Aatif Rashid, author of the novel Portrait of Sebastian Khan, joins the podcast to profess his love for Anthony Powell’s A Dance to the Music of Time. The one with, like, a million volumes? The one that’s jam-packed with the subtleties of human interactions, relationships, and communications (or lack thereof)? The one that you saw on all of those “great books” lists, but has since slipped away from the shelves of contemporary readers?
Yes, that one indeed. Listen in as Aatif and David chat about why this movement of all movements is still a must-read.
You can find out more about Aatif Rashid here and you can find Portrait of Sebastian Khan via 7.13 Books.
Also, for anyone curious about the article Aatif refernces in the episode, here it is: "A Text of Arrested Desire: The Anticlimax of Extended Narrative in Anthony Powell's "A Dance to the Music of Time" (1988) by Lynette Felber
https://www.jstor.org/stable/
Ah yes, Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha. You probably read it in high school or college as a young seeker of truth, but have you read it later in life? Do the messages change after you too have gone out into the world and been both drawn to and broken by its sweet, empty promises? And most importantly, have you been pronouncing Siddhartha properly all this time? (We haven’t.)
Join Nathan and David as they take another spin through Hesse’s most known novel. But just remember — we could tell you what this novel is about, but one can only share knowledge, not wisdom.