“Here is the truth: Chastity belts, made of metal and used to ensure female fidelity, never really existed. … Or, as the British Museum puts it: ‘It is probable that the great majority of examples now existing were made in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as curiosities for the prurient, or as jokes for the tasteless.'”
Author: Matthew Westphal
How To Wash A 17th-Century Tapestry In A 13-Foot Tub (Very Carefully)
“I love how gently the conservators sponge the surface like they’re bathing a gigantic wool, silk, gold and silver baby in a massive bassinet.” (includes video)
Top Posts From AJBlogs 08.20.15
True-isms: Marion True, the Getty’s Sacrificial Ex-Curator, Vents Again
AJBlog: CultureGrrl Published 2015-08-20
Guest Review. Jan Lundgren: A Retrospective
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2015-08-20
Desmond’s Later Years Revisited
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2015-08-19<
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Crisis At The Coliseum: The Tribulations – And Triumphs – Of English National Opera
Richard Fairman looks at the management battles, senior staff departures, struggles with funding bodies, and artistic successes (“standards have arguably never been higher”) at London’s number-two company.
A Grammy-Nominated Tenor On Raising An Autistic Child While Traveling Nine Months A Year
Lawrence Brownlee: “I talk to my agent to schedule as much time as I can at home without hurting my career. But if you’re in this business, you have to be out and about so people will see you. I do hate leaving my wife and kids. I’ve missed so many milestones, especially my son with his special needs. I’ll come home and I’m amazed at some of the things he can do.”
What Is This Big-Spending, High-Powered, Tight-Lipped Group Of Donors Around The Librarian Of Congress?
“But like its 86-year-old leader” – outgoing Librarian James Billington – “the James Madison Council is a throwback to a different time. Although its mission is outreach, the group is insular and exclusive. Membership is by invitation and individual donations go undisclosed. … Although they’ve raised millions, they’ve spent almost half of their recorded contributions on private parties, exhibition receptions, travel and employees and consultants, financial statements from the council and the library show.”
Bestselling New Adaptation Of ‘Don Quixote’ Called ‘Crime Against Literature’ By (Some) Spanish Academics
“Spanish writer Andres Trapiello spent nearly 14 years adapting Cervantes’s masterpiece for contemporary readers. According to Trapiello, it is impossible to understand Don Quixote without reading the footnotes. The new edition includes a comprehensive set of changes to make it more comprehensible.”
Why Pablo Neruda Is So Very Hard To Translate – And Why That’s Okay
“All translators create their own reality, which may or may not reflect the intentions of the writer. After all, if you make the decision to cut out six cantos in a 12-canto series (as my edition did), to what extent are you even trying to keep faith with with the original work? I found some sort of an answer in Neruda’s own argument for’ an impure poetry’.”
ISIS Beheads 82-Year-Old Scholar Who Refused To Lead Them To Antiquities
“Islamic State militants beheaded a renowned antiquities scholar in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra and hung his mutilated body on a column in a main square of the historic site because he apparently refused to reveal where valuable artefacts had been moved for safekeeping.”
Muslim Drag Queen Featured In Documentary Faces Death Threats
“Asif Quaraishi, an activist for the so-called ‘Gaysian’ community who performs in clubs as the glamorous Asifa Lahore, has received death threats in the past and is concerned about the public reaction to Muslim Drag Queens when it airs [on Britain’s Channel Four] on Monday night.” (includes video)