Benjamin McEvoy

Essays on writing, reading, and life

Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray Podcast

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Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray is endlessly reread-able, beautiful, enduring, haunting, and, despite Wilde’s contentions and theory of art, is an eminently moral book. In today’s episode of Hardcore Literature, we’re talking about the history of this great work, the censorship trial and Wilde’s imprisonment.  We’re doing a close analysis, Talmudic style, of the […]

Poetry is Death and Past Life Regression (A Theory of Poetry)

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Why do some lines of poetry move us more than others? Why do seemingly innocuous lines, lines that many might glide over, lines unsavoured by the mass of men, so enrapture us? Why did this line, from the third stanza of Keats’ ‘To Autumn’, inspire tears in me late last night, compelling me to reread […]

How to Study English in Your First Term of University

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This is my advice to First Year English students studying in their first term at University. This is everything I would have done differently. If I could go back in time and get the most out of my English degree as possible, this is how I would structure my time, how I would approach my […]

Reviewing My 7 Book Reading Goals for 2020

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As we near the end of a strange, tumultuous year, I’m looking back on the goals I set for my reading this time last year. Did I hit them? Did you hit your book reading goals? I’ve put timestamps to the different goals below the video. Reviewing My 7 Book Reading Goals for 2020  […]

The C. S. Lewis Podcast (The Screwtape Letters)

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The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis is a guidebook to good living. In this episode of Hardcore Literature (Season 3, Episode 5), we’re talking about Aristotle, habits, entrepreneurship, law of attraction, religion/Christianity, how to read the Bible, and personal deep spiritual transformation. Check out the timestamps below the player to jump to any topic […]

How to Possess a Poem by Memory

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Memorisation is a lost art. Particularly when it comes to poetry. People hardly even read poetry anymore, let alone memorise poems. But memorising a poem is possessing a poem, and that’s where most of a poem’s value comes in. Here’s how to memorise a poem

Recommended Books for my Teenage Daughter

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I went into a bookstore before lockdown and overheard a father asking the worker what books he would recommend for his teenage daughter. They walked past the Austen. Past the Homer. Past the Shakespeare. And straight to the colourful YA section. Had my British sensibilities not intervened, I might have recommended a few different books… […]

The 5 Best Book Podcasts for Real Readers

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The reason I started the Hardcore Literature Book Review Podcast was because I couldn’t find many book review podcasts I loved. I searched and searched, looking through all of those “Best Book Review Podcasts” and “Top 10 Book Podcasts” articles. The same names kept coming up. The same book review podcasts that I had tried […]

Shakespeare’s King Richard III – Hardcore Literature Podcast

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King Richard III is a pivotal, bold stride towards the creation of the Shakespearean myth, the creation of character and the human. Literature was never the same again after Richard III. We go deep into the history, politics, language, and themes of Richard III, chartering Shakespeare’s influence and the time in which he was writing – a […]