Daniel X. O’Neil, the worldwide entertainment juggernaut of the 21st century, joins us to discuss T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land. You will learn almost nothing about The Waste Land from this discussion, but you will learn about poetry, modernism, truth, hypermedia, (the “end” of) America, and enjambment.

Show notes:

• [T.S. Eliot reads The Waste Land on YouTube](T.S. Eliot reads: The Waste Land)
• The Waste Land on Wikipedia
• Hypertext enjambment
• Blueberry Boat by The Fiery Furnaces
• The truly great Carl Malamud
• The Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-Media-Academia-Think-Tank complex
• Jack Dorsey talking about how dispatch systems influenced Twitter (Dorsey, like Eliot is from St. Louis, as is past guest Jason Goldman and Sam Altman)
• Rashomon
• My essay on Internet Power (thanks to Dan for pushing me over the edge to finally publish this)
• Trut from Emigre Magazine #41
• The Nature Book
• Cahokia Mounds
• Children of a Modest Star by Jonathan S. Blake and Nils Gilman for all those interested in the limitations of nation states
• The end of the Internet

Always remember:

There’s no such thing as life without bloodshed. I think the notion that the species can be improved in some way, that everyone could live in harmony, is a really dangerous idea. Those who are afflicted with this notion are the first ones to give up their souls, their freedom. Your desire that it be that way will enslave you and make your life vacuous.

— Cormac McCarthy 💖

Next month we’ll be talking with Noah Ilinsky about China Mountain Zhang by Maureen F. McHugh.