Ascend - The Great Books Podcast

Today on Ascend: The Great Books Podcast, Dcn. Garlick is joined by the always wonderful Alberto Fernandez to discuss "Red Shadows," a salvage tale of Solomon Kane by Robert E. Howard.
Check out our website for our reading schedule, articles, written guides, and more.
Dcn. Garlick and Alberto discuss Robert E. Howard’s 1928 Solomon Kane tale “Red Shadows,” a pulp adventure chosen as a lively Short Story September “palette cleanser” after heavier classical reading. Howard (1906–1936), the Texas-born creator of Conan the Barbarian, produced hundreds of stories in a short life. Alberto first encountered him through the 1960s–70s Lancer paperbacks with Frank Frazetta covers. Kane, Howard’s only recurring explicitly Christian series character, is described as a grim Puritan-Cavalier mix with pagan and philosophical streaks—“God’s angry swordsman”—a remorseless wandering avenger who rights wrongs he encounters by chance.
The story opens in the French countryside when Kane finds a dying young Catholic woman assaulted by bandits led by Le Loup (“the Wolf”). The stranger’s death prompts Kane’s vow that “Men shall die for this,” launching a relentless pursuit that takes him from France across Europe to the West African jungle.
There the narrative juxtaposes Kane’s grim, driven sense of justice (he sees himself as a “vessel of wrath”) against Le Loup’s cynical evil, tribal politics, the witch-doctor N’Longa, voodoo, jungle drums, and “blood memory.” Unlike the mirthful, vitalistic Conan, Kane is cold and mysterious even to himself. The climax features a duel framed as cosmic justice versus injustice, followed by a second, primal coda in which a gorilla avenges his mate—showing that nature itself can enact justice and that Kane often needs allies to complete vengeance.
Alberto highlights Howard’s youthful ambition (he wrote the story at 21), his debt to adventure writers like Edgar Rice Burroughs and H. Rider Haggard, and the way Africa becomes a recurring, almost inescapable landscape in later Kane tales. He recommends the Del Rey edition and especially the later novella “Wings in the Night” as Howard’s finest Kane story. Both hosts note the stories’ value as high-energy, well-crafted adventure that can later be shared with sons, and they close by pointing listeners toward the next Short Story September episode on Neil Gaiman’s “Chivalry.”
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Robert E. Howard and Solomon Kane
02:13 Howard's Background and Literary Influence
04:37 The Character of Solomon Kane and His Morality
08:36 Howard's Philosophy and Moral Duality
11:02 Why Red Shadows Was Chosen for Discussion
14:48 Beginning of the Story: France and the Dying Girl
16:52 Stranger Motif and the Western Influence
19:10 Cain's Vengeance and Inner Drive
22:50 Primal Justice and the African Setting
26:53 Howard's Use of Africa and Its Significance
32:52 Howard's Publishing Journey and African Themes
36:07 The Role of Ilonga and African Characters
43:49 Eternal Forces: Justice and Injustice
45:58 The Ending: Gorilla and Primal Justice
50:49 Howard's Final Warning and Blood Memory
54:41 Recommended Follow-up Stories and Howard's Legacy
Keywords
Solomon Kane Red Shadows, Robert E. Howard Solomon Kane, Ascend Great Books Podcast, Deacon Harrison Garlick, Alberto Fernandez, Weird Tales 1928, pulp fiction, sword and sorcery, God’s angry swordsman, Conan the Barbarian comparison, Tower of the Elephant, Le Loup the Wolf, N’Longa witch doctor, G’loka the Gorilla Slayer, Short Story September, Del Rey Solomon Kane, Wings in the Night, Moon of Skulls, Hills of the Dead, Puritan avenger, vengeance for a stranger, West Africa jungle, blood memory, jungle drums, Howard pulp adventure, 16th century historical fantasy, Christian hero pulp fiction, Frank Frazetta, Centaur Press Solomon Kane, Lancer paperbacks, Argosy rejection, eighty dollars Weird Tales, grim Puritan Cavalier, vessel of wrath, justice versus injustice.
NEXT WEEK we discuss Neil Gaiman's "Chivalry" with His Excellency Eduard Habsburg, the Archduke of Austria.

Today on Ascend: The Great Books Podcast, Dcn. Garlick is joined by Dr. Joseph Boyne to discuss Flannery O'Connor's "Enduring Chill" as part of Short Story September.
Visit thegreatbookspodcast.com for our reading schedule, articles, and a whole host of written guides.
Asbury Fox, the failed New York writer who returns home to his mother’s dairy farm convinced he is dying a tragic, Kafka-esque death, meets a rural doctor, two farmhands who refuse to share his resentment, and a deaf, one-eyed priest from Purrgatory who simply walks him through the Baltimore Catechism. What begins as another Southern Gothic confrontation with pride becomes something rarer in O’Connor: a dark comedy in which the protagonist desires of a romantic death are met with an enduring chill.
Dr. Boyne and Dcn. Garlick draw out the story’s autobiographical shadows, its critique of performative liberalism and abstract love of humanity, and the way O’Connor uses both the Jesuit in New York and the homely Father Finn to insist that meaning—and grace—cannot be manufactured from the self. The conversation lingers on the water-stain dove that descends as ice rather than fire, the question of whether the tale is comic or merely purgatorial, and what it means for those of us who prize the Great Books that education, by itself, is never enough.
Listeners who have been scarred by “The Lame Shall Enter First” will find this one far easier to finish—and far more unsettling in its quiet demand that we keep living.
Chapters
00:05 — Podcast intro and the reading plan for Short Story September
01:01 — Introducing Enduring Chill and Dr. Joseph Boyne
03:21 — Why Dr. Boyne picked the story
05:00 — Flannery O’Connor and the Southern Gothic tradition
12:55 — The grotesque, violence, and grace in O’Connor
20:32 — Asbury returns home and the education theme
30:30 — Asbury’s desire for a meaningful death and the Jesuit in New York
41:42 — Dr. Block and Asbury’s confrontation with illness
50:00 — The dairy farm, the black workers, and failed communion
57:13 — Asking for a priest and the dream sequence
70:29 — Father Finn arrives and subverts Asbury’s expectations
80:31 — Randall and Morgan return
85:34 — Dr. Block diagnoses the illness correctly
87:40 — Final scene: the Holy Ghost in ice and the enduring chill
96:23 — Closing reflections on O’Connor and the story’s meaning
Keywords
Flannery O’Connor The Enduring Chill short story analysis, Ascend the Great Books Podcast Short Story September episode with Deacon Harrison Garlick and Dr. Joseph Boyne of Tulsa Community College, Southern Gothic literature, Catholic short stories, Christ-haunted South, Asbury Fox character study, Jesuit priest Ignatius Vogle, Father Finn from Purgatory, Baltimore Catechism, Holy Spirit as ice instead of fire, undulant fever raw milk irony, performative liberalism and racial condescension, education versus practical wisdom, grotesque as medium of grace, O’Connor comedy versus tragedy, Good Country People comparison, lupus and autobiographical elements, Great Books education critique, upcoming Plato Republic series, Robert E. Howard Red Shadows Solomon Kane, Neil Gaiman Chivalry with Archduke Eduard Habsburg, Herman Melville Bartleby the Scrivener.

Dcn. Harrison Garlick hosts a full house to discuss the short, strange, forgotten dialogue of Plato's Ion, subtitled "On the Iliad."
10 Question Written Guide on Plato's Ion
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Plato’s Ion opens with a victorious rhapsode who claims to speak more beautifully about Homer than any other human being. Socrates grants the premise that a true rhapsode must not merely recite but interpret the poet’s thought to his hearers—and then tests whether that excellence is a techne, a teachable art that should apply across all poets who treat the same subjects.
Ion fails the test. He is “asleep” except when Homer is mentioned. Socrates therefore offers another account: poets and rhapsodes work not by craft but by divine mania. The Muse is a lodestone, and poet, reciter, and audience form a chain of possession. Ion recognizes himself at once. On stage he is outside himself, and he can move twenty thousand hearers to tears and terror (with a subtle nod in the dialogue about the desire to make money...).
The dialogue then presses the distinction between speaking beautifully and speaking correctly. On charioteering, medicine, and the other arts present in Homer, the expert—not the rhapsode—speaks rightly. Unwilling to admit he has no art at all, Ion seizes the last remaining claim and declares himself the best general. The identification is absurd, and the conversation nearly collapses. Socrates leaves him a choice: to be called unjust, or divine. Ion takes the latter. Skill and inspiration remain unreconciled. What the short work has done is place poetry, possession, and the education of the city on the table—and prepare the larger judgment of the poets that the Republic will make.
Chapters
00:00 - Welcome to Ascend and overview of the episode's purpose
01:05 - Introducing Ion and the returning and first-time guests
02:29 - Erik Rostad explains Book of Titans and his lifelong reading project
06:28 - First reactions to Ion and its perplexing character
07:11 - Preliminary framing: subtitle, translation, and why the dialogue matters
10:10 - Ion's claim to be the finest speaker on Homer
11:44 - What techne means in this dialogue
20:00 - Does Ion really claim knowledge, or only beautiful performance?
23:50 - Ion's claim that no one else speaks more finely on Homer
28:37 - The question of poetry as a better educator than philosophy
31:03 - Ion admits he dozes off when other poets are discussed
38:45 - The magnet metaphor and the chain of divine influence
44:32 - Is divine inspiration irrational, or can it be a real source of truth?
55:31 - A third sense of possession: skill, demonization, and being subsumed into beauty
60:15 - Ion says he watches the crowd and adjusts for money and effect
62:49 - Does Ion have a real art, or is he just managing audience response?
70:29 - The charioteer, the physician, and whether Socrates is being fair
72:26 - Does philosophy itself become a narrow specialty in the same way?
76:03 - Why actors may be excellent performers but poor explainers of their craft
78:10 - Socrates as a guide toward self-recognition of Ion's actual techne
87:25 - Plato as storyteller and the philosopher's need for a better story
90:20 - Storytelling, parables, and the pedagogical power of narrative
92:37 - Plato's self-reflection on his own art and craft
94:36 - The unresolved tension between inspiration and skill
99:44 - Closing thanks
Keywords
Plato’s Ion, On the Iliad, Ion of Ephesus, rhapsode, Homer, Iliad, Odyssey, technē, techne, divine inspiration, mania, theia moira, magnet metaphor, lodestone, Muse, speaking beautifully, speaking correctly, kalos, orthos, Socratic dialogue, forgotten Platonic dialogues, aporetic dialogue, poetry versus philosophy, education of the city, Republic Book 10, poets as imitators, Allan Bloom, Thomas Pangle, Roots of Political Philosophy, Debra Nails, Dr. Frank Grabowski, Thomas Lackey, Jack Drury, Erik Rostad, Book of Titans, Ascend the Great Books Podcast, rhapsodic contest, Asclepieia, Epidaurus, generalship, polymathy, Plato as dramatist.

Today on Ascend: The Great Books Podcast, Dcn. Garlick, Dr. Larson, Dr. Grabowski, and Mr. Thomas Lackey discuss the short, strange, and forgotten dialogue of HIppias Minor or "On the Lie."
8 Questions on Hippias Minor Study Guide
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Plato’s Hippias Minor is a short, strange dialogue with a traditional subtitle that cuts straight to the point: “On the Lie.” After the boastful sophist Hippias finishes a public speech ranking Achilles the best and Odysseus the most polytropos—the man of twists and turns—Socrates is drawn into a conversation that begins with Homer and ends in one of the deepest aporias of the early dialogues.
What starts as a dispute over who is the better man, the straightforward Achilles or the wily Odysseus, quickly becomes a rigorous examination of voluntary versus involuntary wrongdoing, the nature of knowledge and power, and the unsettling claim that the man who does injustice on purpose is better than the one who does it by accident.
Deacon and the guests work through the dialogue’s sharp arguments and its surprising relevance. The conversation exposes the limits of treating virtue as mere knowledge plus power, raises the question of whether a just person might ever speak falsely for a good end, and serves as a genuine appetizer for the noble lie in the Republic.
Come listen—and discover why even Socrates, at the end, cannot agree with himself.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Hippias Minor and its Context
04:55 Setting the Scene: Hippias' Speech and Socrates' Role
09:22 Hippias' Boasts and Socrates' Irony
17:55 The Homeric Heroes: Achilles and Odysseus
25:04 Knowledge, Power, and the Art of Lying
36:15 The Distinction Between Capacity and Action
44:53 The Nature of Truth and Falsehood in Socratic Dialogue
46:43 Conclusion: What Socrates Reveals About Knowledge and Lies
02:39 Socrates' questioning of Hippias and the nature of virtue
04:55 The analogy of athletic competitions and the concept of justice
07:57 Socrates' discussion on voluntary and involuntary actions
12:05 The role of knowledge and capacity in moral actions
15:34 Hippias' understanding of justice and its relation to power
19:50 The concept of noble lies and pedagogical deception
25:04 The absence of forms and gods in the dialogue
30:14 The deeper meaning of Socratic ignorance and self-awareness
34:54 The significance of the question: Is justice knowledge or power?
39:51 Conclusion: What we learn about virtue, knowledge, and truth
Keywords
Plato’s Hippias Minor, Lesser Hippias, On the Lie, Hippias of Elis, Achilles and Odysseus, polytropos, voluntary and involuntary wrongdoing, voluntary liar, Socratic dialogue, aporetic dialogue, forgotten Platonic dialogues, noble lie, Republic, virtue is knowledge, knowledge and power, sophist, polymath, Eudicus, Embassy scene Iliad, teleology, Forms, Socratic irony, beneficial falsehood, Dr. Frank Grabowski, Dr. Brett Larson, Thomas Lackey, Ascend the Great Books Podcast, political philosophy, Allan Bloom, Roots of Political Philosophy.
Next week we discuss Plato's Ion!

Today on Ascend: The Great Books Podcast, Dcn. Garlick, Dr. Larson, and Dr. Grabowski discuss Plato's Lovers--a strange, short, and somewhat forgotten dialogue seeking the definition of philosophy.
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Check out our WRITTEN GUIDE to the Lovers.
Plato’s Lovers is a short, strange, and easily overlooked dialogue that asks one of the most important questions in the entire Platonic corpus: What is philosophy?
Set in a grammar school where two rival older lovers—one an athlete, the other a cultured “know-it-all”—compete for the attention of younger boys discussing astronomy, the conversation quickly becomes an erotic and educational contest. Socrates enters the scene and quietly reorders the loves on display, showing that philosophy is not the accumulation of many things, that self-knowledge must come before any claim to rule, and that the true lover of the young is the one who leads their souls toward wisdom.
In this episode of Ascend, Dcn. Garlick is joined by Dr. Grabowski and Dr. Larson to unpack the dialogue’s subtle images of the soul, its playful yet serious treatment of eros, and its surprising role as an appetizer for the Republic.
The accompanying written guide offers a clear outline, preliminary questions, and dense Q&A—perfect for first-time readers, small groups, or anyone who wants to follow the argument more carefully.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Plato's 'The Lovers'
02:07 The setting and context of the dialogue
06:19 Who is the dialogue for? Audience and purpose
11:12 The erotic dimension of philosophy and education
16:10 The strangeness of the dialogue's setting
22:02 What is philosophy? The first definitions
27:36 The analogy of athletic training and measured learning
37:25 Usefulness, goodness, and self-knowledge
41:11 The political implications and the role of the philosopher
50:11 The dramatic and rhetorical aspects of the dialogue
57:32 The aporetic ending and its significance
Keywords
Plato’s Lovers, Rival Lovers, Erastai, what is philosophy, polymathy, much learning, Socratic dialogue, aporetic dialogue, forgotten Platonic dialogues, eros, erotic education, true love of the soul, tripartite soul, music and gymnastics, mousikē, gymnastikē, self-knowledge, know thyself, Socrates as third lover, Dionysius grammar school, anonymity in Plato, via negativa, aporia, preparation for the Republic, Dr. Frank Grabowski, Dr. Brett Larson, Ascend the Great Books Podcast, Platonic education, philosophy and politics, soul craft before statecraft.