Hello, and welcome to the back of the book.

I'm your host, Christopher Scalia of the American Enterprise Institute.

As you know, loyal listeners,

this podcast is a sort of audio version of a magazine's back pages where you find the real good stuff, essays about literature and culture, reviews of books and film, travelogues, and

humor pieces. At its best, such writing transcends the news and

controversies of the moment, the stuff you find in the front of the magazine, and

steers readers toward more enduring conversations. These pages aren't about escapism, but perspective.

Brooke Allen is a common presence in those back pages, a master of the book review and

literary essay. She's been called, quote, one of the country's finest literary essayists,

scrupulous, discerning, utterly direct, and at the same time, always surprising.

Her writings have appeared in the new criterion, the Wall Street Journal, the Hudson Review,

the New York Times, the Atlantic, and the nation.

She has a Ph.D. in English from Columbia University and has taught literature at Bennington

College and History of Thought in the school's prison education initiative.

Her latest book is Good Bones, Glorious Relics from the Age of Reading, published by Tivoli Books.

She joins the podcast to talk about that collection, as well as the passing of the age of reading and the emergence

of what she calls a post-literate society.

Brooke, welcome to the back of the book.

Thank you.

Well, as I told you just a minute ago before we started recording, I've been a big fan of

your reviews for a long time, and it's a pleasure to speak to you, if not in person, at least online.

And congratulations on the publication of Good Bones.

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