In this episode of In Bed With Books, I’m joined by my friend Michelle Craft for a chat about our recent buddy read, Babel by R.F. Kuang.

We start the conversation with a close reading of the full title, Babel, or The Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translator’s Revolution, asking what we can consider violence, and how it builds on itself. Kuang’s commentary on colonialism and empire, its exploration of language as power and the emotional destruction of the ending (yes, there be spoilers), feels like just the beginning of this conversation.

Tune in as Michelle and I also take a look at some of the biggest critiques of the book - its over-intellectualized style, as well as the accusation of it being too obvious, and how those things can both exist in the novel. Kuang’s homage to 19th ce ...