NB! · Art · Books · Rome

A beautiful engraving by Cornelis Claesz Duyssend, showing Romulus and Remus vying for the milk of the she-wolf, on the title page of one of the best-known books on the history of Rome, a concise account of events from the foundation of the city to the da

Faith · Art · People

Leonardo da Vinci's Saint John the Baptist of 1513 and his pupil Salai's version

Here are two St John the Baptists. One is by Leonardo da Vinci, 1513; the other is by his pupil Salai. According to a popular legend, da Vinci painted John the Baptist from his favourite apprentice, nicknamed Salai. Salai's features, however, are also detected in other works by

Archive · Books · London

A critical remark on Sologub, his comparison to Poe and madness in Russian prose

A review of the Russian Symbolists in the British weekly The New Age, mid-1910s:. We are never quite sure whether Russian prose writers write about Russia as it is or as they would like to see it; in either case, Russia appears to be a very gloomy place. Everyone

Sepia photograph of an elderly man in round thin-framed glasses looking downward.

Archive · Faith · Books · Observations · Humour

Excerpt from Joseph Brodsky's notebook dating from 1970

The Last Judgement is the Last Judgement, but a man who has lived his life in Russia ought by rights to be admitted to paradise without further ado. From Joseph Brodsky's notebook, 1970

A wooden writing slope in a museum case, with letters, envelopes, an inkwell, a quill and a penknife.

NB! · Books · Museums · Observations

Charlotte Brontë's writing desk with the quills and penknife she used

Charlotte Brontë's writing desk, with a penknife. For the most part she wrote with genuine quills, although the fountain pen had already been invented and was in active use.

NB! · Archive · Paris

Photographs of Paris in the Days of the Commune

NB! · Books · Observations

A Rat in the Head: American Science-Fiction Writer Rog Phillips Knew It All Back in 1959

NB! · Archaeology · Art · Humour

Alberto Giacometti's "Standing Woman", by the Swiss master of the twentieth century, and an Etruscan statuette of the 3rd century BC

"Standing Woman" by the twentieth-century Swiss master Alberto Giacometti and a statuette of the Etruscans of the 3rd century BC. Which is which, you must work out for yourselves

NB! · Architecture · Madrid · Moscow · Observations

Modernism Everywhere, Each to His Own: A Petrol Station in Madrid on San Lorenzo de El Escorial and a Petrol Station Opposite the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow

NB! · Art

Flowers, Frédéric Bazille, 1868

Portrait of a young red-haired girl in a red gown with gold embroidery and a pearl headdress, holding a small book.

Cinema · Monarchies · Observations · Society

People from sub-Saharan Africa as characters in alternative histories of the West

Anne Boleyn Before and After the Introduction of the New Concept of World Cultural History. Note that, as dramatis personae of the alternative history of the West, they now use chiefly natives of the countries south of the Sahara, rather than non-Europeans of any other description. Precisely those whose

NB! · Architecture · Humour

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