Hello! I’m excited to share my first podcast of the year :)
As a quick reminder, here’s how I’m approaching Lit Visions for the next few months:
I’ll be publishing twice per week:
News2Novel on Tuesdays
Essays, podcasts or speculative fiction on Thursdays
All posts will be themed around fiction, reality and the liminal space in between
You can help me out by sharing Lit Visions with friends, family, colleagues and anyone else who might find it interesting:
Thanks a ton for your support. Now, onto the podcast.
If you have ever procrastinated on the internet, then you'll probably relate to this conversation with Jordan Castro.
He is a novelist whose debut novel is actually called The Novelist and it is just fascinating. The story is set over the course of a single morning, where a writer is trying to pen an autobiographical novel in Google Docs. But just keeps getting distracted by Twitter, Instagram, daily rituals and his own mind. Each act of procrastination prompts an intriguing and often comedic psychic reflection on the nature of language, consciousness, technology and addiction.
Now in our conversation, we discuss Jordan's book and dive into a number of tangential topics such as:
The power of saying a lot, using little
Attention spans and whether they are actually on the decline
Social media and how as we build it, it is building us
Drug addiction and lessons from sobriety
Infinite universe theory and what it means for the novel
and lots more...
What struck me about Jordan was not just how he thinks but also his humility. He's a really chilled out guy and has a rare talent for traversing complex terrain in a way that's light and super fun. I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and YouTube.
Where you can find us:
Jordan on Twitter: twitter.com/jordan_castro2
Dhru on Twitter: twitter.com/dhrupadkarwa
Mentioned in the episode:
The Novelist by Jordan Castro
Lit Visions - for essays, podcasts, speculative fiction and novel suggestions
Frost by Thomas Bernhard
The works of Tao Lin
Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Cat Country by Lao She
Omon Ra by Victor Pelevin
The Courage to Be by Paul Tillich
Dynamics of Faith by Paul Tillich
Show notes:
0:00 - Introduction
02:08 - What fiction means to Jordan
02:56 - His journey as a poet
05:30 - The art of distillation
07:15 - Time well spent
08:05 - Attention spans and social media
17:40 - The Novelist by Jordan Castro
25:30 - On machines and AI
34:24 - Animals, Objects and Animism
43:15 - Reality, Paradoxes and Individualism
48:09 - Infinite Novel Theory
51:30 - Drugs and lessons from getting sober
56:45 - Lightning round
Procrastination, Dostoevsky and Infinite Novel Theory | Jordan Castro