ARTIDOTE

📍Join Odyssey Read-Along https://armenikus.substack.com/p/join-the-odyssey-read-along-may-july📍 Substack: https://armenikus.substack.com📍 Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/cw/armenikus If you want to start reading The Odyssey, understand Homer’s epic more deeply, or prepare for Christopher Nolan’s upcoming adaptation, this conversation is one of the best places to begin. In this episode of the A...

In this eye-opening conversation, we sit down with Alina Verbenchuk — entrepreneur, product leader, former YouTube and Google product expert, and co-founder of the music-industry technology platform Korda — to unpack a question that affects us all: How do platforms actually shape our world, and how can we use them without being used by them?   Alina’s new book, How Platforms Work , takes us inside...

Hello friends,In this episode of The Artidote Podcast, I speak with Gregory Jusdanis and Peter Jeffreys, authors of Alexandrian Sphinx: The Life of C.P. Cavafy — the first major biography of one of the twentieth century’s greatest poets. Together we explore the hidden life behind the polished verse:how Cavafy transformed loneliness into art, guarded his privacy while pursuing immortality, and re-i...

Willpower will define whether your ideas become real or die in your mind. How to Have Willpower is a book about what makes the difference between ideas that die in our heads and the few that become life. In this episode, Vashik Armenikus speaks to Michael Fontaine , classicist at Cornell University and translator of How to Have Willpower: An Ancient Guide to Not Giving In . Together we ask a pract...

How do you survive the court of a tyrant? In this interview, classicist Dr. James Romm discusses his book Dying Every Day: Seneca at the Court of Nero—a gripping portrait of Stoic philosophy stress-tested inside imperial power. We explore Seneca’s survival strategies as Nero’s adviser: what he taught, what he compromised, and what we can learn about living under volatile authority today. You’ll l...

Dr. John Sellars is a lecturer in philosophy at Royal Holloway, University of London, and is a leading expert in ancient philosophy, with a particular focus on Stoicism. In this interview, we'll be delving into the ancient philosophy of Stoicism, discussing its relevance to modern life, and exploring how we can apply its teachings to our daily lives. We'll also be discussing Sellars's books, "Less...

Ruth Millington’s wonderful book uncovers the hidden figures behind art history’s masterpieces. We tend to forget that each great artist, whether from the past or present, has their own unique muse who inspires them, gives them energy and influences their creativity. For Picasso it was Dora Maar; for Rodin it was Camille Claudel; for Frida Kahlo it was her illness. Those muses had a significant im...

In this episode, Adriana Barton - a journalist and former staff reporter at Canada's national newspaper, The Globe and Mail - tells Vashik Armenikus how we can get reconnected with the healing powers of music.  She tells us about the power of music by combining medical studies, discoveries by pioneering neuroscientists, and research from biology and anthropology. She also tells us her persona...

In this episode Vashik Armenikus sits down with philosopher David Fideler, who wrote a brilliant book called Breakfast with Seneca. Seneca was a stoic philosopher who is widely recognised as the most humane writer of the Stoic tradition. He teaches us to live with freedom and purpose. In  Breakfast with Seneca , David Fideler explores Seneca’s ideas in a series of focused chapters, clearly ex...

Rumi was a 13th-century Persian poet whose wisdom continues to echo and inspire souls around the world.  Every person who has read at least a single line written by Rumi knows that his verse can heal one's heart.  We wouldn't have known about Rumi and these mystical powers if not for talented translators like Haleh Liza Gafori. Her recent beautiful translation of Rumi's poetry 'Gold' was...

How to lead a meaningful life?  How can we lead a good life and enjoy happiness in a world without a providential God? "In Think Least of Death , Pulitzer Prize–finalist Steven Nadler connects Spinoza’s ideas with his life and times to offer a compelling account of how the philosopher can provide a guide to living one’s best life." All the show notes  👉 https://artidote.uk/episodes/stev...

Stalin was an avid and voracious reader. In his recent book, Professor Geoffrey Roberts tells us about the life of Joseph Stalin through the books that the dictator read, collected, annotated, and banned. This book draws an extraordinary vivid portrait of Stalin as an intellectual who could never satiate his curiosity; who ardently believed in ideas; and who believed in mysterious powers of readin...

This episode’s guest is Rachel Corbett , the author of a brilliant book called You Must Change Your Life, which tells the story of the brief and intense relationship between renowned sculptor Auguste Rodin and the poet Rainer Maria Rilke. In 1902, Rainer Maria Rilke was a delicate young visitor from Prague in Paris , he was broke and suffering from writer’s block. He was commissioned to write a bo...

Exercise is our modern obsession. The way we choose to exercise can tell us so much about our culture, our ambition or our mindset. Ancient Greeks, for example, used to discuss philosophy at their gyms and believed that the intelligence of the mind needs to be in equilibrium with the fitness of the body. In this wonderful book, ‘Sweat: A History of Exercise’, Bill Hayes explores the different ways...

In our age of immediacy John Ruskin’s ideas remain important more than ever. He can teach us how to see beauty, how to gain control over attention span and how to genuinely care about nature. He was a visionary who predicted many of the challenges we are facing today, such as climate change and culture of distraction. Through his writings we can learn how to become better and live in harmony with...

In this interview Ruth Scurr tells me about Napoleon’s relationship with gardens throughout his life. Napoleon was interested in botany and tending gardens satisfied his inherent scientific curiosity.  However, Napoleon also viewed gardens as a space for reflection and where he could have deep philosophical conversations with his peers. Paul Valéry wrote that it ‘is a pity to see a mind as Na...

Hiking with Nietzsche is a tale of two philosophical journeys in the Swiss Alps: one made by John Kaag as an introspective teenager, the other seventeen years later in radically different circumstances - as a husband and father with his wife and small child in tow.  Kaag travels to the peaks above Sils Maria where Nietzsche routinely summered, and where he wrote his mysterious landmark work, Thus...

This is a story about Florentine manuscript hunters. A group of people who travelled across Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries in search of lost ancient works on philosophy and literature. At the centre of this story is a man who is often referred to as ‘Michelangelo of bookselling’. His name is Vespasiano da Bisticci. The most powerful figures across Europe came to him when they needed to find...

In this interview the Italian pianist Federico Albanese tells about his inspirations from writers such as Virginia Woolf to film-makers like Terrence Malick. He also tells about his latest collaborative EP with Tara Nome Doyle. You can find Federico's EP and all the references of the episode here : https://artidote.uk/episodes/federico-albanese You can listen to EP on our playlist on Spotify. Subs...

Everyone perceives Japan in their own unique way. Everyone ‘invents’ their own Japan as Oscar Wilde said in his essay ‘The Decay of Lying’. In this episode Matt Alt - the author of a brilliant book ‘ Pure Invention: How Japan’s Pop Culture Conquered the World ’ - tells the story behind the unique products such as anime, manga, video games or karaoke. Matt lives in Tokyo since 2003 and runs a local...

In this interview Vashik Armenikus speaks to Professor Nicholas McDowell, the author of a recent biography of the poet John Milton .  In his groundbreaking biography, Prof. McDowell explores the formative years of John Milton and what led to the creation of the greatest narrative poem in English language - Paradise Lost. Subscribe to my newsletter for more: http://eepurl.com/he7YKD Profe...

In the 7th episode of the ARTIDOTE podcast, Vashik Armenikus speaks with the Austrian photographer Stefan Draschan.  Stefan is an award winning photographer and author of the ‘Reflections on Art’ photography series.  In this interview he talks about his journey to becoming photographer after first working as a music journalist.  He also shares his favourite masterpieces of cinematog...

In October 2018, I attended a concert by a German pianist Martin Kohlstedt held here in London. It was one of the most atmospheric concerts that I can remember in my life. In this interview Martin told me about his hometown, about the role that subconscious plays in creation of his  music and about his connection with trees and why he calls himself 'a child of the forest'. Subscribe to my new...

I wanted to meet the award-winning street artist Alice Pasquini since 2015, that was when I accidentally stumbled upon her work on Brick Lane in London. I instantly fell in love with her art. In this episode, she told me about her journey to becoming street-artist. She told me about the most dangerous countries in the world to be a street artist; we talked about what influences her and what is it...

Donald Robertson is a cognitive behavioural psychotherapist and author of a great book called How to Think Like a Roman Emperor. In this episode he tells Vashik Armenikus about different techniques that Marcus Aurelius - the Roman Emperor and the author of Meditations - used to cope with stress, anger and anxiety. He also shared his practical experience of how he applied various strategies used by...