I enjoyed the "ramble". I think you could do these solo talks more often if you were so inclined. I'm guessing they'd be well received by the Stalkers and provide a bit of extra context to the blog for your casuals (maybe chase them away, but maybe not!).
Left and right wing have become so ironic now that they really only hold any valid meaning to those that wear the corresponding badges on their lapels........two wings of the same bird.
Keep those longer essays coming Rurik, they're what I look forward to reading.
And I lived with a woman whose father is motherland Italian. She went over every year for a few weeks all throughout her childhood and continues to go over about once in every four or five years to visit her extended family. She will tell you that the male guineas, to a man, are pussy-whipped and ruled over by their women, and that they do so in an attempt at having to get out of working for a living, existing upon the meager earnings of their wop wives.
I spent a year as a paid subscriber to Chris Martenson's Peak Prosperity "community", as the PP'rs referred to it; ending it all last year. In the end I found the "connection" as hollow and unsatisfying as that diet of chips mentioned. One thing that Martenson did enjoin his followers to do as a direct and immediate response to the evil machinations of our overlords was to withdraw consent to being a willing or even an unwitting participant in all of the various mechanisms of control laced upon us at our very births. I first thought this strategy to be cowardly and pathetic; an instance of "too little, too late", and thus inadequate to meet the needs of the peasantry in our moment of long-suffering peril. But this is what I am being exposed to more and more in The Zone, albeit in a decidedly more informed and enlightening manner. It really is a splendid little germination of resistance which may, someday, generations down the line, sprout into a full-scale rebellion of the peasants. Here's hoping.
Yes, Western culture and society is in terminal decay. However, Britain had a strong faery tradition, carried by some aspects of folklore and music, particularly in the Celtic areas. Some of it may be recoverable.
R.J. Stewart is a musician, writer and follower of the Western Mystery Tradition who has written extensively about this (including about Rev. Kirk who supposedly journeyed into faeryland - and Thomas the Rhymer). His assertion is that some of these stories and songs carry the keys of magical initiation into the Other or Underworld. This is best shown in his book The Underworld Initiation, and mentioned in others. Here's a list of his books:
You may also ponder the writings of the brilliant Classicist and mystic and Jungian, Peter Kingsley. His earlier work traced the origin of Greek and Western civilisation to it's shamanic roots. In 'Catafalque' he declares it dead and in a tomb whose ornamentation can still be admired.
'But the hard truth of who Jung was and what he did is only a small part of what this book uncovers. It also exposes the full extent of that great river of esoteric tradition that stretches all the way back to the beginnings of our civilization. It unveils the surprising realities behind western philosophy, literature, poetry, prophecy—both ancient and modern.
In short, Peter Kingsley shows us not only who Carl Jung was but who we in the West are as well. Much more than a brilliant spiritual biography, Catafalque holds the key to understanding why our western culture is dying. And, an incantatory text in its own right, it shows the way to discovering what we in these times of great crisis must do.'
'“Peter Kingsley’s new book is not biographical but historical, in the truest sense of the word. It’s not about an individual or individuals but about the whole: about the impersonal and divine energy that manifests itself, time after time, in human form to allow a culture to be born or to grow. Jung, the alchemists, the Gnostics, Empedocles, Parmenides emerge from history as links in a golden chain through which wisdom, philosophy and science have been given and kept alive in the West. But this book also tells a different story—a story of repeated manipulation and exploitation, of devastation of the sacred, of catastrophic losses caused by egotism and the indiscriminate use of ‘rationality’, which is a story that started long ago in ancient Athens and now is approaching its tragic conclusion. The lament over the death of western culture isn’t Jung’s lament, or Kingsley’s. It’s the howling of nature itself, reminding us of our sacred roots and of our ultimate responsibility as human beings.”
Prof. Laura Gemelli Marciano—author of Parmenide and Die Vorsokratiker'
'“This is the deepest book I have ever read, and it’s straightening out my mind. Take a look and you will see for yourself.”
Это самая глубокая книжка, которую я когда-либо читал, и она выправляет мои мозги. Посмотрите и убедитесь в этом сами.
Misha Gorelkin—Mathematician and specialist in artificial intelligence, Voronezh State University, Russia'
It's better not to think of faerie land physically, although some of the stories present it as being possible to physically journey there - and perhaps return, both dangerous journeys dependent on the will of the faeries. 'Hollow earth' is a materialised debasement.
If you want to try to meet 'fairies', between two hawthorn bushes, you might like to visit Greenhills Farm in Galway.
'..a powerful system of altering consciousness...the central symbols of which survive in songs and ballads whose roots lie in the Celtic and pre-Celtic past'.
Robin Artisson is an American occultist, who has written much on such themes, inspired by the ancient deities and spirits of the British landscape, gives a similar perspective, with more emphasis on the Neolithic beliefs and early-modern witchcraft, including the experiences of witches which Inquisitors misinterpreted literally. He gives an overview in 'The Witching Way of the Hollow Hill'.
'This is a book that acts as a 'traveler's guide' to a hidden country within each human being. Primal peoples all over the world embrace the ideas discussed in this work: the animistic worldview, spiritual communion with the dead and the Unseen World, sorcery and magic.
Author and traditional witch Robin Artisson explores these mystical themes from the perspective of The Old Faiths and pre-Christian metaphysical impulses of Europe and the British Isles. Bringing a new perspective to these ancient practices and making them more accessible, this book is a key to the door that leads into the mythical dimension of each person, and every feature of the sacred landscape. It helps to unlock the hidden wisdom in folklore, shed light on the enigma of the human being, and manifest an experience of the wisdom of the Old Ways- insofar as a book can. This book is about getting out of books and back into the spiritual dimension of the Land itself, and requires considerable dedication and work.'
The modern 'scientific materialist' belief into which we have all been inculcated, acts as a massive hindrance to understanding and more fully participating in reality.
Clif High's notion that this is giving way to 'Ontological Physics' i.e. 'Animism', may be encouraging. https://clifhigh.substack.com/
Your excellent podcast discussion recommending subverting prevailing narratives, can be extended to considering the unquestioned, but very questionable, bases of physics, evolution and the religion of 'science'.
That 'Reality' is alive and conscious and interacts subtly with us may be seen in your own experience which you discussed in your podcast with Ghost, that when you became interested in chemtrails, you suddenly noticed a lot of information about them.
With luck and effort you may become able not only to read, but also to write, about this journey!
Rurik has kept Rolo's sense of humor. The fat wife shall not prevail. Slavic comedy is one of the reasons I keep coming back after the sobering stretches of topically depressing war news briefs. You and Nazi humorist Andrew Anglin help make our black pills go down easier.
I thought there'd be more on CRT, maybe connecting it historically to the Frankfurt School which spread it thru the universities in America. As a hippie I never bought into affirmative action, the first step beyond fair play for Negroes. I remember the turmoil in Boston over bussing. Even controlled media coverage couldn't hide the white plight of the locals.
I was born just after the bussing imbroglio, but I grew up in hardscrabble Lowell in the 80s, and it was definitely both a topic of conversation amongst the proles as well as fodder for history lessons in the public school system, and given rather fair treatment, too, surprisingly. Why these parents took the stand they did and how their children suffered as a consequence of the inevitable have been all but lost to posterity. But, certain real white people who still stalk this land will never forget.
I know we had a complicated relationship, but I always believed in you. This is not ironic I mean it. And it might be cryptic but ... whatever. This solo podcast is one of the best things you have ever done. Very few people grow. One of the best things on the internet.
And, for anyone who might take offense by dint of Rurik's swipes at non-Slavic European ethnicities( i.e. Anglos and such, though it does tend to be mostly Anglos he savages) let's all try to remember we white folk used to be made of sterner stuff and could weather heavy criticism of our various shortcomings or even the supposed shortcomings others foisted upon us a la the classic comedy stylings of stereotype jokes. It wouldn't be a stereotype if there weren't an element of truth contained within it. Rurik advocating for his kind is healthy. Rather than get annoyed that he's savaging my people(diluted Scots-Irish by way of two centuries in America, here) I take it in and ruminate upon it for a good long while before forming any substantial opinions as to the verisimilitude of the accusation. And, by and large, he has a point. We Anglos are a pretty brutish, self-affected, dispassionate lot who wish for the ruination of our neighbors so that our status may be elevated not by dint of our efforts at self-improvement but rather our efforts at laying waste to the competition. Knowing this about myself, I can then take steps to take notice of this tendency in future interactions and strive to do better.
That being said, I've known a few mother-country Slavs in my time, Belarusians, to be exact. I worked with two of them(males) for a year at a restaurant and seduced one of their chickadees, as she had taken to be a bar fly at the same. They were among a group of about a half dozen who had all scammed the US government into granting them temporary work visas which stipulated they not leave the state of New York, but they all absconded and ended up in New Hampshire where the rents were cheaper. They were scoundrels, one and all. They cheated their visa sponsors, they cheated their employers and they cheated their American "friends" and they cheated each other. They were indolent and lazy and gave off the air of feeling entitled to all they could get their hands on, by hook or by crook. Perhaps this was just an example of the detritus which this modern world makes of us all until such time as we reach an age where introspection compels us to do better with ourselves. Perhaps this is what all Slavs are like. I'm not sure. Rurik definitely knows about Anglos because he lived in the States for a number of years and I only had this one moment in time. I can tell you when I lived in Germany for two years the Deutschers were not shy about professing their utter HATRED for the Slavs, one and all. I suppose they have their historical reasons for holding the opinions that they do.
In the end, I'm glad us white folks are as different from each other as we are. Families need this patchwork of personalities and inclinations. It's what makes communal gatherings as exciting and dynamic as they are. Lord knows, haven't we all gotten more than a peek at what the homogenization of a global society would look like? Ick.
My mind is a whirl...Dignity and my tenuous grasp upon the masculine attributes I have somehow been able to retain in this era of the emasculated are all that keeps in check my urge to gush profusely about my utmost appreciation for the wisdom I have gleaned from these teachings in The Zone. Teachings are what they are. And, Rolo, were you to offer a concentrated mystical transformational program, I would surely entreaty you to take me on as a student.
This was great. I've also struggled in my writing to find themes or ideas that are profound and engaging but avoid the pitfall of "anti-transgressive transgression, edgy rightwing partisan narratives, on-the-nose metaphors".
You bring up the Joker several times on these podcasts. Wanted to direct you to the Psyop Cinema guys' research on the topic. The character of the Joker is part of a massive, decades spanning, spook-created spook-driven feedback loop psyop aimed at young men and society. He's not a positive/necessary character nor a natural artistic reaction to modernity or whatever. It's wrapped tightly with the incel, the mass shooter, the serial killer, and the celebrity assassin and how these archetypes are purposefuly promoted and then fed-back into popular (spook) culture.
Modernism, like irony, relies on the idea that "don't believe your eyes or ears, you'd like this is you were smarter and better educated." Kingsley Amis and Phillip Larkin denounced this notion, and demanded that any work of art should be immediately rewarding, though perhaps repaying further study, rather than the decadent idea that you had to first read a bunch of books in order to "understand what the artist is trying to convey" etc. I've found this to be a good rule of thumb. Don't sign up for the course that "explains" why X is good, if X doesn't seem to be, well, good.
English Lit was the first of the bogus majors, long before feminism, black studies, CRT etc. Places like Oxbridge would have thought it absurd to "study" books written in your own language, which you could read on the weekend if you wanted, but Modernists convinced people that you had to study real hard to understand Joyce or Eliot, and so Eng Lit was born. Even then, Oxford insisted on starting with Anglo Saxon, so that it was sort of a historical study of the language, like a real major.
Amis and Larkin were subjected to this, and hated it: "I can just about stand learning the filthy lingo [Olde English] but it's when I'm asked to appreciate how wonderful Beowulf is that it gets me down" -- Larkin. Interestingly, the Professor of Anglo Saxon was dreary, droning old Tolkien, and Amis and Larkin agreed he was the worst teacher of the lot.
I enjoyed the "ramble". I think you could do these solo talks more often if you were so inclined. I'm guessing they'd be well received by the Stalkers and provide a bit of extra context to the blog for your casuals (maybe chase them away, but maybe not!).
Left and right wing have become so ironic now that they really only hold any valid meaning to those that wear the corresponding badges on their lapels........two wings of the same bird.
Keep those longer essays coming Rurik, they're what I look forward to reading.
Slavlander - You could have made a top shelf court jester, who would tell truths about the powerful and , usually, survive.
Wait, I thought her name was Margarita Simonyan?
And I lived with a woman whose father is motherland Italian. She went over every year for a few weeks all throughout her childhood and continues to go over about once in every four or five years to visit her extended family. She will tell you that the male guineas, to a man, are pussy-whipped and ruled over by their women, and that they do so in an attempt at having to get out of working for a living, existing upon the meager earnings of their wop wives.
I spent a year as a paid subscriber to Chris Martenson's Peak Prosperity "community", as the PP'rs referred to it; ending it all last year. In the end I found the "connection" as hollow and unsatisfying as that diet of chips mentioned. One thing that Martenson did enjoin his followers to do as a direct and immediate response to the evil machinations of our overlords was to withdraw consent to being a willing or even an unwitting participant in all of the various mechanisms of control laced upon us at our very births. I first thought this strategy to be cowardly and pathetic; an instance of "too little, too late", and thus inadequate to meet the needs of the peasantry in our moment of long-suffering peril. But this is what I am being exposed to more and more in The Zone, albeit in a decidedly more informed and enlightening manner. It really is a splendid little germination of resistance which may, someday, generations down the line, sprout into a full-scale rebellion of the peasants. Here's hoping.
Yes, Western culture and society is in terminal decay. However, Britain had a strong faery tradition, carried by some aspects of folklore and music, particularly in the Celtic areas. Some of it may be recoverable.
R.J. Stewart is a musician, writer and follower of the Western Mystery Tradition who has written extensively about this (including about Rev. Kirk who supposedly journeyed into faeryland - and Thomas the Rhymer). His assertion is that some of these stories and songs carry the keys of magical initiation into the Other or Underworld. This is best shown in his book The Underworld Initiation, and mentioned in others. Here's a list of his books:
https://rjstewart.net/rjstewart-books.htm
You may also ponder the writings of the brilliant Classicist and mystic and Jungian, Peter Kingsley. His earlier work traced the origin of Greek and Western civilisation to it's shamanic roots. In 'Catafalque' he declares it dead and in a tomb whose ornamentation can still be admired.
https://peterkingsley.org/product/catafalque/
'But the hard truth of who Jung was and what he did is only a small part of what this book uncovers. It also exposes the full extent of that great river of esoteric tradition that stretches all the way back to the beginnings of our civilization. It unveils the surprising realities behind western philosophy, literature, poetry, prophecy—both ancient and modern.
In short, Peter Kingsley shows us not only who Carl Jung was but who we in the West are as well. Much more than a brilliant spiritual biography, Catafalque holds the key to understanding why our western culture is dying. And, an incantatory text in its own right, it shows the way to discovering what we in these times of great crisis must do.'
'“Peter Kingsley’s new book is not biographical but historical, in the truest sense of the word. It’s not about an individual or individuals but about the whole: about the impersonal and divine energy that manifests itself, time after time, in human form to allow a culture to be born or to grow. Jung, the alchemists, the Gnostics, Empedocles, Parmenides emerge from history as links in a golden chain through which wisdom, philosophy and science have been given and kept alive in the West. But this book also tells a different story—a story of repeated manipulation and exploitation, of devastation of the sacred, of catastrophic losses caused by egotism and the indiscriminate use of ‘rationality’, which is a story that started long ago in ancient Athens and now is approaching its tragic conclusion. The lament over the death of western culture isn’t Jung’s lament, or Kingsley’s. It’s the howling of nature itself, reminding us of our sacred roots and of our ultimate responsibility as human beings.”
Prof. Laura Gemelli Marciano—author of Parmenide and Die Vorsokratiker'
'“This is the deepest book I have ever read, and it’s straightening out my mind. Take a look and you will see for yourself.”
Это самая глубокая книжка, которую я когда-либо читал, и она выправляет мои мозги. Посмотрите и убедитесь в этом сами.
Misha Gorelkin—Mathematician and specialist in artificial intelligence, Voronezh State University, Russia'
where can i read about this journey into hollow earth aka faerie land?
https://rjstewart.net/robert-kirk.htm
Robert Kirk's 1692 journal.
It's better not to think of faerie land physically, although some of the stories present it as being possible to physically journey there - and perhaps return, both dangerous journeys dependent on the will of the faeries. 'Hollow earth' is a materialised debasement.
If you want to try to meet 'fairies', between two hawthorn bushes, you might like to visit Greenhills Farm in Galway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjF1pbloXZ8
In the 18th c. it was still possible to make faery contacts through the land in both Britain and America:
https://rjstewart.net/living-faery.htm
'...people of light who are within the body of the land...' The 'inner' land, not a 'hollow earth'.
Stewart, from personal experience and understanding of the symbolism expressed through folklore, explains it in 'The UnderWorld Initiation'.
https://rjstewart.net/underworld-initiation.htm
'..a powerful system of altering consciousness...the central symbols of which survive in songs and ballads whose roots lie in the Celtic and pre-Celtic past'.
Robin Artisson is an American occultist, who has written much on such themes, inspired by the ancient deities and spirits of the British landscape, gives a similar perspective, with more emphasis on the Neolithic beliefs and early-modern witchcraft, including the experiences of witches which Inquisitors misinterpreted literally. He gives an overview in 'The Witching Way of the Hollow Hill'.
https://www.amazon.com/Witching-Way-Hollow-Hill-ebook/dp/B00VL8LPZE/?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_w=1VuPF&content-id=amzn1.sym.bc3ba8d1-5076-4ab7-9ba8-a5c6211e002d&pf_rd_p=bc3ba8d1-5076-4ab7-9ba8-a5c6211e002d&pf_rd_r=131-0452545-1287241&pd_rd_wg=9ZZQK&pd_rd_r=2c91a468-9cb4-47f1-a3ca-7169c740135d&ref_=aufs_ap_sc_dsk
'This is a book that acts as a 'traveler's guide' to a hidden country within each human being. Primal peoples all over the world embrace the ideas discussed in this work: the animistic worldview, spiritual communion with the dead and the Unseen World, sorcery and magic.
Author and traditional witch Robin Artisson explores these mystical themes from the perspective of The Old Faiths and pre-Christian metaphysical impulses of Europe and the British Isles. Bringing a new perspective to these ancient practices and making them more accessible, this book is a key to the door that leads into the mythical dimension of each person, and every feature of the sacred landscape. It helps to unlock the hidden wisdom in folklore, shed light on the enigma of the human being, and manifest an experience of the wisdom of the Old Ways- insofar as a book can. This book is about getting out of books and back into the spiritual dimension of the Land itself, and requires considerable dedication and work.'
The modern 'scientific materialist' belief into which we have all been inculcated, acts as a massive hindrance to understanding and more fully participating in reality.
Clif High's notion that this is giving way to 'Ontological Physics' i.e. 'Animism', may be encouraging. https://clifhigh.substack.com/
Your excellent podcast discussion recommending subverting prevailing narratives, can be extended to considering the unquestioned, but very questionable, bases of physics, evolution and the religion of 'science'.
That 'Reality' is alive and conscious and interacts subtly with us may be seen in your own experience which you discussed in your podcast with Ghost, that when you became interested in chemtrails, you suddenly noticed a lot of information about them.
With luck and effort you may become able not only to read, but also to write, about this journey!
Rurik has kept Rolo's sense of humor. The fat wife shall not prevail. Slavic comedy is one of the reasons I keep coming back after the sobering stretches of topically depressing war news briefs. You and Nazi humorist Andrew Anglin help make our black pills go down easier.
I thought there'd be more on CRT, maybe connecting it historically to the Frankfurt School which spread it thru the universities in America. As a hippie I never bought into affirmative action, the first step beyond fair play for Negroes. I remember the turmoil in Boston over bussing. Even controlled media coverage couldn't hide the white plight of the locals.
interesting combo of writers.
I was born just after the bussing imbroglio, but I grew up in hardscrabble Lowell in the 80s, and it was definitely both a topic of conversation amongst the proles as well as fodder for history lessons in the public school system, and given rather fair treatment, too, surprisingly. Why these parents took the stand they did and how their children suffered as a consequence of the inevitable have been all but lost to posterity. But, certain real white people who still stalk this land will never forget.
I know we had a complicated relationship, but I always believed in you. This is not ironic I mean it. And it might be cryptic but ... whatever. This solo podcast is one of the best things you have ever done. Very few people grow. One of the best things on the internet.
" This solo podcast is one of the best things you have ever done. Very few people grow. One of the best things on the internet."
Hear, hear!
Great episode tho! I enjoyed this excourse into this territory amd noticed many parallels to what I have experienced.
And, for anyone who might take offense by dint of Rurik's swipes at non-Slavic European ethnicities( i.e. Anglos and such, though it does tend to be mostly Anglos he savages) let's all try to remember we white folk used to be made of sterner stuff and could weather heavy criticism of our various shortcomings or even the supposed shortcomings others foisted upon us a la the classic comedy stylings of stereotype jokes. It wouldn't be a stereotype if there weren't an element of truth contained within it. Rurik advocating for his kind is healthy. Rather than get annoyed that he's savaging my people(diluted Scots-Irish by way of two centuries in America, here) I take it in and ruminate upon it for a good long while before forming any substantial opinions as to the verisimilitude of the accusation. And, by and large, he has a point. We Anglos are a pretty brutish, self-affected, dispassionate lot who wish for the ruination of our neighbors so that our status may be elevated not by dint of our efforts at self-improvement but rather our efforts at laying waste to the competition. Knowing this about myself, I can then take steps to take notice of this tendency in future interactions and strive to do better.
That being said, I've known a few mother-country Slavs in my time, Belarusians, to be exact. I worked with two of them(males) for a year at a restaurant and seduced one of their chickadees, as she had taken to be a bar fly at the same. They were among a group of about a half dozen who had all scammed the US government into granting them temporary work visas which stipulated they not leave the state of New York, but they all absconded and ended up in New Hampshire where the rents were cheaper. They were scoundrels, one and all. They cheated their visa sponsors, they cheated their employers and they cheated their American "friends" and they cheated each other. They were indolent and lazy and gave off the air of feeling entitled to all they could get their hands on, by hook or by crook. Perhaps this was just an example of the detritus which this modern world makes of us all until such time as we reach an age where introspection compels us to do better with ourselves. Perhaps this is what all Slavs are like. I'm not sure. Rurik definitely knows about Anglos because he lived in the States for a number of years and I only had this one moment in time. I can tell you when I lived in Germany for two years the Deutschers were not shy about professing their utter HATRED for the Slavs, one and all. I suppose they have their historical reasons for holding the opinions that they do.
In the end, I'm glad us white folks are as different from each other as we are. Families need this patchwork of personalities and inclinations. It's what makes communal gatherings as exciting and dynamic as they are. Lord knows, haven't we all gotten more than a peek at what the homogenization of a global society would look like? Ick.
Bully for the tapestry of white civilization!
My mind is a whirl...Dignity and my tenuous grasp upon the masculine attributes I have somehow been able to retain in this era of the emasculated are all that keeps in check my urge to gush profusely about my utmost appreciation for the wisdom I have gleaned from these teachings in The Zone. Teachings are what they are. And, Rolo, were you to offer a concentrated mystical transformational program, I would surely entreaty you to take me on as a student.
I think my approach would only work for INTJs and or some combination of T and I
How old are you? 33? Christ time :) Death and rebirth. And I am Scorpio.
What was the anti white message in Severance?
the outie mixed race couples.
the evil company being run by bland, stale, fuddy-duddy, stereotypical psychotic intergenerational whites who are racially insensitive.
the gay romance with christopher walken was unnecessary too.
This is top podcast
This was great. I've also struggled in my writing to find themes or ideas that are profound and engaging but avoid the pitfall of "anti-transgressive transgression, edgy rightwing partisan narratives, on-the-nose metaphors".
You bring up the Joker several times on these podcasts. Wanted to direct you to the Psyop Cinema guys' research on the topic. The character of the Joker is part of a massive, decades spanning, spook-created spook-driven feedback loop psyop aimed at young men and society. He's not a positive/necessary character nor a natural artistic reaction to modernity or whatever. It's wrapped tightly with the incel, the mass shooter, the serial killer, and the celebrity assassin and how these archetypes are purposefuly promoted and then fed-back into popular (spook) culture.
Anyway, I implore you to check out their Joker Cycle essay for the thesis (https://im1776.com/prints/issue-3/the-joker-cycle/) or some of their podcast analysis:
Recent review of the Joker musical: https://overcast.fm/+AAnufJW6XXI
First joker cycle epi: https://psyop-cinema.com/ep-21-the-dark-self-joker-1/
Modernism, like irony, relies on the idea that "don't believe your eyes or ears, you'd like this is you were smarter and better educated." Kingsley Amis and Phillip Larkin denounced this notion, and demanded that any work of art should be immediately rewarding, though perhaps repaying further study, rather than the decadent idea that you had to first read a bunch of books in order to "understand what the artist is trying to convey" etc. I've found this to be a good rule of thumb. Don't sign up for the course that "explains" why X is good, if X doesn't seem to be, well, good.
English Lit was the first of the bogus majors, long before feminism, black studies, CRT etc. Places like Oxbridge would have thought it absurd to "study" books written in your own language, which you could read on the weekend if you wanted, but Modernists convinced people that you had to study real hard to understand Joyce or Eliot, and so Eng Lit was born. Even then, Oxford insisted on starting with Anglo Saxon, so that it was sort of a historical study of the language, like a real major.
Amis and Larkin were subjected to this, and hated it: "I can just about stand learning the filthy lingo [Olde English] but it's when I'm asked to appreciate how wonderful Beowulf is that it gets me down" -- Larkin. Interestingly, the Professor of Anglo Saxon was dreary, droning old Tolkien, and Amis and Larkin agreed he was the worst teacher of the lot.