{"podcast":{"title":"Ascend - The Great Books Podcast","slug":"ascend-the-great-books-podcast-6733379","podcast_index_feed_id":6733379,"rss_url":"https://feeds.captivate.fm/ascend-the-great-book/","website_url":"https://ascend-the-great-book.captivate.fm","image_url":"https://artwork.captivate.fm/91cb8b50-c0b7-49d8-9476-279514463e73/TfaX-DfFN1GQWT2CL2LiBMBS.png","author":"Harrison Garlick and Adam Minihan","episode_count":151,"summary":"Welcome to Ascend! We are a weekly Great Books podcast hosted by Deacon Harrison Garlick and Adam Minihan. What are the Great Books? The Great Books are the most impactful texts that have shaped Western civilization. They include ancients like Homer, Plato, St. Augustine, Dante, and St. Thomas Aquinas, and also moderns like Machiavelli, Locke, and Nietzsche. We will explore the Great Books with the light of the Catholic intellectual tradition. Why should we read the Great Books? Everyone is a disciple of someone. A person may have never read Locke or Nietzsche, but he or she thinks like them. Reading the Great Books allows us to reclaim our intellect and understand the origin of the ideas that shape our world. We enter a \"great conversation\" amongst the most learned, intelligent humans in history and benefit from their insights. Is this for first-time readers? YES. Our goal is to host meaningful conversations on the Great Books by working through the texts in chronological order in a slow, attentive manner. Our host Adam Minihan is a first-time reader of Homer. We will start shallow and go deep. All are invited to join. Will any resources be available? YES. We are providing a free…","last_synced_at":"2026-09-16T04:18:19.709235+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ascend-the-great-books-podcast-6733379"},"episode":{"title":"Red Shadows: A Savage Tale of Solomon Kane with Alberto Fernandez","slug":"red-shadows-a-savage-tale-of-solomon-kane-with-alberto-fernandez","published_at":"2026-09-08T14:15:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ascend-the-great-books-podcast-6733379/red-shadows-a-savage-tale-of-solomon-kane-with-alberto-fernandez","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ascend-the-great-books-podcast-6733379","url":"http://mcidfrxn.podcastwebsites.com/episodes/red-shadows-a-savage-tale-of-solomon-kane-with-alberto-fernandez","audio_url":"https://episodes.captivate.fm/episode/33592428-a8f9-49cc-8ee8-23db5a94602f.mp3","summary":"Today on Ascend: The Great Books Podcast, Dcn. Garlick is joined by the always wonderful Alberto Fernandez to discuss \"Red Shadows,\" a salvage tale of Solomon Kane by Robert E. Howard. Check out our website for our reading schedule, articles, written guides, and more. Dcn. Garlick and Alberto discuss Robert E. Howard’s 1928 Solomon Kane tale “Red Shadows,” a pulp adventure chosen as a lively Short Story September “palette cleanser” after heavier classical reading. Howard (1906–1936), the Texas-born creator of Conan the Barbarian, produced hundreds of stories in a short life. Alberto first encountered him through the 1960s–70s Lancer paperbacks with Frank Frazetta covers. Kane, Howard’s only recurring explicitly Christian series character, is described as a grim Puritan-Cavalier mix with pagan and philosophical streaks—“God’s angry swordsman”—a remorseless wandering avenger who rights wrongs he encounters by chance. The story opens in the French countryside when Kane finds a dying young Catholic woman assaulted by bandits led by Le Loup (“the Wolf”). The stranger’s death prompts Kane’s vow that “Men shall die for this,” launching a relentless pursuit that takes him from France across Europe to the West African jungle. There the narrative juxtaposes Kane’s grim, driven sense of justice (he sees himself as a “vessel of wrath”) against Le Loup’s cynical evil, tribal politics, the witch-doctor N’Longa, voodoo, jungle drums, and “blood memory.” Unlike the mirthful, vitalistic Conan, Kane is cold and mysterious even to himself. The climax features a duel framed as cosmic justice versus injustice, followed by a second, primal coda in which a gorilla avenges his mate—showing that nature itself can enact justice and that Kane often needs allies to complete vengeance. Alberto hig…","meta_description":"Today on Ascend: The Great Books Podcast, Dcn. Garlick is joined by the always wonderful Alberto Fernandez to discuss \"Red Shadows,\" a salvage tale of Sol…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":3564,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/ascend-the-great-books-podcast-6733379/episodes/red-shadows-a-savage-tale-of-solomon-kane-with-alberto-fernandez/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ascend-the-great-books-podcast-6733379/red-shadows-a-savage-tale-of-solomon-kane-with-alberto-fernandez.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}