Jonathan Rose— Hanoverian Britain had its counterpart of the Bibliothèque bleue—chapbooks offering romances, fairy tales, and other fantastic stories. And a few of their readers, in memoirs, helpfully explained how they read them. As a boy, the poet John Clare (b. 1793) consumed 6d. (sixpence) romances of Cinderella and Jack and
Patrick Pardo— The sixth and final volume of the John Baldessari Catalogue Raisonné covers the years 2011 through 2019. It was published in late January 2021, roughly a year after Baldessari’s death on January 2, 2020, at the age of 88. Thirty canvases comprise John Baldessari’s “Space Between” series, which he had
Patrick J. Lynch— The outstanding feature of the Middle Atlantic Coast is a segment of the world’s longest string of barrier islands, with the sounds and bays that separate these islands from the mainland Atlantic coast. The barrier islands of the Mid-Atlantic Coast are part of a series of sand
Margarette Lincoln— So wrote John Donne, poet and priest, who described London in the 1600s as “a place full of danger and vanity and vice,” neatly encapsulating its horror and allure. The contradictions of London life, its mansions and hovels, its opportunities and epidemics, and the annual influx of migrant
Emily Cockayne— Marginal foodstuffs were eaten in dearth years when regular supplies dwindled. There were fewer opportunities for hedgerow foraging, mushroom picking and rabbiting in the cities than there were in the countryside. Proverbs hint at the desperation of the hungry: Hunger makes hard bones sweet beans. All’s good in
Alexandra Dunietz— Would Sydney Taylor, author of the All-of-a-Kind books, have had a Facebook page? I usually avoid counterfactual history, but while helping June Cummins with research on Taylor, I occasionally wondered what she would have made of the internet. What makes me think she would have engaged in some
Lee Jackson— The emergence of the ‘gin palace’ in the 1830s, on the cusp of the Victorian era, seems a good place to start. These alluring drinking establishments, adorned with gaslight and gilding, were highly attractive public houses, catering to the common man. Their elaborate decor, however, provoked much earnest
Peter F. Sale— Coral reefs are strewn across the tropical ocean like so many pearls from a broken necklace. Some are barely a few hundred meters from other reefs, but many are many kilometers from any other shallow water habitat. Yet nearly all the species that live on coral reefs
Michael Hicks— It is half a millennium since Richard III (1483–5) was king. He is traditionally regarded as the last of England’s medieval monarchs – 14th and last of the great house of Plantagenet (1154–1485) and third of the Yorkist kings (1461–85). He terminated both dynasties. He has been bracketed
Susan Bernofsky— In the spring of 1909, thirty-one-year-old novelist Robert Walser, then living in Berlin, saw a performance by one of the greatest ballet dancers of the twentieth century. Anna Pavlova wasn’t yet the international star she would later become, though she was already a lead dancer with the Maryinsky