Industrialized Rome and Wrong 'un Politicians - with Helen Dale
My interview with author Helen Dale on her Kingdom of the Wicked novels, and other assorted topics
I first encountered
on ’s Disaffected and immediately decided I had to interview her on MindMatters. But I had a task to complete first: reading her Kingdom of the Wicked series. After tearing through both volumes in December and January, we finally sat down in our respective countries to have a chat. Here it is on YouTube (audio on BuzzSprout or your podcast provider of choice):Helen Dale, lawyer and award-winning author of 3 novels, including The Hand that Signed the Paper, writes at Law & Liberty and
. Her two-novel series Kingdom of the Wicked is an alternative history of Roman-occupied Judea in the first century and the arrest and trial of Yeshua ben Yusuf, an enigmatic man with a large following, including some radical religious zealots. I like literary and genre fiction—and Roman history—so I couldn’t put these ones down. They’ve got soldiers, lawyers, terrorists, and biomechs; action, romance, legal proceedings, and as I mentioned in the interview, great characters.During the interview we talked about the books and how Helen came to write them, blending Roman morality with modern technology, and the interesting directions that might have gone. Other topics: political systems and their compatibility with different nations and cultures, Lorenzo Warby’s articles on Helen’s Substack, a policy approach to countering Woke ideology, Cluster B’s and ponerology in modern and historical politics, what Hannah Arendt got wrong about totalitarianism, and how lobbyists are the absolute worst.
For a sample of Helen’s online work, check out the following:
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It makes me happy that you two now know each other. Quality people finding other quality people is one of the few balms in this era.
Thank you for doing such great work, Harrison.
can't wait to read these novels - right up my alley!