What makes us most distinctively human, our reason or our emotions? How do we know when relationships with others are authentic, and when they’re just a matter of utility? Does civilization corrupt or improve us? Is honesty all it’s cracked up to be, or is lying a social inevitability? Which is more important to our happiness, love or work?

(sub)Text is a podcast about the human condition, and what we can learn about it from the greatest inventions of the human imagination: fiction, film, drama, poetry, essays, and criticism. Each episode, philosopher Wes Alwan and poet Erin O’Luanaigh explore life’s big questions by conducting a close reading of a text or film and co-writing an audio essay about it in real time. Learn More.

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(sub)Text: Love and Wit in Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing”

August 21, 2020 by Wes Alwan Leave a Comment

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:29:31 — 105.6MB)

At the center of every courting ritual, there’s a great unknown. How do we know when we’ve met someone we can love? How do we know the other person is actually who they seem to be? In the beginning, all we have to go on is surface appearances, which amount to a kind of hearsay. The question is how to get beyond them. Wes and Erin discuss Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, which seems to suggest that witty banter is more than just good fun, and has an important role to play in getting to know others.