Weird Studies

Researcher Asti Hustvedt joins Phil and JF to discuss a talk she gave at the Lily Dale Symposium this year entitled "Bibliophantoms." The question: What does it mean to "get lost" in a book? Asti's answer, drawing on her research in nineteenth-century neuroscience and spirit mediumship, amounts to a genuine weirding of the act of reading.

Asti Hustvedt is an independent scholar and writer with a PhD in French
literature. Her work examines the entangled histories of science,
psychology, literature, and the occult, with a particular focus on
hysteria and Spiritualism. She is the author of Medical Muses: Hysteria in Nineteenth-Century Paris, named an Editors' Choice by the New York Times and a Book of the Year by The Independent, and the editor of The Decadent Reader: Fiction, Fantasy and Perversion in Fin-de-Siècle France.
She is currently writing a book on hysteria and the supernatural that
examines how Eusapia Palladino and other mediums challenged—and helped shape—the emerging sciences of the mind.

New Course! To learn more on JF's upcoming online course on truth in horror literature and cinema, visit Weirdosphere.

Image: Detail of The Reader by Jacques-Émile Blanche (1861-1942)

Music: "L'Esprit d'escalier" from Weird Studies vol. 3, and "Distant Early Warning" from Weird Studies vol 2.

REFERENCES

Asti Hustvedt, Medical Muses

Jean-Martin Charcot, French physician

Pierre Janet, French physician

Lon Milo DuQuette, It’s All in Your Head

Saint Catherine of Siena, Italian mystic

Saint Augustine, Confessions

Paul Auster, American writer

Julia Kristeva, Bulgarian French philosopher

Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights

Lionel Snell, Introduction to Freya Aswynn’s Power and Principles of the Runes
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"Now and then, a mysterious life and potency will flicker out of an artwork and confront you." So began "Artworks Are People Too," a talk Phil presented at the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute earlier this summer. In this episode, JF and Phil discuss the implications of this idea that some artworks break the mould of the inanimate and act as persons in the world. Are artworks mere creations, or creatures too?

To enroll in Questionable Cinema, our live summer series happening in August 2026, visit Weirdosphere.

Music: "Hypnagogic," from Weird Studies Vol. 3.

References

Henri Corbin, Alone with the Alone

Alfred Hallowell, "Ojibwa Ontology, Behavior, and Worldview"

Martin Buber, I and Thou

Charles Taylor, A Secular Age

Rainer Maria Rilke, “Archaic Torso of Apollo”

Peter Sloterdijk, You Must Change Your Life

Carl Jung, “On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry”

Alejandro Jodorowsky, Pyschomagic

Dan Sperber, “The Causal Chains of Culture”

Paul Stoller, In Sorcery’s Shadow

Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky

Ishmael Reed, Mumbo Jumbo

Holly Cusack-McVeigh, Stories Find You

Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind

Ikea lamp commercial

Sam Raimi (dir.), Evil Dead II
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Owing to circumstances preventing us from releasing a new show this week, we are offering you one from the archives. This episode was originally released on our Patreon in March 2026. In it, we discuss the splendour and squalor of Victorian London, kung-fu bobbies, the (mis)alignment of society and technology, post-apocalyptic optimism, the emancipating genius of tabletop roleplaying games, the human after AI, and a reason for creating works of art.

A new episode of Weird Studies will drop on July 22.

For more information on Questionable Cinema, Phil and JF's upcoming online course, visit Weirdosphere.

To listen to more tracks from Weird Studies Vol. 3 and purchase the download or LP, visit Pierre-Yves Martel's Bandcamp.
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In this episode, JF and Phil discuss Ridley Scott's 1979 sci-fi/horror blockbuster Alien. Together, they wipe off the patina of familiarity that beclouds the film, restoring it to its original weirdness. What is the organism that terrorizes the Nostromo? What's its relation to technology, evolution, industry? How does it differ from the monsters of older horror classics? How does one interpret without explaining away?

Music in this episode: "Hypnagogic," from Pierre-Yves Martel's Weird Studies Vol. 3.

Events

Shannon Taggart's Lily Dale Symposium (July 23-25, 2026Transcendence in the Age of AI, a Weirdosphere chat with Michael Garfield and JF Martel, hosted by Joel Gunz - June 25, 2026

Kickstarter campaign for Artist as Astronaut: The Otherworldly Art of Ionel Talpazan from Strange Attractor Press. The campaign closes June 27!

References

Ionel Talpazan, Romanian experiencer and artist

Ridley Scott (dir.), Alien

Peter Bebergal, All Our Famous Monsters (forthcoming) 

Malachi Martin, Hostage to the Devil

Vilhelm Hammershøi, Danish painter

H. R. Giger, Swiss artist

Simon-Max, French entertainer

Eric Wargo, Passion of the Space Jockey

Weird Studies, Episode 213 on “Eric” 

Mel Brooks (dir.), Spaceballs

Howard and Emerson, “Hello, Ma Baby”

Beowulf

Eugene Thacker, In the Dust of This Planet

Graham Harman, Weird Reality

Pierre Schaeffer, French musician
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It was with heavy hearts that Phil and JF learned of Gordon White's passing. Gordon was a force to be reckoned with: as an author and podcaster on all things occult, he offered unique perspectives and provocative interpretations at every turn. In this episode, your hosts discuss Gordon's thoughts on divination—or fortune-telling, as he preferred to call it...

Click here to purchase tickets to the 2026 edition of the Lily Dale Symposium (July 23-25), organized by Shannon Taggart and closing this year with a live recording of Weird Studies.

References

Rune Soup

Fortune’s Fools Oracle Deck

Duns Scotus, Scottish priest

Marshall Sahlins, The New Science of the Enchanted Universe

Henri Bergson, Time and Free Will

Ithell Colquhoun, Taro as Colour

Lord Dunsany, The Gods of Pegana
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