Series 3 Episode 6 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin and Clara Etherin.In the final ever episode of The Penteract Podcast, Anthony and Clara eat the hottest chili in the world, as they again take on First We Feast's hot wings challenge. Featuring special guest appearances from Tom Jenks, Christian Bök, Rachel Smith, Marian Christie, Moira Walsh, Richard Capener, and Franco Cortese. Check out First We Feast on YouTube and purchase the Hot Ones sauces here.Follow this podcast ...

Series 3 Episode 5 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with poet and mathematician Pedro Poitevin. Topics of conversation include the role of meaning in poetry and palindromes, definitions and redefinitions of the sonnet, politics and art, winning Roman coins at Palindrome Fight!, and finding sonnets in the genome of a cat. Purchase Nowhere at Home, Pedro's first English-language poetry collection, here. Follow this podcast on Twitter and...

Series 3 Episode 4 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with composer, poet, and YouTuber Samuel Andreyev. Topics of conversation include the benefits and difficulties of new media for composers and poets, the role of new technology in music and poetry, and the nature of 'authenticity' in art. Listen to Samuel's speech at the first ARC Forum here. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website...

Series 3 Episode 3 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. Happy Halloween! In this episode, Anthony and Clara speak with poet and Hem Press publisher Richard Capener about their mutual interest in horror movies. During the conversation, they run through Empire Magazine's 50 Best Horror Movies and discuss several recent movie discoveries. This is part two of the conversation begun in Episode 1 of this series. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract...

Series 3 Episode 2 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with poet, translator, and copywriter Moira Walsh. Topics of conversation include Moira's Enneract Editions chapbook Earthrise,  poetry as a therapeutic exercise, realistic idealism, and translating poetry. Purchase Earthrise from the Penteract Press Store. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website and its Twitter. And, if you like...

Series 3 Episode 1 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with poet and Hem Press publisher Richard Capener. Topics of conversation include current events in the independent poetry press community, the role of avantgarde art, politics in art, and the futures of Hem Press and Penteract Press, Part 2 of this conversation, a horror movie special, will air this October 31st. Check out Hem Press here. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover...

Series 2 Episode 18 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In the series 2 finale, Anthony and Clara steal a YouTube channel's idea and ask each other questions while eating increasingly spicy hot wings, ranging from 1,600 Scoville Heat Units to 2,000,000  Units. Topics of conversation include the state of the poetry industry, publishing with a punk rock ethos, and Clara's work in the food industry. Series 3 begins this autumn! Check out First We Feast on YouTube and...

Series 2 Episode 17 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with writer, copywriter, and poet Nick Asbury. Topics of conversation include the politics of the poetry world, concepts and constraints, songwriting, branding, self-directed learning, and authority. Check out https://asburyandasbury.com/, for examples of Nick's work in branding and details on his books, including Realtime Notes and Perpetual Disappointments Diary. Read Nick's Substack...

Series 2 Episode 16 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with Mick Hodgkin, limerick writer, crossword setter, and Puzzles Editor for The Times and The Sunday Times. To mark National Limerick Day 2023, Anthony and Mick discuss limerick form and its history, share some favourite limericks, and chat about Mick's topical limerick Twitter account Mick Twister.  Other topics of conversation include crossword clues, Ximenean and libertarian...

Series 2 Episode 15 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with visual artist, poet, and educator Laura Kerr. Topics of conversation include Laura's recent entry into the world of NFTs, AI-generated art and writing, conceptual art, Twitter Blue, seeing colours differently, and drawing hands.... Anthony and Laura also discuss "Mnemonic Trains" -- Laura's recent collaboration with Nick Piombino -- which will be published by Penteract Press in July...

Series 2 Episode 14 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin and Clara Daneri. To celebrate the 50th episode of The Penteract Podcast, Anthony (and, from 1.26:50, Clara) chats with the podcast's very first guest, Christian Bök. The questions in this episode are based on a series of polls conducted by Penteract Press's Twitter account, between March 2022 and February 2023. Questions include: Should any topic or style be off-limits to poets? Should we separate art from artist? Is...

Series 2 Episode 13 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony Etherin and Teo Eve discuss the history of the alphabet. Topics include hieroglyphs and the rebus principle; the evolution of letterforms; runes and lost letters; the impact of the printing press and of digital media; and the alphabet's future. Also discussed are Teo's Penteract Press books, The Ox House and I Imagine an Image (coming 2024), as well as their upcoming Beir Bua Press book On...

Series 2 Episode 12 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony meets Sasha Stiles, to discuss AI-generated poetry, NFTs, and Sasha's work with theVERSEverse. Topics include: poetry on the blockchain; the relationship between constrained poetry and AI-generated poetry;  Ray Kurzweil and transhumanism; and the future of poetry. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website and its Twitter. Support the show

Series 2 Episode 11 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with Lori Wike about puzzles, wordplay, and Lori's work as Principal Bassoon for the Utah Symphony Orchestra. Topics include inventing puzzles and poem forms, (not) solving Torquemada's Cain's Jawbone, the flow state, and the relationship between music and wordplay. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website and its Twitter. Support the...

Series 2 Episode 10 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony meets Jack Waley-Cohen, Co-founder of What3Words, Question Editor for the BBC' s Only Connect, and Co-owner of QuizQuizQuiz. Topics of conversation include TV quizzes, wordplay, entrepreneurship, and the success of the What3Words app.  Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website and its Twitter. Support the show

Series 2 Episode 9 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony and Marian Christie — author of Fractal Poems (Enneract Editions, 2021) and From Fibs to Fractals (Beir Bua Press, 2021) — discuss the relationship between mathematics and poetry, while making time to discuss their shared interest in cricket. Read "A Reminiscence of Cricket" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Discover the aelindrome here. Discover the aelinslice here. Discover the aelindivider...

Series 2 Episode 8 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin and Clara Daneri. In this episode, Anthony and Clara catch up with comedian, writer, and palindromist Mark Saltveit, to discuss Mark's career in stand-up. Topics of conversation include the comedy circuit, cancel culture, and Taoism. This episode has been recorded in anticipation of the Edinburgh Fringe show Palindrome Fight!, which will run from August 6th till August 28th. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover...

Series 2 Episode 7 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with Jane Espenson about her work as a writer on such shows as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Battlestar Galactica, and Once Upon a Time — other topics include conceptual metaphor, word games, literary wordplay, and ‘Buffy Speak’. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website and its Twitter. Support the show

Series 2 Episode 6 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with visual artist, poet, and educator Laura Kerr. Topics of conversation include process art, social media, galleries, books, and NFTs. Follow these links to see the art Laura is referring to, when discussing her process (towards the end of the...

Series 2 Episode 5 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. "Live! David Astle melts a diva devil!" "Decode! Lest David Astle decode!" In this episode, Anthony speaks with writer, presenter, and celebrated crossword setter David Astle. Topics of conversation include the crossword community, different approaches to crossword setting, and the obsessive pleasures of wordplay. Follow this podcast on Twitter and discover more about Penteract Press by visiting its website and its...

Series 2 Episode 4 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony speaks with Andrew Hugill, author of 'Pataphysics: A Useless Guide (MIT Press, 2012), and Christian Bök, author of 'Pataphysics: The Poetics of an Imaginary Science (Northwestern University Press, 2001). The three pataphysicians present an introduction to 'Pataphysics, discussing its origins in the work of Alfred Jarry, its meaning and definitions, its key principles, and its appearance...

Series 2 Episode 3 of The Penteract Podcast, presented by Anthony Etherin and featuring an interview with novelist and screenwriter Anthony Horowitz.  Topics of conversation include wordplay and structure, genre and tradition, and adapting novels for the screen. Alex Rider series one and two are currently available on IMDb Tv. Magpie Murders is currently available on BritBox. Listen to episodes of The Penteract Podcast on YouTube, and please consider subscribing to the channel. Follow this...

Series 2 Episode 2 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin, and featuring an interview with chess champion, artist, photographer, musician, poet, and palindromist Merlina Acevedo. In this episode, Anthony and Merlina discuss Merlina's experiences playing competitive chess. Topics include competing in Olympiads, playing Kasparov and Spassky, and Netflix's The Queen's Gambit. They also discuss their shared interests in music and palindromes. Listen to Merlina's band, LLT, on her...

Series 2 Episode 1 of The Penteract Podcast, hosted by Anthony Etherin. In this episode, Anthony meets Wall Street Journal lexicographer Ben Zimmer and Word Wars director Eric Chaikin. Together, Ben and Eric operate Beyond Wordplay, a platform dedicated to the art, science, and culture of words. Topics of conversation include the National Puzzler’s League; Scrabble and crossword tournaments; palindromes, anagrams, letter banks and lipograms; computational wordplay; lexicography; and the...