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The best free cultural & educational media on the web
≡ Category: Art, Books, Literature | ≅ 2 Comments
In his 1955 classic, Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov described the facial features of his scandalous protagonist, Humbert Humbert, in small bits. When taken together, here’s what you get: Gloomy good looks… Clean-cut jaw, muscular hand, deep sonorous voice… broad shoulders … I was, and still am, despite mes malheurs, an exceptionally handsome male; slow-moving, tall, with soft dark [...]
≡ Category: Audio Books, Books, e-books, Film, Literature | ≅ 1 Comment
Today is the 200th birthday of Charles Dickens. He was born in Portsmouth, England on February 7, 1812, the second of eight children. When he was 12 years old his father was sent to debtors’ prison, along with most of his family, and Charles went to live with a friend of the family, an impoverished [...]
≡ Category: Books, Literature | ≅ Leave a Comment
Today is the birthday of James Joyce, born in Dublin 130 years ago, who wrote in his autobiographical novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, “Welcome, O life! I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience [...]
≡ Category: Books | ≅ 16 Comments
Here’s one way to become a better writer. Listen to the advice of writers who earn their daily bread with their pens. During the past week, lists of writing commandments by Henry Miller, Elmore Leonard (above) and William Safire have buzzed around Twitter. (Find our Twitter stream here.) So we decided to collect them and add [...]
≡ Category: Books, Literature | ≅ Leave a Comment
Today is the birthday of Richard Brautigan, whose funny and imaginative books were a touchstone for the 1960s counterculture and have remained an inspiration to free spirits ever since. He would have been 77. In this video, uploaded to the Internet exactly a year ago, Ianthe Brautigan Swensen reads her father’s story, “One Afternoon in 1939,” [...]
≡ Category: Books, Literature, Religion | ≅ 10 Comments
This past summer, Jonathan Pararajasingham, a neurosurgeon in London, created a montage of 100 renowned academics, mostly all scientists, talking about their thoughts on the existence of God. (Find it in two parts here and here.) Now’s he back with a new video, 30 Renowned Writers Speaking About God. It runs 25 minutes, and it offers as much [...]
≡ Category: Animation, Books, Film | ≅ 6 Comments
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore offers a modern tribute to an old world. Made with an animation style that blends stop motion with computer animation and traditional hand-drawing, the silent film pays homage to a bygone era when elegantly printed books inhabited our world. The 15-minute short is the first made by Moonbot Studios, a [...]
≡ Category: Books, Comedy, Film | ≅ Leave a Comment
Here we go again. We’re getting meta with readings by the great Christopher Walken. It all starts with the actor appearing on a 1993 broadcast of the British TV series “Saturday Zoo” hosted by Jonathan Ross, and he’s reading and riffing on the beloved fairy tale, The Story of the Three Little Pigs. The potentially terrifying [...]
≡ Category: Books, Film, Literature | ≅ 2 Comments
Back in 1998, Hunter S. Thompson’s most famous piece of Gonzo journalism, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, was brought to the silver screen, with Johnny Depp playing a lead role. From this point forward, Depp and Thompson became fast friends. Indeed, Depp would end up paying for Thompson’s elaborate funeral, which involved shooting the [...]
≡ Category: Books, Literature | ≅ 1 Comment
Originally aired on 1950s French television, this clip gives you some vintage Vladimir Nabokov. Early on, the Russian novelist reads the wonderfully poetic first lines of Lolita: Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, [...]
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