The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast
A Philosophy Podcast and Philosophy Blog
Phi Fic means Philosophical Fiction. Each episode, we have a candid dicussion on a heady work of of fiction, full of SPOILERS. Join Nathan Hanks, Cezary Baraniecki, and Laura Davis plus the occasional guest. Who are these people?
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts. Refer your friends to us at PhiFicPodcast.com!
Phi Fic grew from The Partially Examined Life's Not School and its Philosophical Fiction group. Sign up for a small recurring donation for access to many more discussions!
Join Cezary Baranieckli, Laura Davis, Nathaniel Hanks, Daniel Johnson, and Jennifer Tejada, as we spend a very long (and with audio issues) episode deconstructing and being reshaped, by our reading of this unspeakably remarkable novel.
Cezary Baraniecki, Laura Davis-Chanin, and Nathaniel Hanks are joined again by the irrepressible Dan Johnson and Jennifer Tejada as we explore this fascinating and prescient story!
“I could not help feeling that they were evil things—mountains of madness whose farther slopes looked out over some accursed ultimate abyss.”
Join Nathan and Laura, with Mark Linsenmayer, Daniel Johnson, and Jennifer Tejada, as we follow H.P. Lovecraft up the Mountain and discover where true madness lies!
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
Every life is in many days, day after day. We walk through ourselves, meeting robbers, ghosts, giants, old men, young men, wives, widows, brothers-in-love, but always meeting ourselves. –Ulysses
For our discussion of this historically difficult but wholly worthwhile classic, Nathan, Laura, and Daniel are joined by Phillip Cherny. It was recorded for our original Not School group, long before that group evolved into a podcast.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
This discussion first appeared in our Not School Group and the readers at the time were Nathan, Laura, Daniel, and Dan Johnson. As an early recording, please bear with the sound quality—many thanks!
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
Listen as Dylan Casey from The Partially Examined Life Podcast joins us to discuss this remarkable novel, in which many scholars believe Woolf found her voice. Written in a stream of consciousness, the plot of the book is written inside the souls, struggles. and angst of the characters.
Join us as we delve into Coetzee’s rich, complex exploration of story and authorship in this novel that presents an origin story of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. Coetzee writes about Susan Barton, a castaway at sea who discovers an island inhabited by two men, Robinson Crusoe and Friday. Once rescued, she seeks the renowned author Daniel Defoe to help tell her story, but struggles to communicate her experiences.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
It is my belief no man ever understands quite his own artful dodges to escape from the grim shadow of self-knowledge. –Lord Jim
Listen along as we discuss this richly complex novel of responsibility, guilt, shame, and redemption.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.
To rest in the arms of perfection is the desire of any man intent upon creating excellence… –Death in Venice
Join us for our discussion of the extraordinary novella of beauty, desire, and morality.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.
“This very second has vanished forever, lost in the anonymous mass of the irrevocable. It will never return. I suffer from this, and I do not. Everything is unique—and insignificant.” –Emil Cioran
Join us as we dive into this beautiful work of nonfiction (yes, we veered from the path a bit) and luxuriate in the charmingly dismal prose of one of life’s master skeptics.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.
“The inferno of the living is not something that will be; if there is one, it is what is already here, the inferno where we live every day, that we form by being together. There are two ways to escape suffering it…”
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.
Our chinwag this time concerns two works by the remarkable Clarice Lispector, the novella The Hour of the Star and the short story “The Departure of the Train.”
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.
This time, we talk about a novella in the late, great Iain M. Banks’s famed Culture sci-fi series, which is centered around a utopian, post-scarcity society that spans various planets (and other habitats) within the Milky Way galaxy.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.
For this month’s episode, we discuss Isaac Asimov’s famous short story that (repeatedly) asks the question: Can we find a way to reverse entropy?
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
This time, the group discusses The House of the Dead, Dostoevsky’s semi-autobiographical novel about life in a labor camp.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
For this month’s reading we chose two short stories by James Baldwin: “This Morning, This Evening, So Soon” and “Sonny’s Blues.” Both stories are included in the collection Going to meet the Man (1965). Unfortunately, Daniel had to be absent this time, but we did get Mark Linsenmayer to join us!
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
Our book this time is The Body Artist by Don Delillo, an absorbing look at Lauren, a performance artist, and her experience of loss at her husband’s death.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
We discuss the novel about what you do when you’re “called” and how you live afterward. You can listen along while Cezary, Daniel, Laura, Mary, and Nathan discuss The Fall by Albert Camus, which Sartre claimed was “perhaps the most beautiful and the least understood” of Camus’s books.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
We discuss the poem within The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
For this month’s discussion, Daniel had us read Erewhon by Samuel Butler. We had a discussion that we all enjoyed much more than reading the book.
Hear more Phi Fic discussions at PhiFicPodcast.com.
