I've heard all these different things about them, so --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] This kind of turning point for both of them is kind of, you know, he's depressed, and she's kind of going back to her old way of thinking, and he wants to commit suicide, and she wants to run. And then, you know, right before she runs, he comes and kind of stops her, and there's this line that she says, and, again, I probably have to go back and reread this to understand what was happening, and she's like, "Not this?" And he's like, "No, not this." So I don't know. That could mean a number of things.

[Frank] Wait.

[Rhonda] To me, I kind of want to think -- I've got to find it. I had it marked in here, and now I can't --

[Frank] Wait, what do they say that in reference to again?

[Rhonda] So she's trying to run from him, and he has the car.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] but he comes, and he stops her and kind of has her get in the car, and she says, "Not this?" And he said, "No, not this." And I'm wondering maybe it's a reference of thinking, well she's thinking he's gonna harm her or hurt or do something maybe sexual to her, and he's kind of saying, no, this isn't [multiple speakers].

[Frank] Or like --

[Rhonda] That's what I was thinking.

[Frank] Yeah. Or we're not -- not this, like not what you would expect. Not with what it was before.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] Like what you would think would happen before, it doesn't exist anymore.

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] And she's sort of like realizing, "Oh, not this?" [Multiple Speakers].

[Rhonda] Yes, that's kind of how I saw it is, you know, he's kind of reassuring her that --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] -- these fears that you had, this is what we're doing.

[Frank] She can trust him.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Or she's dawning -- her mind is opening to trust him.

[Rhonda] Right. And then also she saves him because after they kind of realized like they can't reach anyone else and they may be the only people, he wants to jump in the river. He wants to just end it and say, listen, I think -- and he doesn't say this, but you have the idea that maybe he believed that his family is gone, he is grieving, and he's like there's just no point, and she stops him, and she says, "No, you're not allowed to do this." Like we're gonna survive, and we're gonna figure this out. And so they both have these kind of moments of panic where the other one, you know, brings the other back to reality.

[Frank] Right. Right.

[Rhonda] And they begin to kind of -- you see in their thought process that they're starting to kind of not see the same distinctions that they saw before.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] And so they decide to -- they've driven around for hours, and they tried to call, and they've done all this stuff to try to find people. So they decide they have these flares they found, and they're just gonna go and just live on this roof and occasionally shoot off flares. So they're on this roof, and this is kind of the interesting -- one of the interesting parts of the story is they are just both laying on the roof, and they're just both thinking. And Du Bois' allows us to see kind of what they're both thinking. And the woman, again, we don't know her name either. She has this revelation, right, that she's like, OK, I am the last woman on earth. That means that I am also the mother of civilization.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] And she begins to have these really grand thoughts about herself saying I am just -- like this is me, I am going to be the one to restart humanity, and then she looks at him, and she goes, "And this is the father of humanity. And the two of us, we are just going to restart and repopulate the world."

[Frank] Oh my god.

[Rhonda] Which is a really big switch from, you know, at the beginning of the story, you know, her thinking that he is not even human and her being afraid that she's gonna be raped or she's gonna be harmed and trying to run away from him to thinking they are just special chosen people --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] Who are gonna restart humanity.

[Frank], OK.

[Rhonda] And so then you kind of switch to his thoughts.

[Frank], OK.

[Rhonda] And he's having the same thoughts too. He's like, well, here we are. It's just me. It's just her. We can no longer really make -- these distinctions don't matter anymore about race, about class. And I forgot, they had this whole conversation about what it was like for her to be wealthy, and that she ever had to work a day in her life, and that he had to work every day of his life. And so they bring in class -- the class struggle as well, but they make these -- they both make these realizations kind of at the same time that none of these distinctions matter anymore. The race doesn't matter anymore. The class doesn't matter anymore. There's no more people. And they are the two that are going to restart civilization. And it's almost comical because they are just, you know, they are having these really grand thoughts, and they're looking at each other as they're thinking this. And they literally like reach their arms out for each other. And all of a sudden, you hear a honk. And it's almost funny because it's just they have these thoughts, and they are like we are the father and we are the mother of civilization and honk. And it's this car that they hear, and it literally just snaps them out.

[Frank] Oh.

[Rhonda] It's almost like they hit refresh, you know? It's just stop -- before they can, their arms can touch before they can reach out to each other this car shows up, and it just snaps them out of this immediately like --

[Frank] Oh, boy.

[Rhonda] They just -- it's over.

[Frank] Oh.

[Rhonda] All of that thought, all of the distinctions are gone. You know?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] The new world, beginning, record scratch, over, just like that.

[Frank] Yeah [sound effects].

[Rhonda] Exactly. It's done.

[Frank] Right. So what's happening?

[Rhonda] And, yeah, you know, so it turns out that I guess a rescue unit or something that was sent to New York, maybe they saw the flares. And her father, who is a big wig, and I guess it's her fiancé, her boyfriend were looking for her. So they were alive, and they find her. And they, you know, they're so happy to see her, but then they see him, and literally, the fiancé is gonna shoot him with no questions asked. Like he's gonna pull the gun out and just shoot this man --

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] Because he -- you know, it's this black man and this white woman. He must have had -- been up to no good, had no intentions. And she's like, "No, no, no. He saved me. He saved my life. He risked his life. He saved me." And he's like, "OK. Whatever." And the father gives him a few dollars like thanks. And they leave. But then you hear that all the rescue people who have come because it turns out that the world is fine. Only New York has been devastated. So everyone in New York has died, but the rest of the world is fine. And they see him, and they automatically start yelling like, "N-word. Lynch him."

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] "We've got to kill him. You know, he must've been up to no good." And so they're automatically just brought back to what the world really is.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] And the kind of strange thing that happened is then this woman appears, it's a black woman, and it turns out that it's his wife. And she's just -- she has survived some kind of way and is found her way in the midst of all of these rescuers and what is happening, and she's holding with her a child, a dead baby. So his wife is alive, but his baby is dead. And she's carrying around this dead baby. And so I'm thinking what this means.

[Frank] Is that the end?

[Rhonda] That's pretty much the end. And --

[Frank] I am worn out, Rhonda. That was --

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] I thought it was going to end with them reaching out to each other and, nope, all right.

[Rhonda] No. So he reunites with his wife and with his dead baby. And literally, like the end that says like, "She has a dead baby in her arms," is like the last sentence of the story. And, you know, it's joyful because he finds his wife, but I'm thinking, is this dead baby representative of kind of a hopelessness, you know?

[Frank] Well, I thought so too because counterpointed with this sort of revery of the two -- of the original pair reaching out together are going to start civilization over again, and now that baby is dead or a baby is dead. And they certainly go back to the old social norms.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] I mean, I was thinking a lot about when you were talking about how the lack of other people can lead to personal liberation. When he first got out of the vaults, like he was just like, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that, I'm not gonna take the train, I'll take the car. Like this sort of sends like no people equals his liberation, really. And it seemed like the two of them then eventually, after struggles, were going to reach a sense of liberation together, and then people come back in. So like the more people --, the more oppression.

[Rhonda] Absolutely. Yeah. You see that. And I think we can even see it, I don't know, in current times. You know, if kind of the impact of the -- just the influence of different voices, right? You hear a lot about Facebook and Facebook groups, the influences of all these kind of different voices, and what would it be like if people didn't have all these different influences and voices and things that were interfering, you know, what would happen if people really, really were able to kind of think for themselves and really see things without all the other noise, which is impossible, you know, unless there's a comet that wipes all of us out, but just the opportunity to not have that pressure or to not have those influences, and also it seems like they were both kind of hopeful to start something new. So I thought that was interesting. Because all of this happens in a day.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] And they go through such big transitions within this day, and it seems like they both lost -- they thought they had lost really important people. She had lost her father and fiancé. We didn't know about his wife or baby until the very end of the story, but apparently, like he thought he had lost them, but they were kind of hopeful and ready to just start over. And then it's just over.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] And everything automatically switches back. And they kind of -- and even Du Bois when she says -- tells her fiancé, "No, don't shoot him. This man risked his life and saved me." He makes a point of saying that she could not look at him. She was unable to look the man in his eyes. So, again, wondering if that was just symbolizing that, you know, did she feel guilty? Did she feel ashamed that she had thought these things in the presence of her father and her fiancé --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] -- made her remember like, OK, this is my place and what was I thinking? I don't know.

[Frank] There's like -- there's also another culture reference. Like there's a movie from the '70s called Swept Away by Lina Wertmuller, a female director. And it's like two people get swept away and abandoned on a desert island, one a very rich woman and one a very poor guy. And --

[Rhonda] I've seen this, yeah.

[Frank] Yeah. They develop a relationship, and then they get saved just like your story, and he is sort of like hoping they're going to continue, and she just sort of gets into the rich helicopter and flies away because she can't -- even though she did before, back in the real world in quotes, she can't give into him. She can't resist, I guess, the lure of money and status and just the power of what she's used to.

[Rhonda] Right. And kind of as you were talking about in your book, maybe it's this idea of she held a very, very high position in the society that we currently live in, so that's not worth, you know, worth giving up.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] You -- so --

[Frank] I mean you mention the Facebook and Twitter thing. Like I thought of that too with Hadrian. Like if -- like how he could have a sort of perceived insurrectionist executed like with this panoply of voices if Hadrian an emperor was around, it would be -- I realized it would be like a constant state of war.

[Rhonda] Right. Right.

[Frank] And he'd be constantly going after enemies left and right who are disagreeing with him or insurrectionists or just causing trouble, and then it made me also think that because in some ways like because of social media we are at war. There is like a civil war going on because it's just -- and it's almost never-ending because like there will always be a voice that will foment something else.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] That was off your topic, I think of the story, but [multiple speakers].

[Rhonda] Not necessarily, you know? Because there's so many ways of communication now. You know, I mean in the story when he first comes out of the vault, and he's seeing all the dead people, like one of the things he sees is like the newsboy with all the newspapers with the headline of comet, you know?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] Back then, you know, and the fact that they had to travel to a -- they couldn't just go find a phone or didn't have a phone. They had to go to the switchboard place to make the calls. You know, but now there's communication and information. It's just so easy for it to come, which makes it, yeah, like you said. Yeah.

[Frank] Well, don't get me started because like they talk a lot about actually libraries in Memoirs of Hadrian of how important -- I mean, Hadrian basically says the most important thing in his life was books.

[Rhonda] Wow.

[Frank] And you could extrapolate and say the Internet is also information, so that's why the Internet is so important, and people love it in some ways. But there was a sense of journey to a library, to a sacred place to a book and opening that book and focusing on -- it's about focus. We talk about this all the time. It's just that sort of pilgrimage to focus, which just doesn't really exist on the Internet. But I am fascinated by that story. And it was called The Messenger?

[Rhonda] It's called The Comet.

[Frank] Oh, The Comet.

[Rhonda] And they called him The Messenger.

[Frank] Oh, well, that's interesting.

[Rhonda] Yeah. Right.

[Frank] Because that really stuck with me the idea of The Messenger.

[Rhonda] Right. And that's how we just know -- and she says his name, the wife says his name like the last page of the book.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] I think it's Jim or something like that. But the whole story, we just know of him as either The Man or The Messenger.

[Frank] I really wanted it to end with them on the roof.

[Rhonda] I think Du Bois was kind of bringing us back to reality.

[Frank] Yeah [multiple speakers], so when the world ends, and you and I are the only people alive.

[Rhonda] You think we would be the only people?

[Frank] Well, if I wrote the story or you did.

[Rhonda] Oh, OK.

[Frank] Well, actually, if you wrote the story, you wouldn't choose me.

[Rhonda] You know, maybe --

[Frank] I [multiple speakers] because you're my partner in stardom.

[Rhonda] Right. And we would have more than enough time to read all the books we ever wanted to read.

[Frank], I know. Do you wear -- but I wear glasses, so I have to be very careful.

[Rhonda] I don't wear glasses.

[Frank] Well, good for you. You could read to me.

[Rhonda] I could -- exactly.

[Frank] You'd be the audiobook.

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] What a story! You're just a good storyteller, you know that?

[Rhonda] Well, thank you. I appreciate that.

[Frank] It just occurred to me. It just occurred to me.

[Rhonda] It just occurred to you.

[Frank] I mean I'm like, you know, all over the place, but you're -- you can really tell a story because I was sort of like biting my nails.

[Rhonda] You were like, what's gonna happen.

[Frank], I know. It made me excited. Cool. W.E.B. Du Bois, The Comet. Love it. Love it. Oh, so we also I suppose it's time to tell everybody that the next book from our, the New York Public Library's 125 Books We Love book that we're going to read is a book of poetry called American Primitive by Mary Oliver. We're going to read -- how should we do this? I think we should read certainly a couple of poems each, but we probably should read one poem that we both read. Should have one --

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] I guess I'll talk to you later. We'll email each other. And --

[Rhonda] Yes, absolutely.

[Frank] Yeah, [multiple speakers], and then, you know, you could pick your own, and I'll pick my own, and then we'll go from there. Does that sound good?

[Rhonda] Sounds like a plan.

[Frank] Yeah, Mary Oliver, I don't know a lot about her, but I --

[Rhonda] Not [inaudible].

[Frank] I'm eager to discover her. There's a couple of good -- there's a couple of really good books of poetry on the 125 Books We Love list. One of which I'm going to mention because we're not going to read it together because I already discussed it in the podcast, but it's Autobiography of Red by Ann Carson, which also deals with mythological themes. So good. And one of the best discussions I had in my book discussion group. So that's Autobiography of Red by Anne Carson. But Rhonda and I are gonna read Mary Oliver's American Primitive. December 3rd, that episode will be aired.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Anything else, darling, in your cultural world that you're intrigued by or -- I don't know. We've been talking for like 16 hours.

[Rhonda] Yeah. I think I got it all out.

[Frank] All right. I don't know. I always, always think when I start this, this is gonna be a short one, and then I look --

[Rhonda] You always say that.

[Frank], I know. Look, I'm nothing if not a repeater, but anyway, and then I look at the clock, and I'm like we've been talking for over an hour [inaudible].

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] It's all about the editing, baby. All right. So until the next time, everybody, thank you so much for listening, and we really appreciate it, and we hope you are all doing well and you're getting sleep --

[Rhonda] Yes.

[Frank] And you're eating appropriately. I'm really missing the gym. I really need to move a little more. But I'll work on that.

[Rhonda] Yeah [inaudible].

[Frank] And thanks for listening.

[Rhonda] Thank you.

[Narrator] Thanks for listening to The Librarian Is In, a podcast by The New York Public Library. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review on Apple podcast or Google Play or send us an email at podcasts@nypl.org. For more information about The New York Public Library and our 125th anniversary, please visit NYPL.org/125. We are produced by Christine Farrell. Your hosts are Frank Collerius and Rhonda Evans.