An open old book with a handwritten inscription on the first page, signed Lev Tolstoy and dated 15 December 1902.

Books · Society · Humour

An entrepreneur offers collectible imitations of celebrity autographs

Counterfeiting in the antiquarian book market reaches a new level: outright forgeries presented as collectors' rarities, "manufactured" (!) in a single copy. At the end of the advertisement the entrepreneur adds: We have hundreds of digitised autographs of celebrities of the 19th to 21st centuries, and will produce

NB! · Cinema · Pop Culture · Humour

Robespierre, head of the Jacobins, known as the Incorruptible and effectively at the helm of the government of revolutionary France, is mentioned in The Sopranos, in which the North Jersey mob boss Tony Soprano tries to solve his problems with the help of

Robespierre, head of the Jacobins, known as the Incorruptible and effectively at the helm of the government of revolutionary France, is mentioned in The Sopranos, in which the North Jersey mob boss Tony Soprano tries to solve his problems with the help of a psychotherapist. Good morning, and a good

Geography · Observations · Society · Humour

The Trans-Eurasian Development Belt and experts' doubts over its multitrillion-dollar cost

Remember how, in 2015, the head of Russian Railways proposed building a super-highway from London to New York across the whole of Eurasia and North America, to include a railway, a motorway and oil pipelines? The project was called the Trans-Eurasian Belt Development, but the prospect of its

NB! · Observations · Society · Humour

If we live in a society of the spectacle, show me the brilliant playwright who managed to devise wind turbines powered by diesel generators

Cinema · Observations · Humour

Does it not strike you that a spyglass is most conveniently put to the eye on the same side as the hand that holds it?

Does it not strike you that a spyglass is most conveniently put to the eye on the same side as the hand that holds it? Clearly not the left hand to the right eye. The question, properly speaking, is for Tsar Saltan, from what is probably the finest screen adaptation

In the Press · Mores · People · Humour

A dispute over hummus in Germany and broken food taboos in Israel and India

The philosopher Slavoj Žižek writes on Substack about his eating habits:. What I hate most of all is the politically correct politicisation of food. Recently in Germany I had a conflict with friends who wanted to go to a Lebanese place, but I hate hummus, which reminds me of the

NB! · Books · Observations · Pop Culture · Humour

In essence, ChatGPT and Tom Riddle's diary are phenomena of one and the same demonic nature

NB! · Books · Humour

Thanks to a compositor's error, Lensky's fate might have seemed far more enviable

NB! · Society · Nature · Humour

It Turns Out That Biden's Hyperborea Is Neither a Diagnosis nor Even a Country, but a Plant of the Daisy Family

NB! · Books · Observations · People · Humour

Jean Baudrillard and His Mad Bookcase

Jean Baudrillard and his mad bookcase. Or rather, not a bookcase at all, but some sort of book-trap. Just try reading without being buried under an avalanche of books.

NB! · Moscow · Humour

Muscovites Have Grown So Pampered That They Have Filled the Drainage Canal with Matches

Monarchies · Mores · People · Humour

Bokassa's coronation modelled on Napoleon's, with Olivier Brice's throne and Paris's support

In 1977 the self-proclaimed Emperor of Central Africa, the dictator Bokassa I, presented the guests of honour at his coronation with gilded replicas of his own throne. Paris supported the ruler of the former French colony, who in the tenth year of his rule had decided to turn from