1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
@johnmkuhn.bsky.social
English prof. 17th century stuff. Prairie son. Working on a cultural and material history of the birchbark canoe in the early modern Americas.
Pinned
Towards a history of the hammock: An Indigenous technology in the Atlantic world - postmedieval
When Europeans arrived in the Western Hemisphere beginning in the fifteenth century, they learned that Indigenous groups across the Caribbean and South America valued few technologies as much as the h...
link.springer.com
if you would like to read about early modern hammocks, it's publication day for the article the brilliant @marcynorton.bsky.social and I wrote about them! (open access)
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
really had fun at Wuthering Heights. I a. love Emerald Fennell's just bonkers zero-subtext unrestrained maximalist visual sense and b. do not care at all about the underlying source material. So I had a great time!
February 15, 2026 at 1:38 AM
really had fun at Wuthering Heights. I a. love Emerald Fennell's just bonkers zero-subtext unrestrained maximalist visual sense and b. do not care at all about the underlying source material. So I had a great time!
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
can you imagine how disappointed you’d be if you knew nothing about this book and only picked it up for this particular cover
February 14, 2026 at 8:23 AM
can you imagine how disappointed you’d be if you knew nothing about this book and only picked it up for this particular cover
going to see Wuthering Heights with two other English professors who are also in long-distance relationships....nothing Emerald Fennell could put in front of us will ever be enough lol
February 14, 2026 at 7:46 PM
going to see Wuthering Heights with two other English professors who are also in long-distance relationships....nothing Emerald Fennell could put in front of us will ever be enough lol
two big pieces of news from Binghamton that perfectly sum up the upstate Rust Belt: #1 there was an inexplicable DOUBLE BOAT ARSON in a parking lot this week #2 this thaw is going to start the maple syrup flow all throughout the region!
February 14, 2026 at 7:32 PM
two big pieces of news from Binghamton that perfectly sum up the upstate Rust Belt: #1 there was an inexplicable DOUBLE BOAT ARSON in a parking lot this week #2 this thaw is going to start the maple syrup flow all throughout the region!
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
This quite literally is the last place I would look, unless I developed a kink for people who were judgmental and bad at following instructions.
February 14, 2026 at 6:17 PM
This quite literally is the last place I would look, unless I developed a kink for people who were judgmental and bad at following instructions.
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
TV show pitch: ‘Tome Team’, where a group of rare books librarians and book historians are sent to investigate an uncatalogued library for interesting incunabula, marginalia and provenances - and they have just three days to do it.
February 14, 2026 at 6:57 PM
TV show pitch: ‘Tome Team’, where a group of rare books librarians and book historians are sent to investigate an uncatalogued library for interesting incunabula, marginalia and provenances - and they have just three days to do it.
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
Quick but important question: what are the current guidelines/practices on including on a CV fellowships that a candidate had to decline? What about fellowships that were cancelled due to funding issues (such as 2025's NEH cancellations)?#AcademicJobs #Academia
February 14, 2026 at 6:32 PM
Quick but important question: what are the current guidelines/practices on including on a CV fellowships that a candidate had to decline? What about fellowships that were cancelled due to funding issues (such as 2025's NEH cancellations)?#AcademicJobs #Academia
scheming up a public program for our Humanities Institute---seeing if people in local beekeeping org (which I am a member of) and the Med/Ren center want to reconstruct a medieval beehive?!
February 14, 2026 at 6:31 PM
scheming up a public program for our Humanities Institute---seeing if people in local beekeeping org (which I am a member of) and the Med/Ren center want to reconstruct a medieval beehive?!
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
"You see honey, when a man loves suffering very much,"
February 14, 2026 at 5:08 PM
"You see honey, when a man loves suffering very much,"
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
Yes: the balcony is a mediaeval tomb-chest cemented to the wall in 1930s to cash in on tourism from the Leslie Howard/Norma Shearer 'Romeo & Juliet' film...
Romeo and Juliet never lived in Verona. In fact Shakespeare's most famous lovers never lived anywhere at all. But far be it for facts to intrude on matters of the heart.
Juliet's balcony in Verona: true love's enduring myth
To see the balcony where Romeo and Juliet declared their undying love all that is required is suspension of disbelief and a train ticket to Verona in northern Italy.
www.wantedinrome.com
February 14, 2026 at 4:27 PM
Yes: the balcony is a mediaeval tomb-chest cemented to the wall in 1930s to cash in on tourism from the Leslie Howard/Norma Shearer 'Romeo & Juliet' film...
happy valentines day!
reading an alcoholic (!) wigmaker's (!) diary (!) from the early 18th century (!) that records basically every time he had sex with his wife, and typically he sorts these acts into either doing it "new style" or "old style" (!!!!!!)
February 14, 2026 at 1:30 PM
happy valentines day!
do you know who would have been really into gun control? John fucking Milton, who presents gunpowder as literally invented by Satan (also: George Herbert wrote a Latin mini-epic--Inventa Bellica--about how the invention of artillery was a curse on humanity!)
When coming towards them so
dread they saw
The bottom of the mountains
upward turned;
Till on those cursed engines'
triple-row
They saw them whelmed, and all
their confidence
Under the weight of mountains
buried deep;
VI, 648-652
dread they saw
The bottom of the mountains
upward turned;
Till on those cursed engines'
triple-row
They saw them whelmed, and all
their confidence
Under the weight of mountains
buried deep;
VI, 648-652
February 14, 2026 at 5:49 AM
do you know who would have been really into gun control? John fucking Milton, who presents gunpowder as literally invented by Satan (also: George Herbert wrote a Latin mini-epic--Inventa Bellica--about how the invention of artillery was a curse on humanity!)
wild detail I learned while working on a footnote: Dick Whittington, a famous medieval mayor of London, was later reputed to have gotten his wealth by selling a cat. The story became so popular that ~1600, an engraving of him with a memento mori skull was reworked to have a cat in place of the skull
February 14, 2026 at 5:26 AM
wild detail I learned while working on a footnote: Dick Whittington, a famous medieval mayor of London, was later reputed to have gotten his wealth by selling a cat. The story became so popular that ~1600, an engraving of him with a memento mori skull was reworked to have a cat in place of the skull
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
Sorry, it was Willow the cat’s fault. We tried to stop her.
February 14, 2026 at 3:40 AM
Sorry, it was Willow the cat’s fault. We tried to stop her.
reading an alcoholic (!) wigmaker's (!) diary (!) from the early 18th century (!) that records basically every time he had sex with his wife, and typically he sorts these acts into either doing it "new style" or "old style" (!!!!!!)
February 14, 2026 at 4:30 AM
reading an alcoholic (!) wigmaker's (!) diary (!) from the early 18th century (!) that records basically every time he had sex with his wife, and typically he sorts these acts into either doing it "new style" or "old style" (!!!!!!)
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
Taking my Book Theory seminar to the Houghton next month & found this amusing record . . . The students often get the chance to view fragments, but a fragment of a HOUSE? of William Caxton's HOUSE? Not so much .. .
February 13, 2026 at 5:34 PM
Taking my Book Theory seminar to the Houghton next month & found this amusing record . . . The students often get the chance to view fragments, but a fragment of a HOUSE? of William Caxton's HOUSE? Not so much .. .
seed packet season!!!!!! #bloomscrolling 🌱
February 14, 2026 at 4:08 AM
seed packet season!!!!!! #bloomscrolling 🌱
went on a long hike in the snow with my colleague, which was beautiful up to the point where we found a deer carcass emerging from a slowly ebbing snow drift, its ribs gnawed mostly clean but its head still somehow be-furred, staring at nothing. Not ominous at all!
February 14, 2026 at 4:07 AM
went on a long hike in the snow with my colleague, which was beautiful up to the point where we found a deer carcass emerging from a slowly ebbing snow drift, its ribs gnawed mostly clean but its head still somehow be-furred, staring at nothing. Not ominous at all!
Sir William Coventry having a normal 1669
February 14, 2026 at 4:03 AM
Sir William Coventry having a normal 1669
this ROCKS
As some of you may know, I’m writing a book on the history of high school English in the United States, and I’m excited to share a new article from that project—“High School English and the Making of American Readers”—out today in American Literary History! 🧵
academic.oup.com/alh/article/...
academic.oup.com/alh/article/...
High School English and the Making of American Readers
Abstract. The high school English classroom is the most influential literary institution in the United States, and the most overlooked by literary scholars
academic.oup.com
February 14, 2026 at 1:47 AM
this ROCKS
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Newspapers used to employ ppl to tweet. This is from the The Binghamton Press, NY in FEB 1926.
February 10, 2026 at 4:58 PM
Newspapers used to employ ppl to tweet. This is from the The Binghamton Press, NY in FEB 1926.
need a content filter to protect me from these toxic and damaging PICTURES OF CROCUSES AND DAFFODILS that people in Europe are starting to post, while we are still snow-bound. Just you all wait til the gulf stream collapses, we’ll see who is laughing then!
February 13, 2026 at 2:34 PM
need a content filter to protect me from these toxic and damaging PICTURES OF CROCUSES AND DAFFODILS that people in Europe are starting to post, while we are still snow-bound. Just you all wait til the gulf stream collapses, we’ll see who is laughing then!
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
My wife says that guys will just sit around and name their favorite years in history and have a great time
February 13, 2026 at 1:57 AM
My wife says that guys will just sit around and name their favorite years in history and have a great time
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
Is there really such a thing as a "novel of ideas"? Is that not just a category people have made up for novels they think are bad?
February 13, 2026 at 3:11 AM
Is there really such a thing as a "novel of ideas"? Is that not just a category people have made up for novels they think are bad?
Reposted by 1-800-MARLOWE-FACTS
my new job at the EPA is to hunt and destroy every last goddamn bee they’ve ever saved
February 12, 2026 at 10:45 PM
my new job at the EPA is to hunt and destroy every last goddamn bee they’ve ever saved