Christians Reading Classics

Jane Austen's most underrated novel is also her most serious. In this conversation, books editor Nadya Williams and essayist Beatrice Scudeler explore what Mansfield Park has to say about virtue, vocation, wealth, and the formation of character -- and why Fanny Price, the novel's quiet, overlooked heroine, may be Austen's most carefully drawn moral portrait.
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Get the ebook Spiritual Formation for the Family at http://mereorthodoxy.com/family.
Christians Reading Classics is a podcast from Mere Orthodoxy and is listener-supported. If you would like to support this work, become a Mere Orthodoxy Member today at http://mereorthodoxy.com/membership.
Apply for Beeson Divinity School's Ph.D program by April 1 for Fall 2026 admission here: https://bit.ly/BeesonDivinityPhD
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Chapters
00:03 -- Opening: Austen reads the opening lines of Mansfield Park; Nadya introduces the episode and season premise
01:48 -- Defining a classic: what makes a work speak across centuries without losing its rootedness in its own time
05:29 -- Why Mansfield Park for America's 250th: Austen, evangelical Christianity, and the values that crossed the Atlantic
08:48 -- The plot: Fanny Price, the Bertrams, and what happens when the Crawfords arrive from London
13:35 -- The problem of Fanny Price: why modern readers resist her, and why Lionel Trilling diagnosed the real issue in the 1960s
19:57 -- Fanny as a sympathetic character: what it means to be 10 years old, sent away from your family, and expected to be grateful
25:09 -- The absent adults: Sir Thomas, Lady Bertram, and the novel's indictment of parenting by principle without presence
27:09 -- Was Fanny autobiographical? The case for Jane Austen as observer, introvert, and moral compass
33:15 -- What money buys: education, time, space for contemplation -- and what it cannot buy
39:07 -- Marriage as formation: why Austen's vision of marriage is still revolutionary, and what we've lost by privatizing it
41:16 -- Why Mansfield Park may be Austen's best: constancy, prudence, and the virtue of being the quiet center that holds everything together
48:45 -- Closing question: what classic would Beatrice have written? Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

div]:bg-bg-000/50 [&_pre>div]:border-0.5 [&_pre>div]:border-border-400 [&_.ignore-pre-bg>div]:bg-transparent [&_.standard-markdown_:is(p,blockquote,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6)]:pl-2 [&_.standard-markdown_:is(p,blockquote,ul,ol,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6)]:pr-8 [&_.progressive-markdown_:is(p,blockquote,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6)]:pl-2 [&_.progressive-markdown_:is(p,blockquote,ul,ol,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6)]:pr-8"> _*]:min-w-0 gap-3 standard-markdown"> Nadya Williams and Sabrina Little explore Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics — its account of virtue as habit, the teleological shape of a good life, and how athletics and daily practice form character. Little connects Aristotle to Aquinas, parenting, and her own work as an elite ultramarathoner and philosopher.







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Christians Reading Classics is a podcast from Mere Orthodoxy and is listener-supported. If you would like to support this work, become a Mere Orthodoxy Member today at http://mereorthodoxy.com/membership.
Apply for fall 2026 admission to Beeson Divinity School's MDiv (or M.Div., your choice) and be considered for a full-tuition scholarship.: https://bit.ly/OurRisenLord
 
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Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
02:35 - What is a classic?
03:51 - Why the Nicomachean Ethics for American Christians?
07:19 - Aristotle's aims: eudaimonia and virtue
10:24 - The contemplative life vs. the practical life
13:38 - How college life trains students in virtue
18:13 - Advice for first-time readers of Aristotle
22:27 - The Examined Run: athletics and moral formation
28:29 - Teaching virtue to young children
32:03 - Would Aristotle recognize our struggles today?
34:57 - Aristotle and women
36:07 - What classic do you wish you had written?

Nadya Williams and Evie Solheim discuss Wuthering Heights, what makes it a gothic classic, why Emily Brontë's moral ambiguity still provokes, how the novel speaks to a generation starved for romance, and why the new film adaptation trades subtlety for TikTok-style spectacle. Also: Anna Karenina, Virginia Woolf, and Greta Gerwig's Narnia.
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Get the Mere Orthodoxy ebook, Spiritual Formation for the Family, at http://mereorthodoxy.com/family
Mere Fidelity is a podcast from Mere Orthodoxy and is listener-supported. If you would like to support this work, become a Mere Orthodoxy Member today at http://mereorthodoxy.com/membership.
Get 30% of the Baker Book of the Month, R30 Key Moments in the History of Christianity: Inspiring True Stories from the Early Church Around the World, by going to: http://bakerbookhouse.com/pages/mere-fidelity
Apply for Beeson Divinity School's Ph.D program by April 1 for Fall 2026 admission here: https://bit.ly/BeesonPhD
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Chapters
00:11 – Opening reading from Wuthering Heights and intro to the Brontë sisters
01:54 – Welcome to Season 2 of Christians Reading Classics; introducing Evie Solheim
03:25 – What makes a classic? Timelessness, breaking the mold, and the canon
06:35 – Plot summary: key characters, places, and the structure of the novel
08:43 – The gothic genre: origins, elements, and its American descendants
10:22 – Southern Gothic: Flannery O'Connor, Faulkner, and True Detective
13:12 – How we first meet Cathy — and the unreliable narrators telling her story
16:28 – Advice for first-time readers: Emily Brontë's biography and creative world
19:43 – Virginia Woolf's essay on Wuthering Heights and what it means to write like that
22:56 – Why Wuthering Heights resonates with Americans today: romance, apps, and longing
27:21 – The new film adaptation: competing with TikTok, not other movies
31:43 – Comparing Wuthering Heights to Gone with the Wind: land, love, and star-crossed tropes
36:28 – Good cinematic adaptations: Greta Gerwig's Little Women vs. Emerald Fennell's Wuthering Heights
41:10 – Is Wuthering Heights amoral? Reading Heathcliff's fate through a biblical lens
47:29 – Closing question: the classic Evie wishes she had written — Anna Karenina

Nadya Williams and Obbie Tyler Todd explore Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin as part of season two's focus on classics American Christians should read for America's 250th. They discuss the Beecher family's influence, the Fugitive Slave Law as the book's impetus, Stowe's deeply scriptural approach to critiquing slavery, the Christ-likeness of Uncle Tom, and why the novel's theological vision — not merely its abolitionism — gave it such enduring power.
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Get your copy of Mere Orthodoxy's ebook, Spiritual Formation for the Family, by going to http://mereorthodoxy.com/family
Christians Reading Classics is a podcast from Mere Orthodoxy and is listener-supported. If you would like to support this work, become a Mere Orthodoxy Member today at http://mereorthodoxy.com/membership.
Apply for fall 2026 admission to Beeson Divinity School's MDiv (or M.Div., your choice) and be considered for a full-tuition scholarship.: https://bit.ly/OurRisenLord
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Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Uncle Tom's Cabin
 
02:21 Defining a Classic
 
06:57 The Importance of Uncle Tom's Cabin for Christians
 
12:06 The Beecher Family Legacy
 
20:45 Harriet Beecher Stowe's Impact on American Sentiment
 
27:43 Introducing Uncle Tom's Cabin to New Readers
 
29:59 Moral Complexity of Slavery
 
32:17 The Christian Perspective on Slavery
 
35:32 Character Development and Redemption
 
38:50 Contrasting Narratives of Slavery
 
46:01 Evangelical Reception of Uncle Tom's Cabin
 
50:45 International Reception and Impact

Nadya Williams and Katelyn Walls Shelton discuss Aldous Huxley's Brave New World — its haunting parallels to embryo selection, reproductive biotechnology, and pleasure-maximizing culture — and what Christians should make of a novel that reads less like dystopian fiction and more like this morning's news.
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Christians Reading Classics is a podcast from Mere Orthodoxy and is listener-supported. If you would like to support this work, become a Mere Orthodoxy Member today at http://mereorthodoxy.com/membership.

Apply for a full-tuition scholarship for Beeson Divinity School's M.Div program that begins Fall 2026 here: https://bit.ly/OurRisenLord
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Chapters
00:00 — Introduction & what makes a classic
05:00 — Brave New World mirrors our world: embryo selection, Orchid, Gattaca
07:16 — Why Christians in America should read this book
14:19 — Plot overview: hatcheries, Bernard, Lenina, John the Savage
23:40 — Life in the World State: conditioning, sexuality, soma, death
35:40 — Huxley's own contradictions: Doors of Perception and his LSD death
39:17 — Current reproductive biotechnologies: embryo grading, gene editing, artificial wombs
49:43 — Closing: The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula Le Guin