How Bob Dylan Kept Reinventing His Songwriting Process, Breathing New Life Into His Music

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On his 84th birth­day this past Sat­ur­day, Bob Dylan played a show. That was in keep­ing with not only his still-seri­ous tour­ing sched­ule, but also his appar­ent­ly irre­press­ible instinct to work: on music, on writ­ing, on paint­ing, on sculp­ture. Even his occa­sion­al tweet­ing draws an appre­cia­tive audi­ence every time. The Bob Dylan of…

George Orwell Reviews Salvador Dali’s Autobiography: “Dali is a Good Draughtsman and a Disgusting Human Being” (1944)

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Images or Orwell and Dali via Wiki­me­dia Com­mons

Should we hold artists to the same stan­dards of human decen­cy that we expect of every­one else? Should tal­ent­ed peo­ple be exempt from ordi­nary moral­i­ty? Should artists of ques­tion­able char­ac­ter have their work con­signed to the trash along with their per­son­al rep­u­ta­tions? These…

A 3D Model Reveals What the Parthenon and Its Interior Looked Like 2,500 Years Ago

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Stand­ing atop the Acrop­o­lis in Athens as it has for near­ly 2,500 years now, the Parthenon remains an impres­sive sight indeed. Not that those two and a half mil­len­nia have been kind to the place: one of the most famous ruins of the ancient world is still, after all, a ruin. But it does…

Leo Tolstoy’s Family Recipe for Mac and Cheese

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In 1874, Stepan Andree­vich Bers pub­lished The Cook­book and gave it as a gift to his sis­ter, count­ess Sophia Andreev­na Tol­staya, the wife of the great Russ­ian nov­el­ist, Leo Tol­stoy. The book con­tained a col­lec­tion of Tol­stoy fam­i­ly recipes, the dish­es they served to their fam­i­ly and friends, those for­tu­nate souls who belonged…

The “Dark Relics” of Christianity: Preserved Skulls, Blood & Other Grim Artifacts

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Chris­tian­i­ty often man­i­fests in pop­u­lar cul­ture through cel­e­bra­tions like Christ­mas and East­er, or icons like lambs and fish. Less often do you see it asso­ci­at­ed with vials of blood and dis­em­bod­ied heads. Yet as the new Hochela­ga video above reveals, the most famed Chris­t­ian arti­facts do tend toward the grue­some. Take one par­tic­u­lar­ly…