DRAGONS BE HERE AND THERE PART 2
YESTERDAY, LRB REVIEWER Tom Shippey shared Dragon lore gleaned from Daniel Ogden’s The Dragon in the West: From Ancient Myth to Modern Legend. Here in Part 2, tidbits are about … Continue reading
DRAGONS BE HERE AND THERE PART 1
TOM SHIPPEY SUMMARIZES it well in “Don’t Lie on Your Gold,” the London Review of Books, June 9, 2022: “Who wouldn’t want a friend that could hoard treasure, breathe fire, … Continue reading
CASTAWAY LISTENING PART 2
YESTERDAY, MIRANDA CARTER introduced Desert Island Discs, a long-running BBC interview program, its theme describing desirable musical accompaniments to castaway island living. We continue today with tidbits about this, together … Continue reading
CASTAWAY LISTENING PART 1
THE IDEA OF BEING a castaway on a desert island seems increasingly pleasant these days. The London Review of Books, June 6, 2022 offers “My Castaway This Week, Miranda Carter … Continue reading
ON THE ADVISING OF ETHICS
TODAY’S TIMELESS QUOTE was inspired, perhaps, by Oscar Wilde: “To lose one’s ethics adviser may be regarded as a misfortune, to lose two looks like carelessness.” Proof of its timeliness … Continue reading
DESIGNING FOR THE STAGE
YEARS AGO I HAD youthful aspiration of a career in theater stage design. If blame be necessary (though it isn’t), it was the influence of National Thespian Society and dear … Continue reading
A THEATRICAL SPIN—AND ONE THING LEADS TO ANOTHER
BACK IN 2013, the Met produced a Live in HD presentation of Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda, the bel canto opera based on Friedrich Schiller’s 1800 play Maria Stuart. This Met production … Continue reading
LRB IN THE SKY WITH DIAMONDS
SOMETIMES A BOOK REVIEW might reveal overly much. Like that kid’s comment, “This book tells me more about whales than I wanted to know.” This doesn’t disparage the writing, either … Continue reading
NEW ENGLAND ON THE AZOV
THE NORMAN CONQUEST OF 1066 did more than introduce French words into the language becoming Middle English. As described by Michael Wood in BBC History, May 2022, “… when the … Continue reading
A TIME WARP OF INTERIOR DECOR PART 2
THERE’S A TIME WARP in discussing Emily Genauer’s Modern Interiors Today and Tomorrow, given that its “Tomorrow” began in the year 1939. No matter, though. Genauer’s account of interior decor … Continue reading
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