November 05, 2012
Spinners and Losers
A BBC comedy series explores the gaffe-prone world of professional politics, onscreen and off.
Read MoreRoundtable
Opinions and analysis from Lapham’s Quarterly writers and editors.
August 2, 2025
September 14, 2012
The Magician in the Laboratory
Rupert Sheldrake was a scientific superstar, then he was mocked as a magician. A look at scientific sorcerers throughout the ages.
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September 12, 2012
Beyond the Fields We Know
The supernatural literature of Arthur Machen, Walter de la Mare, and Algernon Blackwood, and the abiding appeal of supernatural literature.
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September 04, 2012
The Father and Son Who Believed in Faeries
The dream world of Arthur Conan Doyle’s father.
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July 20, 2012
How to Make Friends and Walk on Swords
During the nineteenth century, magic tricks were commonly published in newspapers, encouraging teenagers to take dangerous risks to impress their friends.
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July 16, 2012
Gold and Silver Coined from Human Blood
Witch hunts were big business, employing hundreds of judges, jailers, and executioners across Europe for hundreds of years.
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July 12, 2012
Aaron Burr’s Target Practice
Was the outcome of the Hamilton-Burr duel circumstantial, or was it carefully practiced?
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June 27, 2012
Sherlock Holmes in Fairyland
How the creator of literature’s most logical detective became utterly seduced by the world of magic.
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June 26, 2012
Mischief Makers
Genies, or jinn as they are known in Arabic, are not always enslaved in lamps—they are the devils and demons of the Islamic world, playful and often tormenting.
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August 07, 2023
Monumental Mistakes
2023:
Fitness instructor carves his girlfriend’s name into the Colosseum.
c. 1850:
Thompson of Sunderland makes his mark on Pompey’s pillar.
May 22, 2023
Revolutionary Lovebirds
2023:
Writers on strike search for romance at the picket line.
c. 1945:
Young communists engage in party matchmaking.