To start my #PhantomsFriday, something by contemporary artist John Kenn Mortensen, also known as Don Kenn. #ghost #ghosts #weirdart #DanishArt #artsky

CFP: Illuminating the Dark! Night Histories from Byzantion to Istanbul en.iae.org.tr/Event-Detail...

What I’m wearing to the Bluesky Valentines Day Ball

The vile Victorians were funnier than they looked, using brutal Valentine’s Day cards to mock people they didn’t fancy much.

Our friend the Apennine Yellow-bellied Toad lives in southern Italy! They only lay a few eggs at a time but are believed to breed several times a year! They also have heart-shaped pupils! A great toad for Valentine's Day! (photo by Giacomo Gola)

Find out about Vinegar Valentines - by our PhD researcher Grace Marks 🖤

Fresh from their water baths, four Polaroid emulsion lifts (snowdrops and three Aurora shots). Light isn’t great where they’re drying and it’s only ever really clear how the colours are working once they’re set but pretty happy with these!

I'm super excited to be chatting to The Byron Society about how volcanoes have shaped the Gothic and why Lord Byron was the ultimate 'Volcanic Gothic' celebrity. Featuring cameos from Jo March, Dracula & the Dark Lord Sauron! 📆 26/02/2026 5:30 pm. Online. 🎟️ www.thebyronsociety.com/events/volca...

My article 'Ghost nets and rusting machines: rivers in the contemporary Canadian long poem' is now published in Interventions, as part of a special issue on World Literature and Commodity Frontiers: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Can anybody kindly recommend me a nonfiction book for general-ish readers, if one exists, on hydrozoans? Historical or recent, either works.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a special service in possession of a long and illustrious history is in want of celebration. Our esteemed Talking Books service is a remarkable 90 years old! 😍

“The farmer is sowing his corn in the large field that has been ploughed and harrowed” ‘What to Look for in Winter’, 1959 Artist: CF Tunnicliffe Writer: EL Grant Watson

Enjoying all these talks on Chawton fellows’ discoveries in the archives and think we should start a journal called Rabbit Holes for everyone’s weird side quests: short pieces of a ‘look what I’ve found’ variety 🐰

Reminder to submit your abstracts for the 2026 Keats Conference ('The Keats Circle') by 21st Feb! Find the full call for papers on the blog: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6314

A not-completely-exhaustive illustration of our winter shorebirds, but these are the species that you’re most likely to see during winter around Teesmouth (northeast England). 🐡🪶 #birdingNortheast

the whole thing is of course completely revolting. 20 YEARS to settlement for refugees? no settlement if you’ve ever had a criminal conviction or a tax debt? 10 YEARS added if you’ve ever received benefits? partners and children on their own routes to settlement? What are you even TALKING about

The unhinged, institutional racism of the UK Home Office ought to be considered a national scandal - but the British media are united in making the case that it's *not unhinged enough*

"Only two English words rhyme with culture, and these, as it happens, are sepulture and vulture. We don’t yet call museums or galleries or even universities culture-sepultures, but I hear a lot, lately, about culture-vultures (man must rhyme)." Raymond Williams

considering making a conference badge that says "I have exceptionally poor facial recognition please don't hold it against me"

Oooh look! A Coot has snuck into your feed...

2 High 2 Wuthering

A funny bit would be to adapt Wuthering Heights but only the second half of the book nobody ever portrays

The worlds most hopeful dog (Yes it’s closed)

Do I dare close read Cathy's ghost

more like the “MENguin history of europe” en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pen... 🗃️

Slavoj Zizek, Armitage Shanks’ philosopher, sweating, wiping his nose, scratching his beard: ‘Imagine how hard it is for toilets to understand their own function!’

The vanity of Boswell was a rare quality. It kept him alive and it gave a point to him. —Virginia Woolf, “The Genius of Boswell”

Well I can't say responding to the UK government's sociopathic, impenetrable and frankly depraved consultation on how to punish immigrants and refugees even MORE has improved my morning But it's important to push back every way we can. Abolish the Home Office. Salt the earth of their foul ministry

Reality of Home Secretary's proposals are that migrants will be forced to "prove themselves" in ways no-one else would accept, while being treated as second class and magic money trees. "Mandatory volunteering" goes against the very principle of volunteering. www.infomigrants.net/en/post/6976...

#tinyJoys & #18thc & #BookHistory This cheered me up! In honour of our shared love of Maria Edgeworth's novel Belinda, an undergrad just presented me with a 2nd hand bookstore find: a 1900 edition of Saint-Pierre's Paul et Virginie. Look at that cover! They don't make them like that anymore.

And unfortunately the glue is alien blood which is eating through the floor like acid

Closes on 12th Feb 👇

Can't quite believe this is happening. The level of cruelty and unfairness is astounding. Really tight deadline but do it. #labourparty

I urge you to fill in this consultation if you can - with this very helpful support from Amnesty International - although AND because ! it is heart-breaking that this country has sunk so low that Amnesty suggest in a number of cases to provide no answer as the terms of the question are so evil

I’m really proud of Bangor University students today. Very much in the spirit of Penrhyndeudraeth lad Bertrand Russell, when he said that “nothing fruitful or sincere could ever emerge from an association between us”, when invited to debate Oswald Mosley.

Ceramic Jug Norman Carling 1930 A snake is attacked by a dragon, its claws tightly gripping the prey. Note - wings! Norman Carling (1902–1971) was an English designer/modeller in ceramics. He also worked for A.J. Wilkinson & later Maling pottery. Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle #Art #Ceramics

Damage is being done to our University by management, with the livelihoods of precarious workers most at risk. This must stop. #anticas #UCU #StopStaffCuts www.heraldscotland.com/news/2582884...

Aw yeah

Hello - just a quick message to US writers: early copies of my book, LIKE A CAT LOVES A BIRD: THE NINE LIVES OF MURIEL SPARK, will be available soon! Please message me if you’re interested in reading it, and I’ll let my publisher know 🐈‍⬛

Solidarity with @unison.org.uk workers at the University of Bristol who are striking against a 3.4% real terms pay cut. Since 2009 higher education pay has lost around 28% of its value. It's time for University workers to be paid fairly.

🦇 #BatsInArt #PreciousBats #Contemporary #UnitedStates Daria Bagrintseva BLACK WING RITUAL, 2025 Oil, silver leaf on canvas

Colleges need to stop trying to teach students how to use AI. Even in the theoretical use cases, genAI requires the expertise to know the process and outcome WITHOUT IT to be able to use it for shortcuts and then THOROUGHLY vet the product. EXPERTISE. Students don't have that, they're students.

#CFP: 'Call for Contributions: Histories of Weather & Weathering' Deadline for abstract: 4 September 2026 Link: teleskopos.wordpress.com/2026/02/05/c... #envhist #envhum #ecocriticism #ecopoetics #ecolit #histsci #hstm #sts #sciencestudies

"invariably entertaining" and "exuberant, erudite" and "occasionally infuriating": man, this TLS review. i feel seen: excluding the first two, and the adverb "occasionally," this is exactly what my loved ones say about me. #18c #c18 #vastearlyamerica #bookhistory www.the-tls.com/literature/p...

BREAKING NEWS: We’re absolutely thrilled to announce that the Southbank Centre - the Hayward Gallery, Purcell Room, Queen Elizabeth Hall and skaters undercroft - has finally been Grade II listed by DCMS after a 35 year long campaign. ➡️ c20society.org.uk/news/southba...

So grateful to @emilybstanback.bsky.social for this blurb: "Reznicek offers a compelling...of the national tale, calling attention to the foundational ways that concepts of health, illness, and disability have been used to define national identity" www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/book/10....

CALL FOR PITCHES @dan-sinnamon.bsky.social and I are at work on a new version of Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century aimed at a more general audience. We’re looking for new contributions: your model close readings of texts, canonical and not, from literary studies and not. Details below!

one of the few bad bunny facts i know is his incorporation of said toad in his music led to a boost in awareness and popularity and therefore funding for conservation projects for it! my local zoo has been helping w it for a while and talked about it! share.google/SqYuqRVsLEmp...

Meanwhile, in an alternate universe where voters chose chaos with Ed Milliband...