Chris Laoutaris’s survey of the scene around the landmark publication the first collected edition of Shakespeare’s works, paints a lively picture of multiple operations threatening to win over the competition.  Even with the Bard , commercial interests were at least as important as aesthetic and cultural ones.  In Shakespeare’s era there was no separation between painting, publishing and selling books. The captial’s trade on the churchyard of Old St. Paul’s, with preachers orating from the open air pulpit. The true story of how the First Folio creators made “Shakespeare”, as 2023, marks the 400th anniversary of Mr. William Shakespeare’s Comedies, … Continue reading Transmission of Shakespeare’s legacy 400 years ago

In 1616, Thomas Roe arrived in India as James 1’s ambassador to the Mughal Empire, the English barely had a toehold in the subcontinent. Their understanding of South Asian trade and India was sketchy at best, and , to the Mughals, they were minor players on a very large stage. Roe was representing a kingdom that was beset by financial woes and deeply conflicted about its identity as a united Great Britain under Stuart monarchy. The court he entered in India was very wealthy and cultured, its dominion widely considered to be the greatest and richest empires of the world. … Continue reading Encounters in the history of colonialism

Holding the Baby set out to understand why we still treat early parenthood as an individual slog rather than a shared cultural responsibility. Tracing her own journey to the nadir of sleeplessness via social retreat and murderous rage, Frizzell draws on the latest research to explore amid practical guides on raising children, literary explorations about the maternal experience, deep data dives and so call “mom-oirs”. Vogue columnist, Frizzell  describes the earliest stage of motherhood, when your time, identity, body and sense of self is absorbed by the needs of your baby, as “the partial eclipse”. She writes honestly and clearly … Continue reading Partial eclipse