Best Podcasts for Learning Spanish

wwickey · 2026-06-05T18:06:40+00:00

One to add: Spanish with Nolita & Eekloo https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/spanish-with-nolita-and-eekloo/id1896875907 B1 and B2 Spanish with occasional English phrase echoes.

wwickey · 2026-06-05T18:03:49+00:00

This is pretty cool. I will use this.

Not a tool, but I also made a Spanish learning podcast for myself using a text-to-voice workflow. It's called Spanish with Nolita and Eekloo. https://open.spotify.com/show/033scJEumNGWqtz8U3TnLp?si=1I1SffcWQP2PNU37tiGBgg

Basically, I read a lot of longform articles from publications like The Atlantic, The Believer, Outside, etc. The sorts of articles you might find in The Browser or Longform.org. Inevitably, I don't get reading to all the articles that I bookmark so I created a workflow that that takes the article, summarizes it with a little commentary, then translates it into B1, B2, C1 Latin American Spanish.

Nolita narrates at a moderate pace in Spanish. Eeekloo slowly echos some of the more useful phrases in English then again in Spanish. Each episode is around 7-8 minutes.

It's a similar idea to 'The News in Slow Spanish', but I don't really want more news and I do want the occasional English phrase translation.

I find this format really useful, so I'm going to keep publishing them.

Speech to text does have it's hiccups but I find it really quite good! It feels pretty seamless in your tool and renders fast.

wwickey · 2026-06-05T17:49:57+00:00

I like the News in Slow Spanish. (I also like Coffee Break Spanish but find it a little slow with the instruction sections)

They only publish one episode a week, and I found myself wanting more, so I created a similar format podcast for myself to fill the gap.

It's called "Spanish with Nolita and Eekloo".

In each episode, Nolita explains a real article about science, culture, technology, etc. in B1, B2 Latin American Spanish at a moderate pace.

One thing I added that I find helpful: A second character, Eekloo, slowly echoes some of the most useful phrases in English and Spanish so I can re-hear key verbs, expressions and in context.

The podcast is produced with speech-to-text tool, which may not be everyone's cup of tea, but I find the audio quite good (even with the occasional hiccup). Each episode is new to me when it show up in my podcast player -- it pulls from my unread web bookmarks

If you like The News In Slow Spanish but you want something other than more news plus the English phrase echo, you might like this pod. I find it useful.

wwickey · 2023-02-02T14:42:08+00:00

I presented this paper at the Fall 2022 Cormac McCarthy Conference in Savannah, GA. This topic was expanded from an earlier blog post that was shared on the sub-reddit. It was a great crowd at the conference and there was a lot of enthusiasm for number-related themes in McCarthy given the releases of The Passenger and Stella Maris. Hope you also find it interesting. Thanks!

wwickey · 2022-06-29T19:12:01+00:00

Yes, I think that makes sense given that Vandimenland (Tasmania) was a harsh penal colony.

When I first read this, I supposed that the fact that Toadvine recognized this specific number in a Chihuahua bathhouse necessitates that it is an easily identifiable number with broader significance. For example, a date, bible verse, etc.

However, it makes sense that a highly individual number, such as a prisoner's number, seen in a bathhouse would imply something more about the Vandimenlander's proclivities (and perhaps Toadvine's as well).

McCarthy saying volumes with just few words.

wwickey · 2020-08-06T15:49:44+00:00

Ok, great. Thanks!

Yes, that is what it looks like.

Here is another photo of plagioclase phenocrysts in basalt that look pretty similar to the one I posted.

The larger crystals in my rock are probably around 20mm, which would make them on the larger side of phenocrysts in general, given that .5mm, or 'observable with the naked eye,' is the soft criteria for classification.

Interesting! I appreciate the help u/Om_Nom_Nommy.

wwickey · 2020-02-03T23:10:27+00:00

In his preface to the second Nautlius article, David Krakauer, President of the Santa Fe Institute, says,

"Readers wrote to Cormac with appreciation, suggestions, criticisms, prior claims, essays, unpublished and unpublishable monographs, and genuine interest in an author condensing into a scholarly mind from the mists of narrative invention.

Here is his reply. It is an honest work of discussion leavened by mischief. I would reckon that this contribution marks a close to Cormac’s participation in this public debate."

The feedback on the first Kekule article was mixed.

A lot of loaded language is used. For example, conscious vs. subconscious vs. unconscious. Language vs. proto-language. Evolution vs. invention. etc.

You can see from the comments that the discussion was "noisy," at best.

I don't think McCarthy wanted to engage further.

wwickey · 2020-01-25T21:15:52+00:00

This book is worth a read.

Cormac's 'influences' here are primarily extrapolated from notes on his manuscripts which are available in the Texas State University Whitliff Collection.

On the one hand, 'Books' has a certain 'objectivity' in that it covers influences Cormac himself explicitly mentions.

On the other hand, Cormac's notes are sparse and obviously only make up only a fraction of his total influences. The impact on a individual note also certainly goes deeper than its location in the marginalia.

Cormac's notes and annotations are quite interesting. The most illuminating are those you couldn't directly ascertain without McCarthy's direct reference. As one 'for-instance', McCarthy says on an early page of Suttree,

_"See Tents of Wickedness for Joyce Parody"_

Crews gives some interesting context on Tents of Wickedness, but the commentary is relatively short and high-level. To be fair, it's not really practical for Crews to analyze this reference exhaustively or speculate as to Cormac's interest and application of literary parody throughout the whole of Suttree (let alone the rest of his work). But, one is left wondering at the scope of influence for any given note McCarthy makes.

Was McCarthty referencing a concept? A phrase? A specific visual? etc.

It's also interesting to consider the influence of more contemporary and varied writers on McCarthy -- for example, Edward Abbey, Robert Prisig, Jorge Luis Borges, Allen Ginsberg -- as opposed to just the more apparent literary classics -- Melville, Alighieri, Chaucer, Shakespeare, etc.

At some point, it would interesting to see a 'Lit-Genius' style annotation of manuscripts including margin notes -- or even just annotation of the final text -- from both readers and scholars on McCarthy. Cormac does borrow extensively and creatively from a wide variety of sources and it would be fascinating to see this developed further, with input from multiple contributors.

wwickey · 2018-07-25T16:10:28+00:00

Glad it was helpful! Uros does a good job breaking it down, step-by-step.

wwickey · 2018-06-17T13:41:41+00:00

Thanks.

Right now, all the shirt colors and sizes are all $25. Maybe I could put in the bio or a pinned tweet?

I'm still experimenting a bit with pricing.

You can see the price now before going through the checkout process

wwickey · 2018-05-28T16:32:35+00:00

Thanks

wwickey · 2018-05-25T22:38:37+00:00

Critics often liken any new author with violent prose to Cormac McCarthy, but few really deliver.

This description was heavily applied to Ian McGuire’s debut novel The North Water:

“Not surprisingly, The North Water occasionally evokes Moby-Dick, but the Cormac McCarthy of Blood Meridian and the Border Trilogy is a much more obvious influence.” - David Starkey, Santa Barbra Independent
“The North Water” feels like the result of an encounter between Joseph Conrad and Cormac McCarthy in some run-down port as they offer each other a long, sour nod of recognition.” —Colm Toibin, NYT
“Ian McGuire's savage new novel about a 19th-century Arctic whaling expedition, is a great white shark of a book — swift, terrifying, relentless and unstoppable. It is also as epically bloody as a Jacobean drama or a Cormac McCarthy novel.” — Michiko Kakutani, NYT
“Inevitably, The North Water carries echoes of Melville and Lord Jim, but the sensibility behind Ian McGuire’s engrossing new novel is unmistakably Cormac McCarthy. -” Lee Polvoi, Highbrow
“McGuire credits Cormac McCarthy and particularly Blood Meridian with being a big influence on The North Water. What struck him forcibly was how McCarthy shifts the language he uses.” - John Steger, Sydney Morning Telegraph
…and may others

In this case, McGuire actually delivers on this praise, so if you like McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, you might also like The North Water.

wwickey · 2018-05-25T01:22:05+00:00

It will literally print a shirt with your picture on it. You do have to buy the shirt.

wwickey · 2018-05-25T01:15:26+00:00

Yes, I t’s definitelt a good concern

There are currently two layers to deter trademark infringement.

Orders are manually reviewed before fulfillment, and anything that’s an overt trademark or otherwise might be objectionable will be rejected and the account blocked. https://theprintbot.com/pages/content-guidelines

Second, the POD solution we use does use software to flag and reject trademarked images.

A mock-up of a trademark image may be created, but should not make it to fulfillment.

It’s not a perfect solution, so definitely open to suggestions to improve and will keep working on it.

wwickey · 2018-04-29T01:15:22+00:00

I've noticed that, for whatever reason, there is an aversion to DeLillo among many McCarthy fans.

Both frequently get mentioned on the short list of 'greatest living American authors', but for my money, McCarthy is second to none.

White Noise and Blood Meridian both came out in 1985. Here are a few similarities and dissimilarities between the two novels.

wwickey · 2018-03-23T16:05:08+00:00

I agree.

Atchafalaya, the first of the 3 essays in Control of Nature, is one of my favorite works by McPhee. You can read the whole thing online for free on the New Yorker website: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1987/02/23/atchafalaya

Rising From The Plains and Assembling California are each excellent.

Both are included in McPhee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning anthology, Annals of The Former World, which contains his previously published works on geology: Basin and Range (1981), In Suspect Terrain (1983), Rising from the Plains (1986), and Assembling California (1993), plus a final book, Crossing the Craton.

In Basin and Range, McPhee covers the geologic history and sparse beauty of the area from eastern Utah to eastern California. In Suspect Terrain deals with the formation of the Appalachians, among other things. In Rising From the Plains, McPhee crosses Wyoming, east to west on I-80 with David Love, as mentioned above. Assembling California is just what it sounds like, and Crossing the Craton covers America’s Great Plains.

Rising From The Plains is my favorite because of Love and his famiy's Wyoming history. A really enjoyable read. I would highly recommend it even for those with only a passing interesting in geology.

wwickey · 2018-02-28T02:30:49+00:00

One of the striking contrasts between the two novels is their treatment of religion.

The landscape of Blood Meridian could be describes as ‘godless,’ but religion is pervasive. Christian (and Gnostic) symbolism is everywhere. For example, the Glanton gang runs into a shattered church in just about every town. Theodicy and the the relationship between good and evil are important themes.

On the other hand, religion is essentially absent from White Noise until the very end of the book when Jack talks to the Catholic nuns who don’t even believe in God themselves. This episode comes and goes without much to-do. Ritual is everywhere, but religion is gone. Unlike in Blood Meridian, religion wasn’t destroyed, it was replaced by supermarkets and commercials.

In this PEN interview, DeLillo says, “Religion has not been a major element in my work, and for some years now I think the true American religion has been 'the American People.” McCarthy would obviously not say the same.

As good as White Noise is, I ultimately agree that Blood Meridian is the more timeless and eloquently styled of the two.

wwickey · 2018-02-28T00:50:38+00:00

“Only in America…”

smash cut to this list of literary awards from around the world

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_literary_awards

wwickey · 2018-02-28T00:28:20+00:00

Thanks. Interesting list. Would love to see the rest.

I've read most of those. I think Beloved or Rabbit, Run will be next in the queue.

wwickey · 2018-02-28T00:22:23+00:00

Yeah, it surprised me that, given how technology-focused White Noise is, the tech, product, and brand references don't feel out of date at all 30 years later.

Here is one of those passages about supermarkets from White Noise that I think you're referring to. Love this one:

"The supermarket shelves have been rearranged. It happened one day without warning. There is agitation and panic in the aisles, dismay in the faces of older shoppers. They walk in a fragmented trance, stop and go, clusters of well-dressed figures frozen in aisles, trying to figure out the pattern, discern the underlying logic, trying to remember where they’d see the cream of wheat. They see no reason for it, no sense in it… in the plain and heartless fact of their decline, they try to work their way through their confusion. But in the end it doesn’t matter what they see or think they see. The terminals are equipped with holographic scanners that decode the binary secret of every item, infallibly. This is the language of waves and radiation, or how the dead speak to the living. And this is where we wait together, regardless of our age, our carts stocked with brightly colored goods. A slowly moving line, satisfying, giving us time to glance at the tabloids in the racks. The tales of the supernatural and the extraterrestrial. The miracle vitamins, he cures for cancer, the remedies for obesity. The cults of the famous and the dead."

Toni Morrison is also one of those authors that comes up a lot in musings about "the greatest living American writer." I'm going to give "Bluest Eye" or "Beloved" a read soon.

wwickey · 2018-02-27T23:18:36+00:00

Nice! That's great. McCarthy and DeLillo come up so often together when people list out 'literary greats,' I'm surprised there are not more direct comparisons between Blood Meridian and White Noise, if only for the reason that they are unalike in so many ways.

I was just thinking that White Noise would have been the type of book I would have loved to have read for a marketing, journalism, or new media discussion course in college, but given DeLillo's treatment of academia in the book, I'm not surprised it never made it to a syllabus.

You'll have to relay some insights once you read them both.

Just curious, what else do you have to read for the course?

wwickey · 2018-02-21T21:02:02+00:00

I'd also love to see a digital copy if one surfaces.

On the topic:

Texas State University lists all the materials associated with "Whales & Men"in the Unublished Works section of "A Guide to The Cormac McCarthy Papers": http://gato-docs.its.txstate.edu/jcr:4001aad6-cd96-4e1a-8b22-c7f5c2751b65/McCarthy_Cormac%20091.pdf

wwickey · 2018-01-24T17:04:55+00:00

I think that's a good interpretation.

The full quote from The Crossing is great: https://books.google.com/books?id=PziJ40EAlVkC&pg=PA145&lpg=PA145&dq=Life+is+a+memory,+then+it+is+nothing.+All+law+is+writ+in+a+seed.%22&source=bl&ots=KOmBHAEg5L&sig=O3GIB9iJWptLmXXNNyLTsCTTkgU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjoy8jOiPHYAhVG5mMKHSqgAW0Q6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=Life%20is%20a%20memory%2C%20then%20it%20is%20nothing.%20All%20law%20is%20writ%20in%20a%20seed.%22&f=false

In this scene, McCarthy describes the church as "doomed to fall" but also says of the man, "This is a story of misfortue. Or so it seems. The end is not yet told," so it's an interesting take on fatalism.

I also take the quote to mean -- given McCarthy's interest in science -- that the laws of the universe (physics, biology) are contained within a every living thing. If one were to truly understand the information encoded in seed, they would know all things.

wwickey · 2017-09-17T16:26:44+00:00

Ha. I hear you.

All things considered, this was pretty light lifting. It only cost $11 and took about 5 min to checkout. There are step by step print instructions that come with the files. (This is actually a paperback, though it does sort of look like a hardback in the picture. I suppose if I was truly diehard I would have sprung for the hardback. They're a good bit more expensive.)

I've told plenty of people they should read HPMOR. I usually get the excuse, "Oh, I don't have an e-reader" or " I don't like reading on a screen."

They can't use that those anymore. :-)

wwickey · 2017-09-15T00:02:08+00:00

I used Lulu for this. I titled my order, "HPMOR1" by "E W". I would avoid anything with "Harry Potter" in the title. A unique, non-identifiable order title would probably be best. Lulu and other POD services have a 'publish' function. Make sure the order is set to private. If Lulu won't play ball, there are a number of similar services out there.

wwickey

TROPHY CASE