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EconTalk

Zach Weinersmith on Beowulf and Bea Wolf

EconTalk

Library of Economics and Liberty

Ethics, Philosophy, Economics, Books, Science, Business, Courses, Social Sciences, Society & Culture, Interviews, Education, History

4.74.3K Ratings

🗓️ 13 March 2023

⏱️ 63 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Tolkien read it as a tale about mortality. The poet David Whyte said it was a metaphor for the psychological demons deep in our minds. And that, insists the cartoonist and writer Zach Weinersmith, is precisely Beowulf's appeal: Its richness opens the door to endless interpretation. Listen as the author of Bea Wolf, a graphic novel for children based on the Old English poem, speaks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about poetry in general, Beowulf in particular, whether we should require students to memorize poems, and the value of stories for children even without a moral lesson.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics

0:07.0

and Liberty.

0:08.0

I'm your host, Russ Roberts of Shalem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover

0:13.0

Institution.

0:14.0

Go to econtalk.org where you can subscribe, comment on this episode and find links down

0:18.6

the information related to today's conversation.

0:21.6

You'll also find our archives with every episode we've done going back to 2006.

0:26.8

Our email address is mail at econtalk.org.

0:30.2

We'd love to hear from you.

0:33.8

Today is February 16, 2023 and my guest is cartoonist and author Zach Wiener-Smet.

0:43.8

He is the creator of the webcomic Saturday morning breakfast cereal.

0:47.0

This is his second appearance on econ talk.

0:50.0

He was last year in January 2018 talking about his book Sunish.

0:54.5

Zach, welcome back to econ talk.

0:57.6

It is very exciting to be here.

0:59.6

Our topic for today is a bit unusual.

1:02.5

You have a book coming out called Bia Wolfe two words, first word, Bia, as in a short

1:08.6

version of the name Beatrice.

1:10.0

Second word, wolf, as in the animal.

1:12.4

Bia Wolfe, I'm excited to say that right now it hasn't come out yet, but it is the number

1:18.7

one release in children's Norse literature.

1:23.7

That's right.

...

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