Shape-shifting with thieves and serpents, as Dante looks on in horror – but also brags about his superlative poetic talent, able to describe things never before attempted. You are invited to attend the latest episode of Evening under Lamplight.
Dante and Virgil descend to the level of the hypocrites, who shuffle painfully around in an endless circle, weighed down with cloaks golden on the outside but leaden within. We look at various aspects of hypcrisy, including Jekyll and Hyde, Dylan, actors, and all sorts of role-players. You are invited to attend.
We follow Dante and Virgil to the ditch where the grafters writhe submerged below boiling pitch, or, if they rise above the surface for some relief, they run the danger of being ripped apart by sadistic devils. It’s every creature for itself around here, with fraud, deceit, double-crossing creating a scene that mixes both vivid torture with slap-stick comedy. We try to make it all come alive, and you’re invited to attend.
In this episode, Dante enters the area of the sorcerers, wizards, magicians – all twisted – and we play around with all this twisted imagery, including a true story of when your host was put under a real spell, and was robbed right on the streets of London: a tale of real-life evil spell-casting. You are invited to attend – to the show, not the spell-casting, of course.
We continue with Dante at the ditch of the seducers, with songs about seduction, including the seduction gone wrong in “Paradise by the Dashboard Light”, and a Southern Gothic story by Flannery O’Connor about a seduction that goes even more wrong, with surprising results. And there’s the first public playing of a new song by Rukeia. You are invited to attend.
At the half-way point through Dante’s Inferno we meet the Seducers and the Pimps, whipped by horned demons in endless circles. We look at a few examples in song: Don Giovanni, of course, and three seduction songs by *Sir* Ray Davies (pictured), two by Smokey Robinson, one by the Rolling Stones, and one or two others. You are invited to attend.
Dante meets Geryon, the image of Fraud, and takes flight upon the monster’s back. We also bring in the story of Arachne, the spider-woman (in ways you might not have considered before). And special guests in the studio, Andrew AB, and Biff Roxby, who speaks about his record label, Debt Records, and gives us some worthy commentary on the music. At the end, we hear Biff on trombone in two songs by Louis Barabbas and the Bedlam Six. You are invited to attend.
Our topic this week is “Erotic Gifts and Sterile Gifts” – but it’s not what you think. Dante’s experience on the Burning Sands of the Inferno can show us how our gifts should be fruitful, and attractive, not selfish and barren. With the usual varied musical selections from Fraggle Rock, Kinky Friedman, the Kinks, the Lovin’ Spoonful, as well as Private Eye, Bach, the Carter Family and Anne Sylvestre. You are invited to attend.
As we enter the Advent Season, aware of the darkness growing around us, but aware too that the Light comes to us through this darkness, we reflect on whether to go gentle into that good night (pausing to visit one of the inmates of Dante’s Inferno, who refuses to go gentle, refuses even to acknowledge that it’s dark), and we spend time celebrating the legacy of Leonard Cohen, that voice of courage who knew that even the darkness has cracks and that’s how the light gets in. You are invited to attend.
To celebrate episode 150, we’ve given Dante a rest and just play around with some songs and verses. But it’s a muted celebration, as the American election results came in just as we were planning the show. Join our community for something that will touch you, and, I hope, also uplift you. You are invited to attend.
