Personal Landscapes

About Personal Landscapes

Ryan Murdock talks with the world’s most original writers, publishers and travelers to get the story behind great books about place. www.personallandscapespodcast.com (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/s/podcast?utm_medium=podcast)

Publisher

Ryan Murdock

Category

arts · society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

6 Jun 2021

Latest episode

2 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

118 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   2 Oct 2026

   Ask Me Anything (AMA) #2

   Thank you to all those who submitted questions. There were more than I expected. I hope you find this interesting. Watch the video for: * an update on the future of Personal Landscapes — and a change in direction * behind the scenes glimpses into what it takes to produce each episode * questions about my own writing and travels * travel advice * …and more I’m happy to do another one of these anytime. I didn’t realize so many people were interested. Please don’t hesitate to suggest it — or to remind me — in a comment or on the chat. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.personallandscapespodcast.com/subscribe (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

2. 

   22 Sept 2026

   Paul Theroux on the road in Canada

   We’re talking about Canada today, a place I know a little something about. My homeland is the subject of Paul Theroux’s newest travel book. Like Canada, True North is vast and it covers too much ground to summarize in a podcast. This is a glimpse into the creation of the book, with many digressions along the way. Paul Theroux is the author of some 20 travel books including True North: On The Road in Canada, The Great Railway Bazaar and Dark Star Safari, and 33 works of fiction including The Vanishing Point and The Mosquito Coast. He’s also been my favourite writer for as long as I can remember. We spoke about his Quebecois ancestors, the existence of Can-Lit, and the potential threat of isolated ethno-bubbles to the future of the country. Personal Landscapes relies on the support of listeners like you to keep going. Please consider joining my Member's Club on Substack, where you'll find show notes for each episode, book reviews, reading-related videos, and more. You’ll be supporting an independent ad-free podcast that publishes carefully curated conversations like this one, backed by decades of reading. Go to https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/p/start-here (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/p/start-here) Follow my travels — and buy my books — on https://ryanmurdock.com/ (https://ryanmurdock.com/) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.personallandscapespodcast.com/subscribe (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

3. 

   8 Sept 2026

   Jan Morris with biographer Sara Wheeler

   Jan Morris seemed to live multiple lives. She was a soldier at the end of the Second World War, and a globetrotting journalist with a knack for turning up in the middle of what would become historic events. She was a man — James Morris — and then a woman, undergoing gender-reassignment surgery in Casablanca at the age of forty-six. She hated being called a travel writer but she wrote remarkable books about place, and was one of the finest descriptive writers of her time. She also wrote celebrated histories, including the Pax Brittanica Trilogy, an elegy to the British Empire that captured the period in a kaleidoscope of incidents and characters, steeped in melancholy and a sense of decline. The quality of her work is uneven. Money troubles led her to recycle newspaper articles into books that were often formulaic and disjointed. But the best of her work will stand among our greatest writing on place. The life behind that work was rife with contradictions. Morris preached the virtues of kindness, but according to her children she was a terrible parent, cold and cruel. Others have described her as a narcissist, a fabulist, and a class snob who told stories that inflated her family origins. Who better to uncover the complexities of this twentieth-century icon than a writer who excels at both biography and travel writing? Sara Wheeler is the author of Jan Morris: A Life. We spoke about Jan Morris’s iconic writing style, her late-life obsession with Welsh nationalism, and the unreconcilable sense of longing at the heart of her work. Personal Landscapes relies on the support of listeners like you to keep going. Please consider joining my Member's Club on Substack, where you'll find show notes for each episode, book reviews, reading-related videos, and more. You’ll be supporting an independent ad-free podcast that publishes carefully curated conversations like this one, backed by decades of reading. Go to https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/p/start-here (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/p/start-here) Follow my travels — and buy my books — on https://ryanmurdock.com/ (https://ryanmurdock.com/) You can listen to Personal Landscapes: Conversations on Books About Place on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Podbean, Google Podcasts, Audible, PlayerFM, and TuneIn + Alexa. Please subscribe (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/p/why-subscribe), and rate the podcast or leave a review. Your support is greatly appreciated. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.personallandscapespodcast.com/subscribe (https://www.personallandscapespodcast.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

Who has been a guest on Personal Landscapes

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Eland
• Louis D Hall
• Andrew McCarthy

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

18 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 24 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

13

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

85

Contact Personal Landscapes

Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

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Questions about Personal Landscapes