“For the wander-thirst is on me” (Wanderlust 2)
"The Sea Gypsy" - Richard Hovey (1864-1900) I am fevered with the sunset, I am fretful with the bay, For the wander-thirst is on me And my soul is in…
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December 8, 2015
“Yet there isn’t a train I wouldn’t take…” (Wanderlust 1)
This view of Scranton, Pennsylvania, shows the new roundhouse of the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad. The painting was commissioned by the president of the railroad ca. 1856. I love the way the train…
December 7, 2015
Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted …
A favorite quote on reading, from Francis Bacon (1561-1626): Crafty men condemn studies; simple men admire them; and wise men use them: for they teach not their own use: but…
December 3, 2015
Lord Peter, I presume?
Leyendecker (1874-1951) is one of my favorite American illustrators, active starting in 1899 - almost the same time as Maxfield Parrish began painting. On my wish list is the latest, gloriously…
December 2, 2015
Erasmus, and Erasmus, and Erasmus
Manchester's A World Lit Only by Fire is brilliant, gripping, and startlingly vivid view of the late Middle Ages and Renaissance that uses Magellan's circumnavigation of the globe as a a hook.…
December 1, 2015
Come back when I’ve finished the chapter … or maybe the book
I've loved reading for as long as I can remember, and this painting captures the emotion I associate with it---utter absorption and bright light, even if the day is dark…
November 30, 2015
Sink me, is it time for The Scarlet Pimpernel again?
The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy is a romping good story, and was the first novel to feature a fop who is a hero in disguise. That makes Sir Percival Blakeney…
November 21, 2015
Where our image of the French Revolution came from
After reading some of my favorite modern mystery writers (Lee Child, Dick Francis, et al.), I have trouble slowing down to the pace of Dickens and other 19th-century novelists ... but it's always…
November 21, 2015
Would have been famous if not for Mozart, Handel, Haydn
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0d-DFtjIOk Pandora tossed the elegant Symphony in C Major into one of my playlists recently, with the comment that its creator, Johann Baptist Wanhal, would be far more famous if he…
November 19, 2015
The Father (and Mother?) of Chemistry
Lavoisier is credited with changing chemistry from a qualitative to a quantitative science. He discovered the role oxygen plays in combustion, stated the law of conservation of mass, helped construct…
November 19, 2015