L'historien Carlo Ginzburg est mort à 87 ans. Pionnier de la micro-histoire, il a fait de la rencontre avec l’inattendu le moteur de sa méthode et de son écriture. Pour (re)découvrir son parcours et sa pensée, écoutez l'entretien qu’il nous avait accordé en 2025. ➡️ https://l.franceculture.fr/cPy

"All of this is a colossal and entirely avoidable act of self-harm on the part of a country whose higher education sector has until recently been one of the few things it had going for it." newleftreview.org/sidecar/post...

Lorna Finlayson, Irreversible — Sidecar

On Britain’s universities.

newleftreview.org

Announcing a new De Gruyter Brill book series - Early Modern Visual and Material Cultures Series Editor: Allison Levy, Brown University brill.com/page/forthco... We welcome your book proposals! Feel free to DM me for more info, or email me at Erika.Gaffney@degruyterbrill.com

Remarkable drawing by Frances Yates from 1952, as she was studying Giordano Bruno's art of memory. This is the lead image for Relics, a new student-curated exhibition at the @warburginstitute.bsky.social. Much looking forward to seeing this up close.... mailchi.mp/sas/news-fro....

Looking forward to discussing my book tomorrow at the @mfoxford.bsky.social with brilliant colleagues @manymanyplies.bsky.social, @lukeosullivan.bsky.social & Emma Claussen. 12.30-2.00 if you happen to be in Oxford! 💚

Walking through the world with a toddler who waves at every single passer by is a real litmus test of societal morale.

Newly restored online: Leonardo da Vinci's Notebook, also known as the Codex Arundel (Arundel MS 263), written in his characteristic mirror-writing with diagrams, drawings, brief texts, and personal notes. You can consult the entire manuscript online now: searcharchives.bl.uk/catalog/040-...

Happy birthday to Montaigne, and to my book! This product of love and errance, now available @academic.oup.com.

Early modern Frenchies! Oxford Modern Languages/Trinity College is looking for a Departmental Lecturer, a 3 year position to replace me while I'm on secondment my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...

𝘔𝘢𝘥𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘖𝘭𝘰𝘯. A French spirit that reenacts a moment of ‘yck’. Yck was a regular emotion of the 7th century used to express a moment of irredeemable disgust, a cognate of the modern ‘ick’ (OED).

If you're looking for a sign to switch careers: this is the sign.

Annibale Carracci, Diana and Endymion, 1597-1602, Fresco, Galleria Farnese (Palazzo Farnese, Rome). Francesco Albani wrote, “When Annibale was alive, I heard him say that he wanted to redo his Diana, observing that it seemed as if she was plucking lice off her beloved Endymion.”

Something we don't talk about enough is Caravaggio's humour.

i know we're all busy but i just overheard a plumber say "parlez-vous français ? non ? you motherfuckers don't even speak french, do you" to a pair of french bulldogs

all this is both foolish and unnecessary

Maybe this is the year I read Moby Dick.

Virgin of the Dry Tree. Tiny, fascinating devotional work by Petrus Christus, whose day was today.

Italy in 2025? Opening up the literature supplement of a major newspaper to find an 'interview' from heaven with the recently canonised millennial saint, San Carlo Acutis, entirely written by AI.

Ready to start a movement that argues universities should spend money on their core functions, rather than flashy nonsense. Such as teaching and research for example.

New analysis of the Turin Strike Papyrus—a detailed account from 1157 BCE—shows how artisans building the royal tombs at Deir el-Medina staged a coordinated walkout after going 18 days without grain rations. tinyurl.com/29822yb2 #ShareGoodNewsToo

Collection online - The so-called “Strike Papyrus” written by Amunnakht

More than 4.000 of the approximately 40.000 objects in Museo Egizio’s collection are accessible here. All data are constantly updated, thanks to the continuous study and documentation of the objects.…

tinyurl.com

Nothing like compiling your index to find out what your book is actually about. So far, it seems 'ambivalence', 'chance', 'control', 'death' and 'hands'.

'These days, I stress that close reading is not magic. Its power lies in argument: always vulnerable, nothing simpler and yet nothing harder.' Loved this both tender and sobering defence of close reading: www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...

The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review

Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.

bostonreview.net

Fun times to be in Modern Languages.

We're launching a really exciting new MSt in Creative Translation - details here. Oxford has a wealth of brilliant translator energy and I am excited to see what will come out of this. Please forward to likely sorts! www.mod-langs.ox.ac.uk/news/2025/11...

MSt in Creative Translation

The Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages is delighted to announce the launch of a new course, the MSt in Creative Translation.

mod-langs.ox.ac.uk

I wrote a book on Montaigne! Here's some proof(s).

Early Modern caption competition - literally (c.1680)

absorbing #ValentinesDay BBCFreeThinking BBCRadio4 lineup on the many meanings of romantic love. Suffice it to say Ann & I were dining out—in Perth 🥰. Rana Mitter with Susie Orbach @armanddangour.bsky.social @rhymeswithditto.bsky.social Catherine Wheatley, Mary Harrod www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

BBC Radio 4 - Free Thinking, All we need is love

Susie Orbach, Armand D'Angour, Vittoria Fallanca, Mary Harrod and Catherine Wheatley.

bbc.co.uk

Going to be putting forward my best defenses for the anti-love camp this Valentine's Day, on BBC Radio 4: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

BBC Radio 4 - Free Thinking, All we need is love

Susie Orbach, Armand D'Angour, Vittoria Fallanca, Mary Harrod and Catherine Wheatley.

bbc.co.uk