Deidre Lynch
@drbibliomane.bsky.social
She/her, 1st gen, Canadian who's at Harvard but isn't OF Harvard--posts in a personal capacity, mainly about books (w/ cats & flowers thrown in). Now writing an itty-bitty book that aims to be a literary & media history of scrap. https://deidrelynch.org
You can/should read Emily Wilson's latest take on the Odyssey, but I'm logging on to convey my hairdresser's reaction. She was AGHAST that Nolan, with his million $ budget, gave Matt Damon ONLY 6 hair extensions. As a result, his hair did not blow around properly, & that ruined the film for her.
Also of interest to #histmed #histsex folks: @ceyingst.bsky.social's essay on trans information history and female soldier/sailor/surgeon ballads. I was lucky enough to read an earlier version of this and it blew me away:
Dr Sam Bailey@18thcenturysam.bsky.social · 2d agoGorgeous gorgeous special issue on queer bibliography... www.euppublishing.com/toc/lih/42/2
Every academic knows about doing well without praise.
Deidre Lynch@drbibliomane.bsky.social · 2d agoRegency-era mugs, gifts for #19thc children who managed to stick to their books & learn to read. Their mottoes are grim but maybe necessary admonitions, too, for the academic who's soldiering on while coming to terms with the fact that it's August now. I.e. I feel seen. #AcademicLife
Call For Proposals: Conference on Families in Early American and Atlantic Worlds April 15-17, 2027 Hosted by the John Carter Brown Library (Co-chairs Julie Hardwick and Karin Wulf) Details at: forms.gle/QWcB23XGbwu6...
Regency-era mugs, gifts for #19thc children who managed to stick to their books & learn to read. Their mottoes are grim but maybe necessary admonitions, too, for the academic who's soldiering on while coming to terms with the fact that it's August now. I.e. I feel seen. #AcademicLife
Gorgeous gorgeous special issue on queer bibliography... www.euppublishing.com/toc/lih/42/2
Edinburgh University Press Journals - Table of Contents - lih: Vol 42, No 2
euppublishing.com
Modern equivalent of the funeral games for Patroclus in the Iliad , book 23
The Onion@theonion.com · 3d agoMoment Of Silence Followed By Hot Dog Race
This could be an episode from my childhood (including the hardly-reined-in disdain for younger sibling). 💯
Tom Gauld@tomgauld.bsky.social · 3d agoMy latest books cartoon for @theguardian.com
Friends who read and buy books: where online do you buy used books? I don’t want to use Abebooks (owned by amazon), or Better World Books (they sell to AI companies). Other suggestions? (US based)
"When the first of August came round, the Professor realized he had pleasantly trifled away nearly two months at a task which should have taken little more than a week." -Willa Cather (from The Professor's House, 1925)
Hello everyone, I found it! From the book by the reputed 18th century. founder of orthopedics!
Deidre Lynch@drbibliomane.bsky.social · 4d agoFriends in #18thc European studies, please help. I recall--but so vaguely--a famous allegorical image of the process of education, which (help me here) depicts a crooked tree being made to grow straight, or so I think? What is it? Where is it? Thank you!
Friends in #18thc European studies, please help. I recall--but so vaguely--a famous allegorical image of the process of education, which (help me here) depicts a crooked tree being made to grow straight, or so I think? What is it? Where is it? Thank you!
If you're in need of a laugh, head over to Dorval Ave to this neighbourhood bad joke dispenser. Caution: If you are allergic to groaners, steer clear. #westendwhimsy
I've just taken the plunge with this mammoth novel/family chronicle, and it seems promising though daunting. (Pen included in photo for scale.) This novel will probably be my last big read of the summer. Is anyone else embarking on _Effingers_? @nyrb-imprints.bsky.social
Found out from my book group that there's a silent film (1930) adapting & also updating this Zola novel. The opening sequence shows us the department store's ultra-modern methods of advertising; sandwich board men! leafletting Paris from a fleet of airplanes! It's fabulous--I would love to teach it
Deidre Lynch@drbibliomane.bsky.social · last wk.I feel I must post about something that makes me happy, & right now that's Sheila Heti saying that Zola's Au Bonheur des Dames is 1 of her favourite novels. #19thc The New Yorker had asked her which book had taught her most about another medium. So cool to think of the department store as a medium!
We are putting the numerous cardboard "cat scratch lounges" in the recycling bin this afternoon and feeling both heartbroken and kind of foolish.
“You will have heard that I am going to commence Poet in print; & to-morrow my works go to the press. I expect it will be a volume of about 200 pages. It is just the last foolish action I intend to do…” Robert Burns’s 𝘗𝘰𝘦𝘮𝘴, 𝘊𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘧𝘭𝘺 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘚𝘤𝘰𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘩 𝘋𝘪𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘤𝘵 published #OTD, 31 July, 1786 #BookHistory
When will they reorganize varsity ATHLETICS? Oh wait, that will be never…
I’m sad but also mad. My experience volunteering through PBH made me who I am today. Shame on the admin, who sit on billions and nickel and dime units such as this.
My time volunteering with a Phillips Brook House program--becoming a big brother figure for a middle schooler in Boston's Mission Hill community--was one of the best parts by far of my @harvard.edu experience. Fuck the consultants who recommended this, & the administration for going along with it.
Deidre Lynch@drbibliomane.bsky.social · 5d agoThe latest, heartbreaking casualty of austerity & reorganization at my home institution: Phillips Brooks House was set up 126 years ago, in the recognition that community service could & should be central to undergraduate education. Now it's being dismantled. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...
The latest, heartbreaking casualty of austerity & reorganization at my home institution: Phillips Brooks House was set up 126 years ago, in the recognition that community service could & should be central to undergraduate education. Now it's being dismantled. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...
Nearly Half of Phillips Brooks House Staff Positions Impacted by FAS Restructuring | News | The Harvard Crimson
The Phillips Brooks House was the hardest-hit Harvard College unit by share of staff positions in a recent round of layoffs tied to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences’ sweeping administrative overhaul, ...
thecrimson.com
As Mary says, outrage after outrage and cruelty after cruelty these days (and on top of everything else, all of it happening really very late in the summer--classes start BEFORE Labor Day).
Mary Lewis@profmarylewis.bsky.social · 7d agoFirst it was the writing center, now Dudley House. This was the place where people like married veterans & other students who had reasons to live off campus found community at Harvard. I refuse to believe this was extremely costly. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...
Something that shouldn’t get lost in this: Jim Herron has done a fantastic job of running the Harvard Writing Project, which helps faculty across the disciplines integrate writing into their courses. I was proud to work for the HWP when I was there, and for an exceptional colleague.
Before I moved to ISU I taught for Expos, where I recommended that all my students visit the Writing Center. Many did, and all had excellent experiences. So much of that is due to Jane, an incredible teacher and mentor. All Harvard students deserve the opportunity to learn from her.
Harvard College Lays Off Writing Center Director, Consolidates Center | News | The Harvard Crimson
The Harvard College Writing Center will no longer operate as a standalone unit after its director was laid off and its functions were consolidated as part of a restructuring in the Faculty of Arts and...
thecrimson.com
We had to say goodbye yesterday, after 14 years of cuddles, to our lovely Mr. Bean, who had been suffering a lot. The silence (he was a talker, right up to the end) is feeling horrible. Does any one want to volunteer, by way of cheering me up a bit, to share anecdotes about their feline friends?
Holy shit Jane Rosenzweig was my freshman expository writing teacher back in 2004 A genius and a true defender of human ingenuity Her firing by Harvard is fucking outrageous DOWN WITH THE CHATBOTS
Mary Lewis@profmarylewis.bsky.social · last wk.It‘s quite possible that with this move, @harvard.edu could become the only Ivy League university without a writing center. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...
www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...
In Defense of the Harvard College Writing Center | Opinion | The Harvard Crimson
As current and former Harvard College Writing Center tutors, we write to condemn the dissolution of the Writing Center as an independent entity and the laying off of its director, Jane Rosenzweig.
thecrimson.com
This is one of the most absurd decisions by higher ed administrators that I can recall in recent (or even longer) memory. This is an absolute, irrefutable signal that the leaders of Harvard puts no value in the student experience of LEARNING. It's a joke and should be seen as hugely discrediting.
Mary Lewis@profmarylewis.bsky.social · last wk.It‘s quite possible that with this move, @harvard.edu could become the only Ivy League university without a writing center. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...
I feel I must post about something that makes me happy, & right now that's Sheila Heti saying that Zola's Au Bonheur des Dames is 1 of her favourite novels. #19thc The New Yorker had asked her which book had taught her most about another medium. So cool to think of the department store as a medium!
