Celebrating with a brightly coloured liqueur!

- not Shakespeare’s words from “Tokyo These Days” by Taiyo Matsumoto #ShakespeareSunday

“… roughly 9m piglets die every year in Denmark, more than 25,000 a day.” www.theguardian.com/world/2026/j...

very sad news …

'Average person eats six times more chicken than in 1961, UN report finds' 🤯 🐔 A trend that's fuelling ecological destruction from the Amazon (rainforests cut down to grow soy feed for chickens) to the River Wye (full of chicken shit): www.theguardian.com/environment/...

#IPL final halftime show!

John Milton coughs politely and points to book six of Paradise Lost ….

#T20 tonight at Worcester - loud, brash, colourful, local rivals, full house, getting a little giddy with beer & wickets falling

Tonight in REP we read Thierry & Theodoret (1617/18) in which Brunhild is taxed with hot tainters (and I think we all know how that feels at the moment).

Shandy

Blimey, in a search for a particular book #Google #AI just killed off its author, a very senior #Shakespeare scholar! (I mean he’s quite old, but not “late”)

Introduce yourself with ten bands/musicians you’ve seen live: David Byrne Antony & The Johnsons Kraftwerk Richard Thompson Tom Waits The Stranglers Mano Negra Les Negresses Vertes Mathilde Santing The Communards

Gamesters of #Makerfield: (Labour’s internal psychodrama S2.16)

“Brutto nome, pare una bestemmia.” - from Andreas by Hugo von Hofmannsthal (tr. Marie D Hottinger)

Reform have been ousted from Worcestershire County Council control, (Farage previously did say he wishes the party "hadn't bothered" taking control of it) www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Tonight in REP we read Rollo, Duke of Normandy, as performed by The King’s Men in 1617.

106 years ago today, on May 7th, an undergraduate at Christchurch College, Oxford, drank a glass of port then left through the main gates for a walk. I've been thinking about him, & his walk, for years now. It's taken a long time for me to figure out why - why I've kept returning, near obsessed.

Tonight in REP we resume our readings of The King’s Men repertoire, marking the 1617 revival of The Alchemist (in our own reduced version, meaning we can begin at the usual time of 7.30pm despite Ben Jonson.) - and coming this season: Dukes, Duchesses & Queens, from Normandy, Malfi, Corinth & more

OMG! Here known as “Gallery of Horror” this is a film of such wondrous awfulness, that having been accidentally recorded on VHS in the middle of the night in Australia nearly fifty years ago it became a legend in my family. Just recommended to me by Prime Video! watch.amazon.co.uk/detail?gti=a...

At @ashmoleanmuseum.bsky.social in Oxford today I noticed that the Sultan’s daughter (c.1630) has a little boost to her height, making her “nearer to heaven … by the altitude of a chopine” as Hamlet says.

The Judgement of Paris (frankly he looks a little embarrassed) on one panel of a casket, Venice c.1400-30 - today at the @ashmoleanmuseum.bsky.social

Film you've watched more than six times with a gif. Hard mode: no Star Trek, Star Wars, LOTR, Marvel, Disney, or Ghibli.

Tea will be taken when the half moon is directly above the tower of the Cathedral; the ancient regulations regarding astronomical timekeeping are quite strict on this, so there’s no point complaining. 🏏 🌖 🫖

Multitasking as the week ends: Worcestershire out in the middle; Bach (Jesu, meine Freude) on headphones (not visible); ‘Andreas’ by Hugo von Hoffmannsthal on Kindle; pale ale in foreground.

Cricket at @worcestershireccc.bsky.social - first home game of the season 🏏

“Athena stood behind Achilles, son of Peleus, and grabbed him by his chestnut hair.” (The Iliad Book 1, tr. Wilson)

Celebratory babgulyás tonight

“Doran’s love of both #Shakespeare and Sher burns through the book.” www.theguardian.com/books/2026/a...

Péter Magyar victory speech: "We want to make a country where no one is persecuted because they think differently or because someone loves in a different way to others." He may not have campaigned as a liberal. But this is a huge change of direction and rhetoric from Orbán’s anti-LGBTQ+ crusade.

🇭🇺 - #TISZA - a river, a shoe, and now a victorious Orbán-ejecting political party (and a very big party in Budapest, I’m sure). www.tiszacipo.com/shoes/comfor...

— got my political shoes on #Tisza

hello—on Monday 20 April @curzon.com Soho is showing Lost For Words, a beautiful film about language, nature & hope based on The Lost Words by me & Jackie Morris. Jackie & I will both be there for a Q&A. Please let others know who might be interested—& come join us! www.curzon.com/films/lost-f...

For #UnicornDay, an angry Armenian unicorn. — from the play Bussy D’Ambois (1603) by George Chapman

A Moment’s Escape by Richard Church (from The Solitary Man, 1941)

The Fallow Field by Richard Church (from Lyrical Poems, 1942-47)

The beauty of the returning County Championship 🏏 - @worcestershireccc.bsky.social slowly batting out a tense & hard-earned draw in the early evening sunshine of the fourth & final day at Derby.

Illustrations for a long weekend (a short series) The Chancery Lane Safe Deposit: Its History & Usefulness (1886) - Cover / Plan* / Identification Lobby / Ladies’ Writing Room. (* Does the plan provides a little too much information; such as might be useful to those with felonious intent?) 1/x

In which the Daleks kill Brian Cant … www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

#Bosnia ! ⚽️ !

Renaissance Society of America (#RSA) ending access to Early English Books Online (#EEBO) in July; which I suppose means me ending my membership of RSA. — does anyone know of any other way an independent scholar can get reasonably priced access to EEBO?

Rising Conservative Star Just Guy Wearing Nazi Armband And Crying https://theonion.com/rising-conservative-star-just-guy-wearing-nazi-armband-1849855062/

So… I can now watch #TNTSports via the new #HBOmax app (but not on the old #Discovery+ app) and I can watch #HBO shows on the #NowTV app, but not on the #HBOmax app. Got it.

Pop Leo asked if he should put on gloves to turn pages in the gorgeous Renaissance Bible and the librarian explained why it’s better to do so with bare hands. Glorious reaction. Every rare books librarian & archivist feeling very seen, I gather. www.instagram.com/reel/DUcpEBY... #BookHistory

A reminder to REP members that despite our text of Volpone being a bespoke reduced version for the King’s Men 1617 revival - known as the #SlimNano edit - we are still starting at 7pm UK time (because Ben Jonson)

This is a dance off. If you see this, repost a dance, or you’re eliminated.

Farage is a piece of absolute garbage. (I know this isn’t news, but worth repeating when he finds new ways to prove it to be true.)

"a delight in the contemplation of bestial vice, and the expression of low sarcasm, which is, I believe, the most hopeless state into which the human mind can fall" --- Santa Maria Formosa, Venice. --- Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, 3. #grotesque #art #architecture #renaissance #Italy

Tonight in REP we read The Chances written by John Fletcher for The King’s Men in 1617