NB! · Observations
Alexandr Radayev
Faith · The East · Books
A reflection on the impossibility of inaction and the duty to perform one's appointed tasks
A man does not yet enjoy freedom from action when he does not begin what he ought to do, nor does he attain bliss from perfect inaction. No one remains in inaction for a single minute. Every man is involuntarily compelled to act according to the principles native to his
Art · Moscow · Museums
The Fire of Moscow in 1812, Unknown Artist
Collection of the Museum of Moscow
Cinema · Books · Pop Culture · Humour
Books in the “Wallace and Gromit” Universe: Gromit Reads Canine Classics, Wallace Cheese Books
Gromit, the dog of the Wallace and Gromit animated universe, reads Crime and Punishment, penned by Fido Dogstoevsky, a dog, as is all the other classic literature he reads throughout the series, which is evidently of canine authorship. His luckless master Wallace, by contrast, does read "human" books,
NB! · Archive · Books · Education · People
Tolkien sketched Helm's Deep on a used examination paper
Tolkien sketched Helm's Deep on a used examination paper. He wrote the epic The Lord of the Rings while already a professor of Anglo-Saxon language and literature at the University of Oxford
Architecture · Observations · Heritage
The author criticises immersive shows at historic monuments for displacing cultural context
How I loathe these idiotic immersive shows staged at historic sites, which not only prevent one from contemplating genuine architecture as it actually is and transform the landscape, but also substitute a false context for cultural phenomena. Stage your immersive shows at monuments of stagnation-era functionalism or in your
Archaeology · Art · Museums · Saint Petersburg
Gold ring with an image of a bird in the collection of the State Hermitage Museum
Scythian gold ring with a flying duck, 4th century BC, from the Chertomlyk kurgan. Collection of the State Hermitage Museum
Archaeology · The East · Museums · Ethnography
Arrangement of ten horses in the Pazyryk burial mound, Hermitage collection
A 2,300-year-old ceremonial horse headdress found on the skeleton of a horse in the frozen tombs of Pazyryk in Siberia. Eight of the ten horses in the Pazyryk kurgan were arranged in two rows with their heads turned to the east, while two horses in the western
NB! · Art · People
Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978) and Alexander Tyshler (1898–1980)
Books · Observations · Humour
Yandex Books and Romir study: every third man wants a history book as a gift
The best book to give a man is a work of history. Every third man would choose a historical study as a gift. I hope that the survey conducted by Yandex Books and Romir will put an end to the interminable disputes: an album of gardens and parks, or a
Books · Observations · Education
French readers of “Anna Karenina” prefer the storyline of Levin and Kitty
We discussed the reception of "Anna Karenina" in France in class. Here, if you please, are some average reviews of the book: "Despite what the title leads us to suppose, this book is not only the story of Anna, a married woman who falls under the spell
NB! · Archive · Monarchies · Moscow · Mores