Writers should look to T.S. Eliot for inspiration: banker by day, writer by night — almost like a literary superhero. Born #OTD

Born #OTD

Born #OTD

Find out more about the history of letters here: fleamarketloveletters.com/post/the-his... #WorldLetterWritingDay

✉️✨ Today is #WorldLetterWritingDay ! ✍️ Did you know the very first love letter is thought to have been written by the Persian queen Atossa around 500 BC? Celebrate the day with the unforgettable and passionate epistolary 'Love Letters of a Portuguese Nun' : hesperus.press/products/the...

Happy Publication Day! Available now: hesperus.press/products/exc...

Me, getting lost in my own thoughts mid-read… Miniature models by Thomas Doyle #readingyetnotreading

Word of the Day: oubliette (noun) A secret dungeon with an opening only at the top. From French 'oublier' : to forget. 📚 In a sentence: My unread books live in an oubliette of good intentions.

Born #OTD

Me after saying I wasn't gonna buy any more books for a while

(Spoiler alert) Today’s Wordle word is foist ... interesting choice. Had to look it up. Oldest uses I found were from 1714: An Essay on Trade by Shewig, and On Pills by Dr. Sermons (1672).

'Then the Genius of the Divide, the great, free spirit which breathes across it, must have bent lower than it ever bent to a human will before. The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.' O Pioneers - Willa Cather, via @hesperus.press

Word of the Day: Amanuensis A person employed to write from dictation or transcribe manuscripts — a faithful scribe in the shadow of another’s voice, from verse to royal decree.

A library?

Ireland’s Oldest and Largest Medieval Book Shrine Goes on Public View for the First Time www.thisiscolossal.com/2025/06/loug...

Nineteen Eighty-Four might have been inspired by George Orwell’s fear of drowning theconversation.com/nineteen-eig...

Born #OTD

The Vanity of Human Wishes

She wrote a novel about a Welsh prince discovering America before Columbus. Then she vanished. No records. No bio. No trace. Who was the real Joan Dane? Over 100 years later, we may be getting closer to the truth. ➡️ Dive into the mystery: hesperus.press/blogs/news/u...

"Life is a flame that is always burning itself out; but it catches fire again every time a child is born. Life is greater than death, and hope than despair." George Bernard Shaw, The Adventures of a Black Girl in Search of God Available now as an ebook: mybook.to/BlackGirSear...

Literary Portraits by Andrew Salgado (Andrew.salgado.art) www.thisiscolossal.com/2025/06/andr... 👇"Meditations"

Just discovered the French phrase “livre de chevet” (pronounced sheu-veh). It literally means “bedside book”, but carries a lovely sense of predilection — the book you always return to, your quiet favourite. What’s your livre de chevet?

🌈 Celebrate Pride Month with a forgotten queer masterpiece — now at a special price! At the Edge of the Night by Friedo Lampe: banned by the Nazis in 1933 for its queerness, realism & quiet magic. Silenced then. Reclaimed now. Link: hesperus.press/products/at-... #PrideReads #BannedBooks

🍸 Celebrate #WorldCocktailDay in Style! 🎉 📖 First published in 1862 – the world’s 1st bartending guide 🍋 + 200 timeless recipes 🎩 Written by Jerry Thomas, father of mixology 🥂 A must-have for cocktail lovers, history buffs, & imbibers Link: mybook.to/CocktailBible

Died #OTD

Born #OTD: Sigmund Freud 🧠, father of modern psychiatry (and the Oedipus complex). Check out 'On Cocaine'—our translation of his studies, letters, and dreams diving deep into his obsession with the “miracle drug.” 💊 Get your copy here: mybook.to/OnCocaine

Born #OTD

Information overload is nothing new open.substack.com/pub/jaredhen...

From Substack substack.com/@readwhateve...

Bratford Waterstones #onlybooks ❤️📚 Original post: www.threads.net/@alice_barke...

Why I Hate the Book of the Month Club open.substack.com/pub/everythi...

Scary times in the digital age: 40% of 2-year-olds now own a tablet. 📱👶 Maybe it’s time to swap some of that screen time for reading, playing, listening, and outdoor adventures. 🌿📖🎶 #booktime #onlybooks Full study here: commonsensemedia.org/sites/defaul...

Is reposting considered an echo? 🤔

Books as a fashion accessory www.wsj.com/articles/the...

From Facebook: A Literary Map of the United Kingdom 🇬🇧

'Scientific Lives' by John Aubrey A new selection from John Aubrey's enormous work of 17th-century biography 'Brief Lives' : astronomer Edmund Halley, mapmaker Wenceslaus Hollar, and architect Christopher Wren 📖 book sample: t.co/9Nu1qrwc9F

'Unfortunately you cannot dance through life. I wish you could for many reasons. A continual change of partners, for instance, would it not be refreshing?'

Jenny Wren’s Lazy Thoughts, a sharp and witty reply to Jerome K. Jerome's Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow, offers a Victorian woman’s take on love, politics, tea, and daily life—still as relevant today as in 1891 #newrelease #classicbook Link: mybook.to/LazyThoughts...

Will the Gulf of Mexico get the Twitter treatment as in : "Gulf of America, formerly known as Gulf of Mexico"?

Word of the day: 'valetudinarian' A person who is obsessively or unduly concerned about his or her health.

State of Social Media in 2025: It sucks. Twitter: Nazi cesspool Facebook: For the 60+ crowd (sorry) Instagram: Designed for the reading impaired Threads & Bluesky: Anti-Nazi but soulless Mastodon: Extinct Is there a thriving social platform for book lovers 📚? #MondayRant