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Are we consuming an authentic place, or are we willingly participating in a beautifully staged performance designed around our own expectations? In this opening episode of Journey 7, we begin our exploration of literary tourism. When we travel to the places that inspired our favorite books, whose landscape are we actually stepping into? Today. we cross the eight-mile concrete expanse onto Prince Edward Island to investigate the massive, multi-million dollar infrastructure designed to capitalize on Anne of Green Gables. Along the way, we unpack our collective urge to buy raspberry cordials and straw hats. Along the way, we discover the strange history of the historical Grand Tour, and we investigate the “tourist gaze” and how the global tourism industry packages our favorite books into easily consumed souvenirs. If you love travelogues, literary history, or exploring the real-world histories behind famous books like Anne of Green Gables, this episode will challenge the way we view our next vacation destination. Episode 7.01 – Grand Tours Pt 1: The Postcard Illusion Readings & Resources: Montgomery, Lucy Maud. Anne of Green Gables. 1908 Montgomery, Lucy Maud. Anne of the Island. 1915 Montgomery, Lucy Maud. Anne’s House of Dreams. 1917 Montgomery, Lucy Maud. The Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery. Edited by Mary Rubio and Elizabeth Waterston Montgomery, Lucy Maud. The Story Girl. 1911 MacLeod, Nicola E. Literary Fiction Tourism: Understanding the Practice of Fiction-Inspired Travel. Routledge, 2024 Glossary: Grand Tour: A traditional, multi-year journey across continental Europe that served as a mandatory educational rite of passage for upper-class, wealthy young men from the 17th to the mid-19th centuries. Officially intended to complete a gentleman’s classical education by exposing him to the art, architecture, and polite society of the Old World, it also provided a socially acceptable escape from parental control to pursue worldly pleasures and construct an elite “martial masculinity.” Tourist Gaze: How travelers view and consume a destination, shaped by what guidebooks and the tourism industry have conditioned them to expect to see. Skeptical Pilgrim: A traveler who deeply loves a literary work or historical destination but adopts a critical, questioning posture, refusing to passively accept the fictionalized, manufactured reality that a tourist destination attempts to sell them. Listener’s Guide Reflection Questions When you select a specific souvenir from a location, how does that physical object alter or secure the memory of the real space you left behind? Consider the texts you choose to read versus the places you choose to visit; what makes a comforting historical fiction preferable to a reality of contemporary labor? In analyzing your own home, what is the process of selection behind the display pieces on your shelves, and how do they perform an identity for visitors? How does the presence of a guidebook or a digital travel route affect your ability to notice the un-curated, raw elements of a new place? If you map your immediate neighborhood purely through your senses rather than visual landmarks, how does that shift your understanding of who owns and occupies that space? Skeptical Pilgrim Challenges 1: The Grand Tour – PDF Download Complete Resources: https://waywordsstudio.com/project/literary-tourism/ CHAPTERS 00:00 Field Notes & Trailhead 0:00:0.000000 05:35 Intro Theme 06:11 Montgomery and Two Worlds 10:53 The Grand Tour and the Invention of the Gaze 17:57 Tourist Gazing 25:40 Skeptic Pilgrim Challenges 28:28 Screens and Modern Escapes 32:54 Closing Credits === Transcript and Full Bibliography: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/transcript/7-01-Grand-Tours-1 New to Literary Nomads? Check out my introductory episodes (0.1-0.3) to find out what’s going on here! I’ve got an episode for readers, for teachers, and for students: https://waywordsstudio.com/podcasts/waywords-podcast/ Have a Question? Want to Comment? Literary Nomads Mailbag === Literary Nomads is the main program of Waywords Studio (https://waywordsstudio.com). The podcast posts new material each week, with thought-provoking examinations of literature around selected questions or themes and several smaller supplemental episodes in between the larger programs: history, writing, and contemporary applications of ideas. Visit us for expanded resources for guests and the Waywords community, for other programs and writing, and for opportunities to support our goal to expand reading. Resources available can include full bibliographies of material referenced, full and partial texts, annotated editions, supplemental and expanded episodes, fictional explorations, teaching and learning resources, additional essays, and online courses. Website: https://waywordsstudio.com Newsletter: https://waywordsstudio.kit.com/ Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, LinkedIn, and BlueSky: @WaywordsStudio === CREDITS: Original music by Randon Myles (https://randonmyles.com/) Chapter headings by Natalie Harrison and Sarah Skaleski USING THIS WORK: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is open to be used and adapted for all not-for-profit uses with proper attribution. MLA CITATION: Chisnell, Steve. “7.01: Grand Tours Pt 1: The Postcard Illusion,” Literary Nomads. Waywords Studio, 19 June 2026, https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/.

  And what if nobody listens? Yes, entering our calls for justice into public space carries no small amount of anxiety. And the poster-child for being unheard, the Trojan princess and priestess Cassandra, may–if we read our mythology carefully–provide us some clues to our purpose and goals in writing as anti-epic heroes, wielding language as our weapons. Episode 6.22 – Cassandra: Uncertain Steps Texts from this episode: Aeschylus: Agamemnon Euripides: Trojan Women Schwarz, Hans: Kassandra Smale, Holly: The Cassandra Complex Wolf, Christa: Cassandra Complete Resources: https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/ CHAPTERS 00:00 The Morning After 04:36 Intro Theme 05:11 Cassandra, You Shifty Rabble Rouser 11:18 The Medial Woman 15:47 Privilege and the Apollonian Collective 20:31 The “Anti-Epic Hero” 25:10 Still Anxious 31:02 Methods of Repair: Neurath’s Boat 35:32 Closing Credits === New to Literary Nomads? Check out my introductory episodes (0.1-0.3) to find out what’s going on here! I’ve got an episode for readers, for teachers, and for students: https://waywordsstudio.com/podcasts/waywords-podcast/ Have a Question? Literary Nomads Mailbag: https://forms.gle/WKGp1YWrazNZ3TLt8 Transcript: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/transcript/6-22-cassandra-uncertain-steps === Literary Nomads is the primary program of Waywords Studio (https://waywordsstudio.com). The podcast posts new material each week, with thought-provoking examinations of literature around selected questions or themes and several smaller supplemental episodes in between the larger programs: history, writing, and contemporary applications of ideas. Visit us for expanded resources for guests and the Waywords community, for other programs and writing, and for opportunities to support our goal to expand reading. Resources available can include full bibliographies of material referenced, full and partial texts, annotated editions, supplemental and expanded episodes, fictional explorations, teaching and learning resources, additional essays, and online courses. Website: https://waywordsstudio.com Newsletter: https://waywordsstudio.kit.com/ Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, and LinkedIn: @WaywordsStudio CREDITS: Original music by Randon Myles (https://randonmyles.com/) Chapter headings by Natalie Harrison and Sarah Skaleski USING THIS WORK: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is open to be used and adapted for all not-for-profit uses with proper attribution. MLA CITATION: Chisnell, Steve. “6.22 Cassandra: Uncertain Steps,” Literary Nomads. Waywords Studio, 09 January 2026, https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/.

  19 Dec 2025 Episode 6.20 – The Great Societies: Lowry’s The Giver Another thorny utopia, Lowry’s Community practices a different kind of strategy to the Hideous Bargain: ethical evasion, a too tempting strategy for all of us. Political? Yes. But also a YA fantasy vision of what some of the latest writers and thinkers believe we’re doing already. Texts from this episode: Lois Lowry, The Giver, 1993 Rabih Alameddine, Comforting Myths, 2024 Omar El Akkad, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, 2025 Complete Resources: https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/ CHAPTERS 00:00 Choosing Ugliness 05:45 Intro Theme 06:19 Evasion Modeling 11:40 Meaning and Politics in The Giver 20:58 Price Tags for Blissful Ignorance 25:00 At Stake: The Sanitation of Memory 33:30 Where To? 36:44 Closing Credits === New to Literary Nomads? Check out my introductory episodes (0.1-0.3) to find out what’s going on here! I’ve got an episode for readers, for teachers, and for students: https://waywordsstudio.com/podcasts/waywords-podcast/ Have a Question? Literary Nomads Mailbag: https://forms.gle/WKGp1YWrazNZ3TLt8 Transcript: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/transcript/6-20-the-great-societies-the-giver/ === Literary Nomads is the primary program of Waywords Studio (https://waywordsstudio.com). The podcast posts new material each week, with thought-provoking examinations of literature around selected questions or themes and several smaller supplemental episodes in between the larger programs: history, writing, and contemporary applications of ideas. Visit us for expanded resources for guests and the Waywords community, for other programs and writing, and for opportunities to support our goal to expand reading. Resources available can include full bibliographies of material referenced, full and partial texts, annotated editions, supplemental and expanded episodes, fictional explorations, teaching and learning resources, additional essays, and online courses. Website: https://waywordsstudio.com Newsletter: https://waywordsstudio.kit.com/ Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, and LinkedIn: @ Waywords Studio CREDITS: Original music by Randon Myles (https://randonmyles.com/) Chapter headings by Natalie Harrison and Sarah Skaleski USING THIS WORK: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is open to be used and adapted for all not-for-profit uses with proper attribution. MLA CITATION: Chisnell, Steve. “6.20 The Great Societies: Lowry’s The Giver,” Literary Nomads. Waywords Studio, 19 Dec 2025, https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/.

  5 Dec 2025 Episode 6.18 – Is All Art Political? The Great Societies, Pt. 1: Metropolis It seems everything is politics these days. But at least can’t we keep art pure? You know, art for art’s sake? I offer my thoughts on the topic while we examine the classic silent film, Metropolis (1927). In the process, we discuss an indigenous protest against American Art, the nature of ideology, an opening definition of a Great Society, and the four areas of inquiry we must pursue to answer the question, “Is All Art Political?” The Author’s Intention The Text Itself The Context Around the Text The Reader’s Thinking This Part 1 considers the first of these by asking what we know about the creators of the German silent film; Part 2 will look at the next three approaches. Some links to items mentioned: An Indigenous Takeover of the MET: https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/an-indigenous-takeover-of-the-met-asks-who-should-be-writing-art-history-1234757699/ Metropolis (1927): https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFzHH9EL9x0 Complete Resources: https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/ CHAPTERS 00:00 Great Garden Walls 09:03 Intro Theme 09:38 Framing the Talk 19:18 Some Metropolis Backstory 29:58 Harbou and Lang: Artist’s Intent 37:30 Author Trouble 48:38 Where This Leaves Us 52:49 Closing Credits === New to Literary Nomads? Check out episode 5.00 to find out what we’re all about: https://waywordsstudio.com/podcasts/waywords_podcast/an-introduction-and-irony/ Have a Question? Literary Nomads Mailbag: https://forms.gle/WKGp1YWrazNZ3TLt8 Transcript: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/transcript/6-18-the-great-societies-pt-1/ === Literary Nomads is the primary program of Waywords Studio (https://waywordsstudio.com). The podcast posts new material each week, with thought-provoking examinations of literature around selected questions or themes and several smaller supplemental episodes in between the larger programs: history, writing, and contemporary applications of ideas. Visit us for expanded resources for guests and the Waywords community, for other programs and writing, and for opportunities to support our goal to expand reading. Resources available can include full bibliographies of material referenced, full and partial texts, annotated editions, supplemental and expanded episodes, fictional explorations, teaching and learning resources, additional essays, and online courses. Website: https://waywordsstudio.com Newsletter: https://waywordsstudio.kit.com/ Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, and LinkedIn: @ Waywords Studio CREDITS: Original music by Randon Myles (https://randonmyles.com/) Chapter headings by Natalie Harrison and Sarah Skaleski USING THIS WORK: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is open to be used and adapted for all not-for-profit uses with proper attribution. MLA CITATION: Chisnell, Steve. “6.18 Is All Art Political? The Great Societies, Pt. 1: Metropolis,” Literary Nomads. Waywords Studio, 5 Dec 2025, https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/.

  21 Nov 2025 Episode 6.16 – Poe: Horror, Pathology, and the Necessity for Care *NOTE: While nothing explicit or graphic is named in this episode, it does touch upon difficult and challenging psychological topics, so it is not recommended for those sensitive to violence and war. We say Poe has influence the genre of horror, but have we really considered what that influence has revealed to us across the generations? What happens when we tell stories of a culture that has abandoned its moral foundations? In this episode, I reflect on the role of horror as a cultural mirror or cultural alarm, that current trends away from the good-evil binary offer a unique consequence for us, and that Poe understood it. We also look at Adriana Cavarero’s idea of “horrorism” and how it fits itself to our reading. Some links to items mentioned: My review of Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/reviews/the-mysteries-of-udolpho-by-ann-radcliffe/ My blog series of zombies and Army of the Dead: https://waywordsstudio.com/essay/zzsg-ch1-identification/ Complete Resources: https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/ CHAPTERS 00:00 Listener Advisory 00:37 RomZom 05:39 Opening Theme 06:14 The Sociology of Horror 17:18 Our 19th Nervous Breakdown 32:11 The Aesthetic of a Hideous Bargain 42:07 Beyond Madness 47:46 Strenuous Moods 50:09 Closing Credits === New to Literary Nomads? Check out episode 5.00 to find out what we’re all about: https://waywordsstudio.com/podcasts/waywords_podcast/an-introduction-and-irony/ Have a Question? Literary Nomads Mailbag: https://forms.gle/WKGp1YWrazNZ3TLt8 Transcript: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/transcript/6-16-poe-horror-pathology === Literary Nomads is the primary program of Waywords Studio (https://waywordsstudio.com). The podcast posts new material each week, with thought-provoking examinations of literature around selected questions or themes and several smaller supplemental episodes in between the larger programs: history, writing, and contemporary applications of ideas. Visit us for expanded resources for guests and the Waywords community, for other programs and writing, and for opportunities to support our goal to expand reading. Resources available can include full bibliographies of material referenced, full and partial texts, annotated editions, supplemental and expanded episodes, fictional explorations, teaching and learning resources, additional essays, and online courses. Website: https://waywordsstudio.com Newsletter: https://waywordsstudio.kit.com/ Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, and LinkedIn: @ Waywords Studio CREDITS: Original music by Randon Myles (https://randonmyles.com/) Chapter headings by Natalie Harrison and Sarah Skaleski USING THIS WORK: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is open to be used and adapted for all not-for-profit uses with proper attribution. MLA CITATION: Chisnell, Steve. “6.16 Poe: Horror, Pathology, and the Necessity for Care,” Literary Nomads. Waywords Studio, 21 Nov 2025, https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/.