Terracotta flask in the form of a bird man, Greek, late fifth century bc. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, purchase, Mr. and Mrs. Christos G. Bastis Gift, 1999.
• “But the lush comic hip-hop of Megan Thee Stallion and Cardi B is one of the most useful modern analogues, because it illustrates the core element of Old Comedy that is most often obscured in contemporary Anglophone translations—the flow. Aristophanes, like the creators of ‘WAP,’ was a musician, songwriter, choreographer, and poet, and his linguistic effects depend, like theirs, on the artful manipulation of rhythm and sound in words and imagery.” (London Review of Books)
• “The history of medieval medicine is one that might best be told from the perspective of quotidian acts of care.” (Aeon)
• The technology and politics behind photographs of empty streets. (Cabinet)
• A brief history of declaring victory. (Dilettante Army)
• On the paper dress. (JSTOR Daily)
• “The creation of the West would have been utterly impossible, unthinkable without the expert expropriation of these billions and billions of man hours of labor.” (Africa Is a Country)
• This week in obituaries: Gary Paulsen, Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, Miloš Vasić, Albert J. Raboteau, Megan Rice, Paddy Moloney, Dottie Dodgion, Budge Patty, Anne Saxelby, Tony De Marco, Ray Fosse, Myriam Sarachik, Ricarlo Flanagan, Martin J. Sherwin, Mary Bloom, Stanley Amis, Raymond Odierno, Abdul Qadeer Khan, and Russ Kick.