When the literary critic Desmond MacCarthy was invited to Cambridge in the 1920s to give public lectures, he devoted his course to Byron, which displeased the students: Byron had long gone out of fashion and was considered not worth discussing at…

MacCarthy was not prepared to change his subject and defended Byron in every way he could, but, seeing the audience's displeasure, he made a concession and invited anyone who wished to come to him in the evenings, after the lectures on Byron, for a conversation about talented young poets. And people began to gather in his rooms. Throughout the seminar the professor read the verse of an obscure poet and made the guests fall in love with him. When, after the meeting, MacCarthy was asked the name of this delightful new poet, he answered briefly: George Gordon, Lord Byron

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At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free. So, here is the

Frederic Leighton

Frederic Leighton. “Daedalus and Icarus”, 1869 Daedalus warns his son not to climb too high: the heat of the sun may melt the wax, but Icarus is already gazing into the distance, and the lamentations of a foolish old man interest him not in the least

When the literary critic Desmond MacCarthy was invited to Cambridge in the 1920s to give public lectures, he devoted his course to Byron, which displeased the students: Byron had long gone out of fashion and was considered not worth discussing at…

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At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

Frederic Leighton

Attempts to resolve the problems of many years of uncontrolled mass migration

Characters from Gogol's "Petersburg Tales" on the pedestal of the monument to Nikolai Gogol on Nikitsky Boulevard, photograph of the 1960s