Robert Harrison is a great host, clear enunciation of classic quotes and historical events and curiosity about the thoughts of his guests. His love of the ancient world is great. He should talk more about Ireland! He’s mentioned a few tomes he is an Irish Catholic american, but mostly focuses on ancient Greek ideas, French enlightenment philosophers, Rumi… I love all these episodes, but they are distant in time and space, if not in relevance to minds and hearts today. Thanks, Prof. Harrison

Continue to love the podcast! The discussions are infused with poetry and lyricism…

Especially love the episodes on works of literature, which are so much better than other podcasts. I often save episodes and listen more than once in order to absorb all the insights. Also look forward to the musical segments played at the beginning and end. Normally I would not be attracted to obscure music, but these segments are mesmerizing.

The insights and cultural gems make my mind and soul feel fat and happy.

…is your prerequisite. Fascinating, so far. I will keep investigating. Werner Herzog, Peregrine episode, in interview…terrible fidelity and mono. What gives? STANFORD?! Certainly they could spring for better in this domain. The standard has moved…it’s higher. Let the listening experience be a pleasant one.

Arrives unpredictably, but always worth the wait for lucid and often poetic insights on our culture. The musical interludes deserve their own 5 stars.

Dr. Harrison is an original thinker that isn’t afraid to challenge his listeners with new idea. His guests are always fascinating and bring a rich perspective to the conversation.

Incredible podcast! Robert's monologues are an emotional time machine to the most joyful days of my academic being. Thank you.

The egotistical attitude the host has and the too loud, too long intro music are the main issues of this podcast

I've learned quite a bit from this podcast. I've learned in listening to both the questions and the answers. Handles philisophical and artistic topics with understanding and inisght. The Hans Sluga interview right after the 2016 election was something I wish the nation could have heard or understood. And legendary last interview with Richard Rorty.

Robert Harrison’s trenchant discussion of the beauty and meaning found in the literature of life’s deepest desires, nuanced needs (including their much richer and more complicated ordinariness) and often complex qualities, aspects, and distinctions, raise this podcast above most others. His enthusiasm for the fun that’s found through interviews and reading great books belies a concern for what’s missing amid the popularly political and intensely conflictual media discourse and provides a different picture from what we tend to think is the case. Harrison’s captivatingly plain (and paradoxically simple) discussion of ideas and the importance books play in providing depth and meaning to our daily existence (as well as the permission to question what it all means) gives a sense and sort of corrective to the perspective and complex identity we hold of ourselves and the purpose of this all too human condition. Simply put, it is an eminently listenable and compelling podcast.

Robert Harrison shares his love for humanities education in artful and erudite conversations with leading thinkers from Stanford and around the world. Harrison, with his engaging radio voice, invites the listener to a modern day salon where ideas are examined and challenged with rapt curiosity and valuable literary and philosophical context.

Excellently engaging, enlightened shows, topics, and conversations. The best of what a podcast can be.

This podcast is a delicious banquet of bread.

I cannot say how wonderful it has been to have this podcast during this pandemic.

It seems like the last vestiges of civilized society appear on this show. I like the music, the hosts voice, the witty interludes. Can we hang out irl? I am very concerned in seeing the word “hiatus” - how long?

Consistently the best podcast of its type; manages to make the esoteric accessible to the uninitiated across a broad range of topics. But where is the deep dive on late stage Picasso? No Italian modernist discussion; Morandi, Savinio....

Brilliant !

V grateful for this show and its straightforward approach to the many dimensions of life. From the (very intense) theme song to the dramatic opening monologue to the sometimes heated conversations about very interesting topics...an engaging lively and informative podcast. Thanks Robert!

I don’t remember exactly how I discovered this, but I think it was while searching Apple Podcasts for a term like "Martin Heidegger" about a year ago; not the most common podcast search term. Too bad I have more or less run out of old episodes by now! This is an excellent podcast/radio show. Robert Harrison's passion and intellectual rigor really come through. He affects a kind of highbrow arrogance (as implied by the show title), as opposed to the common podcast-style informality, but it comes off as charming, because there's a seriousness and depth behind it to back it up. Those episodes that are on a subject that he has more personal expertise in are the most engaging. A show like this makes you wonder how many (hundreds?) of other college professors there are out there that are talented communicators and could potentially inform thousands of listeners out in cyberspace if they chose to share their knowledge in podcast form, rather than saving it only for the classroom.

So much to explore and marvel at as one seeks to lift the cover!

Can’t recommend this show enough

Incredible podcast; nothing out there like it! Rober Harrison is a genius and an amazing mind. Thank you for creating content that matters!

A thought provoking, erudite journey through the annals of classical literature, art, music and philosophy. Professor Harrison’s sprawling knowledge will impress, even as the topics and discussions remain generally accessible and entertaining. Not to be missed.

Period. This is a gem must listen to show. expand your horizon, mind, knowledge and intellectual prowess on a journey through time, music and philosophy.

that entitled opinions averages 4.5 (it should be 5). this podcast sets the standard for philosophy and literature podcasts, maybe podcasts in general, maybe public literature media in general. harrisons dante/heidegger rich background means he takes such a multi-layered response to each/monologue. he's not afraid to disagree with his guests, so there are real discussions (these aren't simple interviews). i cant say enough good things. usually i would point to a few great episodes, but for entitled, there are probably thirty to forty truly great ones.

I have been looking for something like this for years only to find it’s been here all along!

Thank you for coming back. I feel smarter each time I listen to one of your podcasts.

Robert gets to the heart and depth of the topic quickly and stays in that zone where the conversation moves effortlessly from point to point, depth to depth with lively, poignant and incisive questions and smooth, warm vocal delivery. As with almost all academics, however, his extremist liberal inculcation precludes him from offering a truly authentic ‘opinion’ when it comes to matters relating to politics. Other than that there’s is no better show on the net for depth, great topics, and great production. He is very very thoughtful, insightful, and very well-spoken.

Awesome interview with Maxwell. Loved his sweetness and humility. Looking forward to future episodes! Great job

For years this has been my favorite podcast. Incredible range of topics, intelligent and thoughtful guests -- a real antidote to what passes for discourse these days. Truly a pleasure. Would I change anything? Well, I'd like more new episodes! But then again, there are still so many shows to go back to and re-listen and find new and engaging ideas.

One of the most thoughtful and well thought out podcasts

I've only recently discovered this great podcast. Stanford University Professor Harrison combines hip and insightful rock and roll deconstruction with meditations on Humanity's greatest minds. One show on Pink Floyd, and then one on Foucault; One show on Jimi Hendrix, and then another on Hegel; or maybe Dante, Elliot, Margaret Fuller, Keats, Thoreau. As a working guy living far from any great university, it's gratifying to have access to these talks. Thankfully, the several years backlog of programing enables to me to be able to listen to them daily. Sometimes Harrison feels like he could be a brother from whom I was separated at birth, but was able both play in a rock band and teach Italian Renaissance literature at Stanford. Get this material out there to us within the masses is important work. From the bottom of my heart, thank-you Robert.

What a magnificent display of the adventurous life of the mind!

There are many shows like this one, where you really want to listen to them because the topics and guests are really interesting, but the host is an insufferable, pseudo-intellectual d-bag.

This is the show that got me listening to podcasts. A fellow grad school student suggested I check out the episodes on Heidegger while we were both taking a seminar on him. Those episodes are pure gold, but I always find that when I think I'll be least interested in the subject of the episode, I end up fascinated. And I'll always be in Harrison's debt for introducing me to Orhan Pamuk.

Best podcast since Plato.

I met Robert in the early 90s over a proposed radio show for public radio show that ended up not being funded, and I remember thinking his approach to the topics before him (at that time the brilliant Forests book) is as a guide amid the thorns of academic research to find gems of understanding of human experience to benefit us all. It would have been perfect for that show. So, it makes me very glad to discover his podcast and that he found radio to share his needed insights.

Mr. Harrison, with his smooth cadence and avuncular charm, is one of the brightest and most interesting voices in podcasting. Each show is a gem, but I especially adore his forays into classic literature and philosophy. The episodes on Nietzsche and Heidegger are required listening for anyone who admires their work. As a humanities and philosophy instructor, listening to EO is an essential part of my class prep routine.

Every episode will make you smarter.

This is the best podcast I've ever encountered. It is enlightening, educational, intellectual, spiritual, scientific, artistic. It is an exquisite feast for the mind.

This is, by far, the most intellectually stimulating podcast around. One need only glance over the episode titles. The range of topics and depth in which they're discussed can not be bested.

Nothing new in 2013? Can't wait for your return Professor Harrison.

Is the show coming back? Is it dead? I miss it. I need it. I still have questions.

Even on a limited listening list, this show is always necessary.

My favorite podcast. Keep up the excellent work professor harrison.

I wish someone would go through this and edit out Robert, leaving just the guests, who are often fascinating. Robert is pretentious, not very well informed, and grates horrendously.

keep em coming

I look forward to each podcast. the subjects are as interesting as the fluid perspective and power to verbally illustrate associations which are stimulating.

I am grateful that a few years ago, Robert Harrison jumped into this podcast pond and starting swimming and thinking and sharing with us. So much of media today is produced and packaged out even when there is not much, if anything, substantive to say. The real test of a podcast, like a book, is whether you come back to it again and again. I have listened to some of these podcasts several times. Moreover, I have been enthralled by subjects and people I would not have bothered with or were intellectually prejudiced against; that alone is a great gift that this show has given me. p.s. some of these iTunes reviews are very old. everything about the show has gotten better and better. p.p.s. I now like all things Stanford because they give this intellectual podcast their own big field to play on!