The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Reads tagged with “history”

William Blake’s Breathtaking Drawings for Dante’s Divine Comedy, Over Which He Labored Until His Dying Day
William Blake’s Breathtaking Drawings for Dante’s Divine Comedy, Over Which He Labored Until His Dying Day

The sinister and sublime, in transcendent watercolors.

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Legendary Indian Leader Nehru on Power, Privilege, and Kindness: Letters to His 10-Year-Old Daughter, Indira Gandhi
Legendary Indian Leader Nehru on Power, Privilege, and Kindness: Letters to His 10-Year-Old Daughter, Indira Gandhi

Notes on the moral foundations of becoming a great leader and a great human, bittersweet in history’s hindsight.

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William Faulkner’s Beautiful Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech About How Artists Help Us Live
William Faulkner’s Beautiful Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech About How Artists Help Us Live

“The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is … to help man endure by lifting his heart.”

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How to Live: Lessons from Montaigne
How to Live: Lessons from Montaigne

Don’t worry about death, pay attention, read a lot, give up control, embrace imperfection.

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Falling Upwards: An Illustrated History of the Golden Age of Hot Air Balloons and How We Conquered the Skies
Falling Upwards: An Illustrated History of the Golden Age of Hot Air Balloons and How We Conquered the Skies

How scientists, explorers, and daredevils risked their lives so we could see our world from above.

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From Galileo to Google: How Big Data Illuminates Human Culture
From Galileo to Google: How Big Data Illuminates Human Culture

“Through our scopes, we see ourselves. Every new lens is also a new mirror.”

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19th-Century German Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer Presages the Economics and Ethics of the Web and Modern Publishing
19th-Century German Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer Presages the Economics and Ethics of the Web and Modern Publishing

A 19th-century critique of the moral failures of linkbait, cat slideshows, and needless pagination.

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Reinventing the Wheel: A Design History of the Circle as a Visual Metaphor for Information
Reinventing the Wheel: A Design History of the Circle as a Visual Metaphor for Information

How nature’s perfect shape came to contain the imperfections of the human condition.

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J.R.R. Tolkien’s Little-Known, Gorgeous Art
J.R.R. Tolkien’s Little-Known, Gorgeous Art

An important side of the beloved writer, who was as much an artist of pictures as he was of words.

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December 24, 1968: NASA Simulates Exactly What the Apollo 8 Astronauts Saw When They Took the Iconic Earthrise Photograph
December 24, 1968: NASA Simulates Exactly What the Apollo 8 Astronauts Saw When They Took the Iconic Earthrise Photograph

Cutting-edge technology reveals how one of history’s most important images almost didn’t happen.

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