The Road To Now

I had a great time guest starring on the brilliant The Road to Now podcast, with my old friend Ben Sawyer and the very smart, fun, and famous Bob Crawford of the Avett Brothers!

We dig into my book, and the difficulties of finding fulfilment in modern academia.

Here’s the show notes from their website:

Bob and Ben speak with Jon Waterlow about his new book It’s Only a Joke Comrade! Humor, Trust and Everyday Life Under Stalin and the role humor plays in helping humans make sense of the world in even the darkest times. Jon also shares his take on humor’s role in politics under Stalin and today, the process he went through to uncover these jokes, and how the artistic technique of crosshatching helps us understand what it was like to live under the Stalinist system. He also discusses his decision to forego publishing his book with an academic publisher and why he decided to leave a bright future in the academy to purse fulfillment elsewhere.