Episode · How I Write · 2026-08-19
Books mentioned on Elif Shafak & Robert Macfarlane: Two Novelists Have an Epic Conversation | How I Write
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Elif Shafak discussed The Epic of Gilgamesh and DON QUIXOTE by Miguel de Cervantes. David Perell discussed There Are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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The Epic of Gilgamesh
Why people recommend it: Preserving ancient mythology, human ambition, and timeless existential dread, The Epic of Gilgamesh is an anonymous Mesopotamian masterpiece.
Discussed“And I know we both, all of us love the epic of Gilgamesh. But this is one of the many reasons why I love the epic because it really talks makes us think about failure, defeat.”
Where to get it
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There Are Rivers in the Sky
Discussed“So, this is from There Rivers in the Sky. You know, you say the inspiration for this book came with a small idea. A raindrop that landed on my palm one day while I was walking by the river temps.”
Where to get it
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DON QUIXOTE
Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes is widely celebrated as one of the earliest modern novels and a foundational masterpiece of Western literature.
Discussed“It was Charles Dickens. It was Doniote by Sarantes. You suddenly connect with characters who seem to have nothing to do with your life.”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (5) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
Plugged There Are Rivers in the Sky
“Um like for instance in the there are rivers in the sky. I had to I didn't finish one character and then start another character and then go for the third one.”
“It's called 10 minutes 38 seconds in the strange world in which um we know it's about the sex worker and we know right away that she's dead after the the human heart has stopped beating.”
Plugged The Epic of Gilgamesh
“When I was writing there are rivers in the sky you know we talked about unlearning earlier. I had to do a lot of unlearning myself, particularly as I was writing about the Yazidi minorities...”
Plugged Is a River Alive?
“...at the end of is a river Alive I thought I'd finish that book three times the first time was recognizable to me. We'd paddled to the sea over 12, 11 days.”
Plugged The Island of Missing Trees
“One of my earlier novels, the island of missing trees, I briefly want to say mention this because that deals with difficult subjects like um civil war, division, partition.”