"professors all over the country have been censoring themselves, avoiding provocative topics and rewriting grants" (Alan Blinder in the New York Times - gift link): www.nytimes.com/2026/03/16/u...

Jürgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96.

"Documents filed in two lawsuits against the agency and DOGE reveal new details about how the mass cancellations took shape, with little input or pushback from the agency’s leadership" (Jennifer Schuessler in the New York Times - gift link): www.nytimes.com/2026/03/07/a...

"Defense Secretary [and Princeton alumnus] Pete Hegseth said he was banning attendance at Yale, Princeton, Brown and other elite colleges and think tanks, accusing them of indoctrinating service members with liberal ideologies." (New York Times gift link) www.nytimes.com/2026/02/28/u...

"The new American dream, for some of its citizens, is to no longer live there" - long, well-documented article in the Wall Street Journal (gift link) www.wsj.com/us-news/amer...

TCD Library is recruiting a Senior Bibliographer to help catalogue the Fagel Collection! This is a fabulous professional opportunity to work on one of Europe's great early modern private libraries. Closing 10 March at noon. Full details available at www.tcd.ie/hr/vacancies

A new development on X - originating in "the Parisian literary salons of the 17th and 18th centuries" (Wall Street Journal gift link) www.wsj.com/world/europe...

Tomorrow's talk, unwisely entitled "Polar Erratics," has been cancelled due to the incoming blizzard.

Although his subject matter was almost always American, he occasionally ventured abroad to tackle subjects that were, in his words, “not possible in America,” in films like “La Comédie-Française ou L’Amour Joué,” “La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet,” and “Crazy Horse” www.nytimes.com/2026/02/16/m...

"Scott Shambaugh woke up early Wednesday morning to learn that an artificial intelligence bot had written a blog post accusing him of hypocrisy and prejudice." (Wall Street Journal gift link) www.wsj.com/tech/ai/when...

A volume of essays I edited some years ago on news in #earlymodern Europe is now available open access 📖 Featuring chapters by @lenaliapi.bsky.social, @emmawhipday.bsky.social, among others! brill.com/edcollbook-o...

Today marks international day of women and girls in science. Louyse Bourgeois (1563-1636) was midwife to the French royal family & the first woman to publish on obstetrics. #WomenInScience

Attn nerds: our annual history sale started yesterday and runs through 2/20. 25% off, free shipping over $50, code is HIST26. www.press.jhu.edu/books/histor...

The BM catalogue says 'Tortoise, and separate view of a walled, coastal town in the Veneto' for this by Melchior Lorck, mid-16th century. I'm sticking with giant flying tortoise myself.

Plagiarism verdict against former University of Zurich professor: Massive scientific misconduct #ReceptioGate www.tagesanzeiger.ch/st-gallen-bu...

Wiener Kunstakademie bietet Donald Trump Studienplatz an www.der-postillon.com/2026/01/wien...

New publication (open access): edizioni.sns.it/prodotto/art...

And for those who are interested in the book that looks at this from a French perspective, it is now available in #openaccess here: books.openedition.org/pur/298922 (so easy to read in automatic translation too!) #bookhistory #earlymodernhistory #frenchhistory

This is a stunning resource, beautifully presented - congratulations to Ros Smith Kathy Acheson and their team emwmlibrary.com

We’re withdrawing from the International Law Commission??? This whole list is absolutely insane. www.whitehouse.gov/presidential...

"According to the syllabus, Dr. Peterson’s planned Plato readings included passages about Diotima’s Ladder of Love and Aristophanes’ myth involving split humans." (New York Times gift link) www.nytimes.com/2026/01/07/u...

For the first time ever, @ransomcenter.bsky.social host @rarebookschool.bsky.social courses this summer, June 7–12: L-165: Literary Manuscripts w/ Stephen Enniss & Megan Barnard (this will be excellent) G-60: Evidence in Handpress-Era Books, 1450–1830 w/ yours truly rarebookschool.org/schedule/

Much-needed distraction

On January 1, we lost a master of the ambigram (words expertly drawn so they read the same when turned upside down). In 2022, John Langdon donated his primary archive to us. #JohnLangdon #Ambigrams #Lettering

"it’s up to us, as individuals, to stop ingesting the pink slime of AI slop, the forever chemicals of outrage bait and the microplastics of misinformation-for-profit." (Christopher Mims in the Wall Street Journal - gift link): www.wsj.com/tech/persona...

BREAKING: Explosions felt across New York City as full socialism begins

New Year’s hours.

"With its wide release this month, “Marty Supreme,” which is loosely inspired by Reisman, has positioned him for the kind of posthumous cultural ubiquity and megawatt treatment that he always believed his arc deserved." (New York Times gift link): www.nytimes.com/2025/12/24/m...

"A.I. may be able to optimize the process of collecting those pieces, but discovery means drawing new connections — something far beyond current A.I. capabilities, as the tests I did confirmed to me." Art historian Elon Danziger in the New York Times (gift link): www.nytimes.com/2025/12/22/o...

Winter, C18th, attr. #AnneVallayerCoster (French, 1744–1818), who was born #otd, Dec 21. Held at @metmuseum.org, www.metmuseum.org/art/collecti... #artherstory #womenartists #FirstDayofWinter #WinterSolstice

The Centre Pompidou in Paris, host to the world’s second-largest collection of modern and contemporary art, has been closed for a five-year, 463 million euro renovation. Catherine Porter and Dmitry Kostyukov witnessed the emptying of its art collection (NYT gift link) www.nytimes.com/2025/12/21/w...

Lesson #1: Cyclists are more alert than museum security personnel... "At the Louvre, the police were ultimately alerted by a passing cyclist who thought the maintenance activity seemed odd" (New York Times gift link): www.nytimes.com/2025/12/19/a...

The Paleo Diet - by French chefs Jean Mabillon and Bernard de Montfaucon

An interim version of the Explore Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue is now available through the BL website: searcharchives.bl.uk It contains all the catalogue data from the eve of the 2023 cyberattack, and features embedded links to all currently available digitised content within the records.

I am asking for your help. For a future talk, I‘ll need a movie scene where books are being burned to condemn the content and judge the author. Medieval and early modern, even 19c would be fine. What movies would you recommend or remember? Thanks so much. #skystorians #BookBurning #bookhistory

"By the time teachers get through their required curriculums and prep students for exams, they often have little or no time left to guide classes through a whole book. [...] Many teachers are secret revolutionaries and still assign whole books” (NY Times gift link) www.nytimes.com/2025/12/12/u...

Rembrandt Portrait Sets New Record for Old Master Prints "Arnout Tholinx, Inspector" last appeared at Christie's in 1924 news.artnet.com/market/rembr...

Embrace the avant-garde, dig for treasure, or visit a Stasi prison (New York Times gift link): www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

'Tis the season

“I like the craziness of the English, with all their hobbies and their interests. The race meetings, the agricultural shows, the summer fêtes. We are an eccentric lot.” (New York Times obituary - gift link): www.nytimes.com/2025/12/07/o...

Last weekend I resumed blogging and have done another post today; I hope to maintain a weekly schedule. The two new posts concern illuminated leaves from the collections of Victor Goldschmidt and Count Stroganoff. mssprovenance.blogspot.com

Monet to Manet: "I need money!" This 1874 letter just sold for €200K. www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/...

PSA: this is not an invitation! Truth is, I cannot possibly take the time to carefully read and review every #Voynich "solution" sent to me, & most are definitely not worth the trouble as they are AI-generated slop. If you've got a "solution", post it to a forum & you'll get plenty of feedback!

A newly redeveloped Getty Provenance Index is now available. This resource contains over 12 million records that allows a window into a vast growing universe of data available on shared cultural heritage. [🧵8/10] www.getty.edu/research/pro...

"While other universities report that the humanities are shrinking, at Berkeley, the opposite is true. The music major is the fastest-growing major on campus. We are finding bigger classrooms because film is exploding. English is back to the numbers we saw 15 years ago. We are hiring" bit.ly/4ohKuOe

"Throughout their decades as collectors, Ms. Vogel worked at the Brooklyn Public Library as a reference librarian, and Mr. Vogel, a high school dropout from Harlem, did the night shift at a post office sorting mail." - New York Times obituary (gift link): www.nytimes.com/2025/11/22/a...

Oxford Handbook to the End of Academia

Explore artistic training and the mastery of #drawing in Europe from about 1550 to 1850 in Learning To Draw, at the Getty Center now through January 25, 2026. ℹ gty.art/42ZB6qL

David Bellos, 80, Dies; Wrestled French Wordplay Into English (New York Times obituary - gift link): www.nytimes.com/2025/11/20/b...