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Reposted by Dr Andrew Higgins

sakanaai.bsky.social @sakanaai.bsky.social · 3h

IASC: Interactive Agentic System for ConLangs

arxiv.org/abs/2510.07591

If you’re a fan of science fiction or fantasy, you’ve probably heard of made-up languages like Elvish from “The Lord of the Rings” or Klingon from “Star Trek.”

Can LLM agents create new artificial languages?

IASC: Interactive Agentic System for ConLangs

We present a system that uses LLMs as a tool in the development of Constructed Languages. The system is modular in that one first creates a target phonology for the language using an agentic approach ...

arxiv.org

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 1d

Eglerio the eagles have delivered a new #Tolkien book to my Kindle this morning and I get to start reading it in front of a castle (Leeds Castle in Kent) #tolkien @harpercollins.bsky.social

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Prof. Dimitra Fimi @dimitrafimi.bsky.social · 3d

For #TolkienTuesday: the second part (out of three) of my essay on childhood in Tolkien’s legendarium, this time focusing on Túrin Turambar and the tragic hero’s childhood.

dimitrafimi.substack.com/p/constructi...

@uofgfantasy.bsky.social @uofgartshums.bsky.social

Constructions of Childhood in Tolkien’s Legendarium (2): Túrin Turambar's childhood

This is the second part of a longer piece on constructions of childhood in Tolkien’s legendarium.

dimitrafimi.substack.com

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Reposted by Dr Andrew Higgins

Tolkien Society @tolkiensociety.org · 2d

New Tolkien Society publication!

Releasing on 25 November, "Númenor, the Mighty and Frail" includes 10 articles relating to Númenor, and its legacy. Edited by @willsherwood.bsky.social and published by @lunapress.bsky.social, it's now available to pre-order. www.tolkiensociety.org/2025/10/new-...

New Tolkien Society publication – <em>Númenor, The Mighty and Frail</em>

The Tolkien Society is pleased to announce that Númenor, the Mighty and Frail: Proceedings of The Tolkien Society Seminar 2023, the twenty-fifth book in the Peter Roe series, is now available to pre-o...

www.tolkiensociety.org

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Peter Johnston @peterajohnston.bsky.social · 3d

A reminder for you all that tickets are still available for this excellent event at IWM London on 9 October, where the brilliant Kavita Puri will share insights and stories from her recent podcast series. Do join us if you can! #SWW www.iwm.org.uk/events/iwm-i...

IWM In Conversation: Kavita Puri | The Second Map

Forgotten histories of the Second World War: the Bengal Famine of 1943 and the war on the Asian FrontJoin journalist and broadcaster Kavita Puri and IWM's Director for Narrative and Content, Peter Joh...

www.iwm.org.uk

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 6d

Eglerio! My book review of Robert Tally’s new monograph The Mismeasure of Orcs has been posted to The Journal of Tolkien Research scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcont.... Uglúk u bagronk sha pushdug Saruman-glob búbhosh skai! #tolkien #orcs

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 5d

Good interview with @RichardOvenden on the upcoming release of the NEW #Tolkien book The Bovadium Fragments youtube.com/watch?v=IGuQ... @harpercollins.bsky.social

Richard Ovenden OBE talks Tolkien and The Bovadium Fragments

YouTube video by TolkienGuide

youtube.com

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 6d

Eglerio! My book review of Robert Tally’s new monograph The Mismeasure of Orcs has been posted to The Journal of Tolkien Research scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcont.... Uglúk u bagronk sha pushdug Saruman-glob búbhosh skai! #tolkien #orcs

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 8d

Praeclara res of @instantclassicspod.bsky.social podcast on the legends of the Birth of Rome with Dame @wmarybeard.bsky.social and Charlotte Higgins - interesting Augustus wanted to call himself Romulus! #rome #classics #instantclassics

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Prof. Dimitra Fimi @dimitrafimi.bsky.social · 8d

If you’re working on any area of fantasy and the fantastic, come and join us at Glasgow in June 2026 and do consider presenting or running a workshop! All the info you need and the full CFP is here:

fantasy.glasgow.ac.uk/index.php/20...

@uofgfantasy.bsky.social @uofgartshums.bsky.social

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DrDinD.bsky.social @drdind.bsky.social · 11d

Friday was the 50th anniversary of the The Rocky Horror Picture Show release, which bombed at the time but quickly became perhaps the biggest, most durable cult classic in history, spanning generations in appeal.

So, let's do the time warp again, folks!

www.washingtonpost.com/entertainmen...

a close up of a woman 's face with the words how bout that written below her

Alt: a close up of a man 's face with the words how bout that written below him - Frankfurter played by Tim Curry from Rocky Horror, released 9/26/75

media.tenor.com

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 11d

Really enjoyed the Chelsea #History Festival this weekend attended several excellent talks on The Viking Great Army and the Templars as well as seeing some great exhibitons in the Chelsea Heritage Quarter including at @nationalarmymuseum.bsky.social and Royal Hospital Chelsea. #Festival

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marybeard @wmarybeard.bsky.social · 14d

Our new Instant Classics podcast is on the Parthenon. Not its modern controversies, but its ancient ones! Was it OTT? tinyurl.com/y9rcp6zj

Decoding The Parthenon

Podcast Episode · Instant Classics · 25/09/2025 · 51m

tinyurl.com

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Tolkien Society @tolkiensociety.org · 16d

On 23 September 1993: Morgoth's Ring was published.

The book is the tenth in the History of Middle-earth series. It includes ideas on reshaping the world, the Annals of Aman, and Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth which discusses the differing characteristics and fates of Men and Elves.

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Prof. Dimitra Fimi @dimitrafimi.bsky.social · 18d

Happy birthday to J.R.R. #Tolkien’s The Hobbit, published #OTD in 1937, with a gorgeous dust jacket and illustrations by Tolkien himself! @tolkiensociety.org @tolkienwonder.bsky.social @uofgfantasy.bsky.social #Hobbit 🐉

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 18d

One of the best books I have read on #museology and #museum studies highly recommend www.goodreads.com/review/show/... #iwm

Andrew Higgins's review of The New Holocaust Galleries at the Imperial War Museum London

5/5: One of the best books I have read on museology and the thinking behind, development and impact of a major museum exhibition. Highly recommend.

www.goodreads.com

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 19d

Congrats @royaloperahouse.bsky.social for an excellent opening night of #Verdi’s grandest of grand #operas The Sicilian Vespers (in the French version) with a stellar cast and powerful performance by maestro Speranza Scappucci - must see!! #opera

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 20d

The very wine of blessedness was working with Professor @dimitrafimi.bsky.social on this remembering sitting with Dimitra at the Bod Library in front of Tolkien MS 24 the manuscripts for Tolkien’s Secret Vice and saying this could be a book - and we did it and now we have #Tolkien’s signature on it

Prof. Dimitra Fimi @dimitrafimi.bsky.social · 20d

Tolkien’s A Secret Vice, his “manifesto” on invented languages edited from his manuscripts by me and @ashiggins.bsky.social, has now been released by HarperCollins as a Tolkien “signature” edition. Amazing to see my name on a book cover alongside Tolkien’s authorised signature!

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Liveright @liveright.bsky.social · Aug 12

Happy publication day to Scott McGill and Susannah Wright, whose translation of THE AENEID (w/ introduction by THE ODYSSEY and THE ILIAD's @emilyrcwilson.bsky.social) is now available wherever epic works are sold! wwnorton.com/books/978132...

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Lit Hub @literaryhub.bsky.social · Sep 3

From migrants and colonizers to gossip and war, @emilyrcwilson.bsky.social examines The Aeneid and its relevance to the modern world.

Emily Wilson Explores The Aeneid ’s Influence on the Contemporary Western World

“Hindsight as foresight makes no sense,” insists the speaker of W. H. Auden’s great poem about the Aeneid, “Secondary Epic,” objecting to perhaps the most provocative element of Virgil’s epic: the …

buff.ly

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 23d

The #Odyssey with the #classics dream team of Dame @wmarybeard.bsky.social and Charlotte Higgins is off with an excellent episode covering the first 10 lines including the key word describing the ἄνδρα of line 1 - πολύτροπον
@instantclassicspod.bsky.social
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i...

The Odyssey#2:

Podcast Episode · Instant Classics · 16/09/2025 · 25m

podcasts.apple.com

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Mark Chadbourn @chadbourn.bsky.social · 23d

When journalism was cool. And risked everything to challenge power.

Robert Redford on the phone, plus Dustin Hoffman. From All the President’s Men

360 3.2K 14K

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Ellen Gallimore @emgallimore.bsky.social · Aug 24

Just over one week left to submit your abstracts! Come join @rafletcher.bsky.social, Dr Thijs Porck, and me at #IMC2026 talking about "Old English in the Long Nineteenth Century".

Ellen Gallimore @emgallimore.bsky.social · Jul 30

CFP for @imc-leeds.bsky.social for July 2026: "Old English in the Long Nineteenth Century". Please share widely! Deadline for abstracts 1 September 2025. #IMC2026

Call for papers for the 2026 Leeds IMC for "Old English in the Long 19th Century". Deadline 1 Sept. 2025. Description reads:
Throughout the long 19th c., various advances were made in the study of Old English, ranging from the 1st edition of Beowulf (1815) the outlining of OE metre by Eduard Sievers, as well as discoveries of such OE texts as the Vercelli Book, the Épinal-Erfurt Glossary and the Brussels Cross. When approaching OE in the 21st c., it is impossible to deny the impact of 19th-c. scholarship. When we refer to titles of such OE poems as The Wanderer, The Seafarer and The Wife’s Lament, we are using titles bestowed on these texts by 19th-c. scholars. Several standard editions of OE texts were made in the 19th c. or heavily rely on earlier, 19th-c. editions. Lexicographical tools with a relevance for OE, including Bosworth and Toller’s An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, A Thesaurus of Old English and the Oxford English Dictionary, also have their roots firmly in 19th-c. philological practices and how OE is taught still relies on paradigms and set texts from the 19th c. Thus, when studying OE, we often have to engage with material on multiple temporal levels, considering not just our own concepts of the early medieval period but also how that period was understood by 19th-c. scholars. Paper proposals are welcome from scholars from all academic backgrounds. Possible topics include but are not limited to:
- Discoveries of OE texts
- Disputes about linguistic or literary interpretations of OE
- Disciplinary developments in the field of OE studies
- Personal, religious, political and ideological motivations for the study of OE
- Biographical contributions about scholars of OE
- Scholarly correspondence on OE matters
- Editing and printing of OE texts
- Teaching of OE
Please send an abstract (300 words) to Rachel A. Fletcher (r.a.fletcher@hum.leidenuniv.nl), Ellen Gallimore (ellen.gallimore@york.ac.uk) and Thijs Porck (m.h.porck@hum.leidenuniv.nl).

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marybeard @wmarybeard.bsky.social · 28d

Todays new podcast . On sappho the first western poet of desire . Charlotte & I enjoy an occasional bit of disagreement ! podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i...

podcasts.apple.com

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Dr Andrew Higgins @ashiggins.bsky.social · 29d

@instantclassicspod.bsky.social great episode by Dame @wmarybeard.bsky.social and Charlotte Higgins about the poet #Sappho remember reading in the original need to revisit #instantclassics