Peter Burke— In Rome, unlike Greece, we find not only the praises of outstanding intellectual all-rounders but also recommendations to students of particular disciplines to acquire a wide knowledge, perhaps as an antidote to creeping specialization. Cicero (106–43 BC), one of the most eloquent public speakers of the Roman world,
As Michael S. Roth wrote in his review in The Washington Post, “The maturation of Grundberg as a renowned critic coincides with the maturation of photography as an art form and its conquest of the art market. With this fine book, he has given us a personal yet balanced account
Peter Burke— People are talking more and more about polymaths these days, but at the same time, living examples of this intellectual species are becoming more and more difficult to find. By polymath I mean, like the ancient Greeks who coined the term, someone who has mastered many intellectual disciplines,
Brian Fagan and Nadia Durrani— What did our ancestors do in bed? It’s an intriguing question. One that we, as archaeologists, realized nobody had sought to answer. Beds, after all, have been around for a very long time—the oldest known is at least 77,000 years old, and the basic design
How have we used size to judge people over time? What is the history of size in popular culture? Lynne Vallone discusses how bodies both big and small influence our perception. Subscribe: iTunes | Stitcher | Soundcloud
Follow @yaleSCIbooks Bernd Brunner discusses the motivations behind his recent book Bears: A Brief History. Humans and bears— two species that exhibit both peaceful and violent behaviors—have shared a lengthy history. And the bear has become a central figure in our collective consciousness: many children sleep with teddy bears while
Once a year, thousands of families chop down a living tree, bring it inside their homes, and decorate it with lights, tinsel, and ornaments. This is considered perfectly normal, despite objective reasoning to the contrary. Especially at Christmas time, tradition is king. And perhaps no tradition is more powerful than
Follow @yaleARTbooks In the introduction to Circus and the City: New York, 1793-2010, the catalogue accompanying a fabulous exhibition of the same name currently on view at the Bard Graduate Center in Manhattan, curator Matthew Wittmann recalls his own experience watching the hulking elephants of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and
When read together, Venice from the Water and Venice & Vitruvius present a multi-sided picture of the complex history and fate of the famous floating city of Venice. In many ways, the books complement one another, engaging in the same subject through different perspectives and offering interrelated conclusions. This dynamic
Contemporary curation must again and again situate art exhibition within a global conversation. The Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art exhibition currently at the Seattle Art Museum affords the museum an opportunity to embrace a fresh strategy for staging global art. The curatorial event provides an exchange among a diverse collection