Just a reminder that Big Mood, Little Mood with Daniel M. Lavery, happens twice week.

Slate Plus members get an additional, many episode or Little Big Mood every Friday.

Sign up now to listen at slate.com slash mood.

Hello and welcome back to Big Mood, Little Mood. I am your host, Danny M. Lavery, and with me in

the studio this week is Wendy Lee, an associate professor in English department at New York University.

She studies and writes about the history of the novel and philosophies of emotions and is

currently working on a new book called Jane Austen and the End of Life. Wendy, welcome to the show.

Thank you, Danny. Welcome to your own podcast.

I am so looking forward to this. We have been discussing this possibility for some time now,

and I am just so, so eager to get a chance to collaborate on some emotional philosophies.

And I'm especially eager to hear a little bit about this new project that you're working on

because I confess I love this title very, very much. Well, I am so excited to be here that I

cleaned my entire apartment for talking to you because it just felt like the right preparation.

I was going to say because you were worried that I would see it or was it because I'm just so

excited I need to put this energy into a chore. I think it weirdly was both. I felt like you were

coming over and also I had to do something with my energy, but I've also been listening to Big

Mood, Little Mood, and I'm really honored to be here at such an important podcast and thing you're

doing. And I told Delia, my daughter, this morning, and she said, why are you on it? You give the

worst advice. And I thought, that's probably true. And also, I'm just an English professor and people

in books make terrible choices. And that's why it's literature. So I'm going to do my best, but I'm

not going to be as good I think as you're the guests that I've heard who aren't giving

techable advice. I am absolutely not going to join you in announcing that you are already doing

...