Find out about the real women of Bronze Age Greece here tinyurl.com/yu5nv46b Or the podcast version (if you're outside the UK) here www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

Kaor! My exploration of #languageinvention on Mars continues! #conlang #sciencefiction

open.substack.com/pub/drandrew... #conlang #inventedlanguages #sciencefiction

Our new, important and captivating exhibition exploring Childhood in War at Imperial War Museums www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

Wow! What a fantastic opening performance of Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos at #Glyndebourne tonight! Stellar cast a must see!! 👏👏👏#opera

Musik ist eine heilige Kunst, zu versammeln alle Arten von Mut wie Cherubim um einen strahlenden Thron! Und darum ist Musik die heilige unter den Künsten! Looking forward to new production of Ariadne auf Naxos at @glyndebourne today #opera @glyndebourne www.glyndebourne.com/events/ariad...

Excellent timely post on #Tolkien and #Homer The Man, O Muse, inform, that many a way / Wound”: On Aragorn and Odysseus as Wandering Men in Tolkien and Homer thetolkienist.com/2026/07/17/t...

It must be getting closer to my favourite weekend again as this was on my doorstep yesterday evening. @miriamellis.bsky.social @tolkiensociety.org #Oxonmoot26 #Tolkien

Another edition of the Roving Ranger has just been sent to its subscribers. Including: 110 years - Battle of the Somme; events in Spain, France, Germany, USA, Australia etc.; pity, power, and audio; dance in the hemlock glade; what is the Ring; and much more... steady.page/en/thetolkie...

G.B. Smith's wit, imagination, and growing maturity in the face of war are the subject of a recently-published edited collection. I wrote chapter 2, about Smith's participation in Oxford Union debates and his wartime consolations of myth and music. #Tolkien #BattleoftheSomme #WWI #WWIPoetry

Great piece on #Odyssey by Charlotte Higgins @instantclassicspod.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/culture/ng-i...

BORED OF THE RINGS: A PARODY OF J. R. R. TOLKIEN’S THE LORD OF THE RINGS (Signet, 1969) by Henry N. Beard and Douglas C. Kenney of The Harvard Lampoon. Cover art by Michael K. Frith.

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i... Quick guide to The Odyssey here. What you need to know before you go!!! In 50 mins

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i... what you need to know before you go!! Instant Classics offers you a 50 minute guide to Homer’s Odyssey… to get you up to speed for the movie!

And so ends another excellent @imc-leeds.bsky.social Tolkien at Leeds 2026 with brilliant sessions, great fellowship and three new books to read! See you next year! #IMC2026

Last?? @imc-leeds.bsky.social book purchase from @UniversityofWalesPress #IMC2026

On my way, Clacton.

We're always sad to see the #IMC2026 Second-Hand and Antiquarian Bookfair come to a close! The bookfair will end today at 17.00. So grab a treasure while you can!📕 Our nearby souvenir stand in the Leeds University Union Building will continue to be open throughout the IMC.

Eglerio! Utúlie'n aurë! Today we have four #Tolkien at @imc-leeds.bsky.social sessions with a great paper line up! #IMC2026

And my #Tolkien paper at @imc-leeds.bsky.social first Tolkien at Leeds session is now delivered - now I can listen to all the others and buy books #IMC2026

First day of @imc-leeds.bsky.social #IMC2026 and #Tolkien at Leeds last minute work on my paper later today

#Tolkien interesting observer.co.uk/news/nationa...

🐇 The IMC Team (and the campus bunnies) look forward to seeing delegates arrive at #IMC2026! 🐇

The #IMC2026 Banner has dropped! 😀🎉 We're very excited to be welcoming our delegates over the next few days for a week full of medievally marvellous academic fun! 🎉 If anyone needs to get in touch with us please email [email protected] #MedievalSky #SkyStorians

Eglerio! My book review of this excellent new #Tolkien volume from Walking Tree Publishers has been posted to the open access Journal of #Tolkien Research scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcont...

Lovely to return to my beloved @glyndebourne tonight to see Michael Grandage’s fantastic #BillyBudd (not seen in ten years!) with a phenomenal cast including Thomas Mole as Billy and my dream Captain Vere @fatboyclayton - one of #Glyndebourne’s best bravi tutti 👏👏👏👏👏 #opera

#OnThisDay in 1952 Michael Ventris announced on the radio that he had deciphered the Linear B script, and the language it was used to write was Greek: www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/maga... #AncientBluesky #ClassicsBluesky 🏺 1/2

Another edition of the Roving Ranger has just been sent to its subscribers. Including: Tolkien Tabor; Great Haywood; Sarehole Mill; neo-fascist tech bros and their companies; Druédain; Gundulf; two books in the making; Samwise the Bard, and much more... steady.page/en/thetolkie...

Why does Gandalf behave less like a wizard in his confrontation with Bilbo—and more like a parent? That’s the starting point for my latest piece on The Lord of the Rings. The opening is free to read if you’d like to take a look: 👉 open.substack.com/pub/dimitraf...

I’ve been quietly writing not 1, but 2 books - and reshaping my Substack to make it possible. One will be on miniature fantasies, the other is the reason for my “slow” re-read of The #LordoftheRings. The full archive is open to all as I begin a new weekly series: open.substack.com/pub/dimitraf...

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i... why is the US so full of classical architecture from state capitols to planned arches and ballrooms?

Animated Dark Shadows series in the works! I hope this fills the void left by Scooby Doo: Mystery Inc ending. www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/w...

In honor of Dark Shadows’ 60th anniversary, here are some famous clips from the show.

The book also features essays from the delightful Penny Dreadful, Ansel H. Faraj, Stuart Manning, and Craig Hurd-McKinney. You can read more from Chinbeard Books here: www.facebook.com/chinbeardboo...

thrilled to reveal The Collins Family Album, written by my friend Rich Handley, des. Robert Hammond, pub. Chinbeard Books, and illustrated by... me! the book chronicles Collinses across stage, page, and screen, with their many parallel lives (and twice as many deaths). avail. to pledge July 30! 🌊🦇⚰️🪰

Happy 60th Anniversary to #DarkShadows my celebratory Substack Post open.substack.com/pub/drandrew... @darkshadowsnews.bsky.social

A Good opportunity to plug the Guide to #Tolkien Calendars for anyone who wants to see more of this Calendar and peruse the nearly 500 other Calendars 😍 www.tolkienguide.com/guide/calend...

Happy Father's Day 🖤

The latest in our USA 250 series on Instant Classics focuses on a very big Roman coffin and a Roman president. One of my favourite Roman objects in the world. podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/u...

Come join us October 3rd and 4th for a mammoth 20-hour marathon livestream to celebrate the site’s 20th anniversary! Guests, giveaways, shenanigans and fun. More info soon.

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i... Fancy being buried in a pre-used coffin?? The dying President Andrew Jackson said a definite NO THANKS to a coffin that had once (so it was said) held a Roman emperor. Get the whole story on Instant Classics

A 7th century Pictish symbol stone discovered in 1936 during excavations at the Knowe of Burrian - a broch at Netherbrough, Harray, in the Orkney Isles. Now part of the collections at the Orkney Museum in Kirkwall. 📸 My own. #FindsFriday #Orkney #Picts

Cyrhaeddodd Heddiw! Ardderchog mae hyn yn edrych fel hwyl! #welsh #language #philology

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i... we’re launching an Instant Classics mini series on USA 250, on the US and the ancient world from Founders to today. First off we talk to Joy Connolly (on toga clad 18th century revolutionaries to politicians now)

Welcome to the Old Operating Theatre Museum! Step into Europe’s oldest surgical theatre, hidden above St. Thomas' Church,and discover the world of 19th c medicine. From apothecary bottles to medicinal leeches and surgical tools, journey with us into the fascinating history of Medicine! #OldOpTheatre

I’ve talked about #fundraising in many places but never until last night in the Oldest Operating Theatre in #London and doing it standing where the operations took place! Great session and went home at watched The Pitt @OldOpTheatre #oldoperatingtheatre #museums

tolkien’s translation of sawles warde is now available to the public after 63 years of public nonexistence academic.oup.com/res/advance-...

Eglerio! Will definitely be submitting an abstract for this online @tolkiensociety.org seminar in November on #Tolkien’s Invented Languages - deadline for submission end of July. www.tolkiensociety.org/events/semin... #conlangs #tolkien #Elvish