Seeing my kids engage and ask really good, even hard questions about the content of the Obama Center and where the country has gone since 2016 tells me they freaking nailed its programming.
Kevin Manzel
@kevinmanzel.bsky.social
History. Music. Books. Running. Learning. Always learning. VP Content Strategy, The Great Courses.
It was an incredible, moving experience for the whole family. Cannot recommend enough visiting it.
In Chicago with my wife and kids, and they can’t stop saying how nice everyone is. Thank you, hometown, for showing them your best side ❤️
As part of my Amazon prime video subscription I have added the Great Courses collection. I'm really impressed, there is a ton here I'd love to watch, but you can't search it. All you can do is scroll through the whole list. It's maddening. www.amazon.com/Prime-Video-...
Amazon.com
amazon.com
Just in time for Communism to hit the headlines again, my new book "The Screen and the Mirror" has a whole chapter on "The Manchurian Candidate" and modern-day McCarthyism! And you can read that chapter for free at @christandpopculture.com. #booksky #filmsky christandpopculture.com/capc-exclusi...
CAPC Exclusive: Read the First Chapter From Gina Dalfonzo's The Screen and the Mirror - Christ and Pop Culture
Gina Dalfonzo's new book considers how flawed movie characters can teach us about our own fallen natures.
christandpopculture.com
I grew up near Chicago. I lived in Chicago. I still want a Great Course on Chicago. Give me all the history, all the great writers, all the great immigrant cultures. And save a lecture for the great food.
The Greenland shark does not fully mature until approximately 150 yrs old. In other words, around the same age as men.
One thing immediately clear from my Iceland course is how resilient its people are after repeated famines, a brutal environment, constant threat of volcanoes and glacial flooding. Real life is a saga for them.
How lucky are we that he's still out here entertaining us at 90... www.chicagotribune.com/2026/07/26/b...
Review: Happy 90th birthday, Buddy Guy — you still set the standard for getting the blues
As members of his family and the capacity crowd at the Chicago Theatre serenaded Buddy Guy with Stevie Wonder’s “Happy Birthday” on Saturday night, Guy began a wrenching guitar solo over his band’s ac...
chicagotribune.com
Prepping for my upcoming trip to Iceland by reviewing Ken Harl’s old but wonderful Great Course on the Vikings. Already have visiting the ancient Law Rock on my must-visit list.
It should be a law that “watery grave” appears in every single work of historical fiction. It’s maybe my favorite phrase ever.
Is Howard U so flush with cash they can literally unenroll 502 freshman who had the funds and intention to pay their tuition on the timeline they understood? No school just auto-unenrolls students for a missed deadline. I feel horrible for those kids.
Repost @mickydolenz: This month in 1967, @themonkees released “Pleasant Valley Sunday.” Written by the extraordinary Gerry Goffin and Carole King, the song reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 11 in the U.K. And somehow, it still feels just as much fun to sing all these years later.
Late notice but do you want to hear a FREE live talk w/ Q&A on the making of early medieval Morocco by esteemed scholar Dr. Eve MacDonald today at 2 pm EST? Of course, you do! Register here and see you there. riverside.com/webinar/regi...
Riverside Studio
riverside.com
Had no idea that many scholars think the last book of The Odyssey is not original to the story. Sort of makes Nolan’s divergence from the text perhaps more reasonable? Maybe?
If I had to wager a guess, I’d say Christopher Nolan watched Elizabeth Vandiver’s Great Course on The Odyssey. Maybe unconsciously even, there are specific lines almost quoted from her course and super-specific things she said she found significant that he has key scenes of.
I’m no genius but methinks breaching Troy’s fortifications in Nolan’s Odyssey was not really about “Oh, let’s show fans the Trojan Horse in action”
I always love hearing about great players like Tommy Gwynn, Orville Hershiser, and Darnell Strawberry.
Maybe painfully obvious, but to me the overarching concept of xenia in The Odyssey is what makes it feel so relevant, even urgent right now.
Wrote up a description for a potential course on Jack the Ripper in Victorian context and I’ve never wanted customers to vote more for something.
Getting ready for The Odyssey by listening to Elizabeth Vandiver’s positively wonderful “The Odyssey of Homer” during my morning runs. It’s such perfect prep for me to be absolutely obnoxious in the theater with my family 🤓
I just found some highly rated historical fiction by an author I enjoy but never knew wrote historical fiction and I’m so freaking excited.
URGENT CASTING: Queen Mary 2 🚢 Immediate speaker vacancy for Eastbound Transatlantic! 📅 July 28 – Aug 4, 2026 (Voyage M617) 🗣️ Need 4 talks: UK Social History or Royal Family ⏳ Deadline: Mon, July 13 @ Noon GMT Apply with talk titles to casting@pastpreservers.com #CruiseSpeakers #QueenMary2
Thank you @danielmendelsohn.bsky.social for elevating a silly argument into a profound question of Who Was Helen? The Beautiful Truth About Helen of Troy www.nytimes.com/2026/07/10/o...
Opinion | The Beautiful Truth About Helen of Troy
nytimes.com
Charles Williams truly does sound like the oddest Inkling. Based on this first sentence, tho, I might need to read his novel War in Heaven: “The telephone bell was ringing wildly, but without result, since there was no-one in the room but the corpse.”
It’s probably already been made, but I really want a series on The Cretaceous Perambulators’ walking tours.
Got a 10k run in despite the 90+ heat largely thanks to the exquisite company of @sorinahiggins.bsky.social teaching her new Great Course on The Inklings. Historical, biographical, religious, social contexts and more are making it a delight.
Learned today how Iceland’s volcanic eruption in 1783 had a strong long-term impact leading to the French Revolution. Natural events that change history in unexpected ways is absolutely fascinating.