MashReads Podcast: 'Voyage of the Sable Venus' is poetic dissection of art, language and race

In his classic Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare famously asks "What's in a name?" According to Robin Coste Lewis and her poem "Voyage of the Sable Venus," — Everything.

"Voyage" is one long poem told only using the titles and descriptions of works of art that depict black women. (You can find an excerpt here.)

This week on the MashReads Podcast, we are joined by Mashable's Social Good editor and resident poet Matt Petronzio to read and discuss Robin Coste Lewis' poem 'Voyage of the Sable Venus.'

Then we talk about our favorite books that were inspired by works of art, including Doll Studies: Forensics by Carol Guess, The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt, Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde and Skinny Legs and All by Tom Robbins.

And as always, we end the show with One Last Question: what books, tv shows, etc do we recommend?

• Matt recommends Surrounded By Friends by Matthew Rohrer.

• Aliza recommends Sarah J. Maas' Throne of Glass series. "If you enjoy epic fantasy, please read the series." She also recommends watching the classic film Clue.

• Peter recommends listening to The Run-Up, a new politics podcast from The New York Times.

• And MJ recommends reading the articles from all of Gawker Media's Senior Week articles especially "Hillary, Let Us Write Your Tweets" and "Cut My Hair Right," an hyper-literary, first person narrative of a dog getting a haircut.

And if you're looking for more book news, don't forget to follow MashReads on Facebook and Twitter.