Episodes

  • Episode 74 - Uncle Tom's Cabin

    Episode 74 - Uncle Tom's Cabin
    Dec 17 2025

    Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. In our seventy-fourth episode, and last in our season on banned books, we celebrate (?) Christmas with the inappropriately summery Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852). There are ample Simpsons and South Park references, we reveal that everything we knew about this book we both learned from The King and I, and Daniel gets annoyed by a Bookends slight AND by his own previously poor skills in name analysis.


    Cover art © Catherine Wu.


    Episode Theme: 'Ol' Man River'.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    1 hr and 19 mins
  • SMFMS Bookends 25: Lord of the Flies

    SMFMS Bookends 25: Lord of the Flies
    Nov 26 2025
    The twenty-fifth episode of SMFMS Bookends, the satellite show for Save Me From My Shelf. Here we read emails, answer listener questions, talk about what we're currently reading, watching, and playing, resuscitate the Bad Sex Awards™, and provide further outtakes and analysis cut from our Lord of the Flies episode.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    35 mins
  • Episode 73 - Lord of the Flies

    Episode 73 - Lord of the Flies
    Nov 19 2025

    Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. This season, we are only looking at banned and controversial texts. In our seventy-third episode, and to celebrate Internation Men's Day, we look at our blokiest book yet: William Golding's Lord of the Flies (1954). Our accents get a workout, we debate the correct pronunciation of 'conch', and learn that they don't teach this kind of thing on Nickelodeon (or, indeed, Nick At Nite).


    Cover art © Catherine Wu.


    Episode Theme: Kampen Boys Choir, 'O Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem'.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    1 hr and 13 mins
  • SMFMS Bookends 24: Dante's Inferno

    SMFMS Bookends 24: Dante's Inferno
    Oct 22 2025
    The twenty-fourth episode of SMFMS Bookends, the satellite show for Save Me From My Shelf. Here we read emails, answer listener questions, talk about what we're currently reading, watching, and playing, resuscitate the Bad Sex Awards™, and provide further outtakes and analysis cut from our Dante's Inferno episode.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    31 mins
  • Episode 72 - Dante's Inferno (and rest of the Divine Comedy)

    Episode 72 - Dante's Inferno (and rest of the Divine Comedy)
    Oct 15 2025

    Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. This season, we are only looking at banned and controversial texts. In our seventy-second episode, we invite Friend of the Podcast (and Abby's best friend/medieval historian) Justine back to the show to school us on Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy. We focus primarily on the 'Inferno' section and get really caught up on Dante being a civil engineering girlie.


    Cover art © Catherine Wu.


    Episode Theme: Motet, 'Ypocrite / Velut stelle / Et gaudebit' (14th century)

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    1 hr and 23 mins
  • SMFMS Bookends 23: Catcher in the Rye

    SMFMS Bookends 23: Catcher in the Rye
    Sep 24 2025
    The twenty-third episode of SMFMS Bookends, the satellite show for Save Me From My Shelf. Here we read emails, answer listener questions, talk about what we're currently reading, watching, and playing, resuscitate the Bad Sex Awards™, and provide further outtakes and analysis cut from our Catcher in the Rye episode.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    29 mins
  • Episode 71 - The Catcher in the Rye

    Episode 71 - The Catcher in the Rye
    Sep 17 2025

    Two friends and academics recap classic literature and take it off its pedestal. This season, we are only looking at banned and controversial texts. In our seventy-first episode, we look at a controversial text of teenage rebellion and grief-trauma that has attracted a LOT of weird loners over the years: J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye (1951). In this episode, Daniel takes a big L over David Copperfield, we have Buckfast at Tiffany's, spend a long time discussing Howard Hughes's design of the perfect bra, and realise that this should have been our Christmas episode.


    Cover art © Catherine Wu.


    Episode Theme: Larry Wagner, 'Autopsy on Schubert' (1937).

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    1 hr and 14 mins
  • SMFMS Bookends 22: Fahrenheit 451

    SMFMS Bookends 22: Fahrenheit 451
    Aug 20 2025
    The twenty-second episode of SMFMS Bookends, the satellite show for Save Me From My Shelf. Here we read emails, answer listener questions, talk about what we're currently reading, watching, and playing, resuscitate the Bad Sex Awards™, and provide further outtakes and analysis cut from our Fahrenheit 451 episode.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    35 mins