Lost in the Cosmos: Exploring Modernity and the Self with Walker Percy

“Why is it that of all the billions and billions of strange objects in the Cosmos - novas, quasars, pulsars, black holes - you are beyond doubt the strangest”

- Walker Percy Lost in the Cosmos

 

In this episode Rachel is joined by Shane Jenkins to discuss Walker Percy’s satirical self-help book Lost in the Cosmos. In this book Percy explores ideas of the self, as well as the problems of modernity, scientism, identity crisis, and the breakdown of meaning in the modern age. Lost is the Cosmos is a complex and often troubling book but it also contains many keen observations and humorous moments. 

 

Hosts: Rachel Sherlock, Shane Jenkins

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Music: Ashton Manor by Kevin MacLeod

 

Works Mentioned

Lost in the Cosmos by Walker Percy

The Moviegoer by Walker Percy

“Everything is Broken” Tablet by Alana Newhouse

Mystery and Manners by Flannery O’Connor

Thoughts after Lambeth by T.S. Eliot

“Is Pope Francis Anti-Modern?” The New Atlantis by M. Anthony Mills

 

What We’re Enjoying at the Moment

Shane: Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.

Notes from the Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Hippo Campus (band)

 

Rachel: Tickets to my Downfall by MGK (album)