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Extraordinary times: revisiting the familiar through the novels of Marilynne Robinson

By Laura E. Tanner

Last week, after more than a year of living in pandemic lock-down, my husband, my son, and I drove from our home outside Boston to the outer tip of Cape Cod, where we parked in a near empty lot and walked down a steep hill through the dunes to the ocean. “It’s still here,” I said aloud, trying to breathe in the sweeping expanse of the curved shore, the June light illuminating the water, the sound of waves and the sweep of terns. Like the trip we took as a young family to watch the sunset at Race Point Beach just days after 9/11, this encounter with the sublime felt like a blessing, a visceral recollection of the way that beauty opens us up to something larger than ourselves.

The Spanish Civil War: a nostalgia of hope

By Kathleen Riley

This summer will mark the 85th anniversary of the start of the Spanish Civil War, a brutal struggle that began with a military uprising against the democratic Second Republic and ended, three years later, in victory for the rebels under General Francisco Franco. The enduring fascination of that conflict, its ability to grip the global imagination, belies its geographical scale and is testament to the power of art.

The Hidden History of Coined Words

Do you know how these words were coined? [Quiz]

By Ralph Keyes

Successful word-coinages—those that stay in lingual currency for a good, long time—tend to conceal their beginnings. In The Hidden History of Coined Words, author and word sleuth Ralph Keyes explores the etymological underworld of terms and expressions and uncovers plenty of hidden gems.

SHAPE

On SHAPE: a Q&A with Lucy Noakes, Eyal Poleg, Laura Wright & Mary Kelly

By Eyal Poleg, Laura Wright, Lucy Noakes, and Mary Kelly

OUP have recently announced our support for the newly created SHAPE initiative—Social Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts for People and the Economy. To further understand the crucial role these subjects play in our everyday lives, we have put three questions to four British Academy SHAPE authors and editors—social and cultural historian Lucy Noakes, historian of objects and faith Eyal Poleg, historical sociolinguist Laura Wright, and Lecturer in Contemporary Art History Mary Kelly—on what SHAPE means to them, and to their research.

Poetry and the Language of Oppression: Essays on Politics and Poetics

Lyricism as activism: Sigurd Olson and The Singing Wilderness

By Carmen Bugan

Placing the reader in the poetic and ethical space is the first step toward direct action that affects the larger human community: a step toward activism. Activism formalizes the values that inspire and ultimately direct our will—and action—to preserve and protect. By opening new worlds, other spaces, and creating experiences for the reader—and, crucially, letting the reader explore those worlds for herself or for himself—the lyric writer has an opportunity to create a protected zone for significant communication.

Fictions of Credit in the Age of Shakespeare

To you I owe the most: tales of debt from Shakespeare’s England to the present day

By Laura Kolb

Our debts today are largely owed to institutions: to banks, schools, hospitals. Sometimes, they are owed to companies that do nothing but buy and manage debt. In Shakespeare’s England, debt was just as necessary for day-to-day life as it is now—maybe more so—but rather than faceless corporations, debts were owed to other people.

Shakespeare before Shakespeare

New discoveries about John Shakespeare: financial ruin and government corruption

By Cathryn Enis and Glyn Parry

A golden age for some, crooked and dishonest for others? Perhaps William Shakespeare grew up thinking this way about Elizabeth I and her ministers as disaster befell his father.

The Hidden History of Coined Words

Do you know the hidden histories of these words? [Quiz]

By Ralph Keyes

Successful word-coinages—those that stay in lingual currency for a good, long time—tend to conceal their beginnings. In “The Hidden History of Coined Words,” author and word sleuth Ralph Keyes explores the etymological underworld of terms and expressions and uncovers plenty of hidden gems. Take our quiz and see how many hidden histories you know!

Disability, access, and the virtual conference

By Sonya Freeman Loftis

Creating access for people with disabilities sometimes means fundamentally changing the nature of the thing that is made accessible. When we change the nature of the thing made accessible, we don’t just create access and inclusion for people with disabilities—we often create a new kind of experience altogether.

Picture World

Victorian 3D: virtual adventures in the stereoscope

By Rachel Teukolsky

We’re used to travelling long distances to explore exotic new locations—but that hasn’t always been possible. So how did people visit far-flung spots in times gone by? Rachel Teukolsky, author of “Picture World: Image, Aesthetics, and Victorian New Media”, takes us on a fascinating journey in glorious Victoriana 3D, introducing us to the must-have virtual reality tech of the 19th century: the stereoscope.

Oxford World's Classics

How well do you know these literary classics by women? [Quiz]

By Julia Baker

Test your knowledge of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literary classics penned by women!

SHAPE

SHAPE today and tomorrow: Q&A with Sophie Goldsworthy and Julia Black (part two)

By Julia Black and Sophie Goldsworthy

This second part of our Q&A with Sophie Goldsworthy, Director of Content Strategy & Acquisitions at OUP, and Professor Julia Black CBE FCA, Strategic Director of Innovation and Professor of Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and President-elect of the British Academy, reflects on how SHAPE disciplines can help us to understand the impact of the events of the pandemic and look towards the future of SHAPE.

SHAPE

Introducing SHAPE: Q&A with Sophie Goldsworthy and Julia Black (part one)

By Julia Black and Sophie Goldsworthy

OUP is excited to support the newly created SHAPE initiative—Social Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts for People and the Economy. SHAPE has been coined to enable us to clearly communicate the value that these disciplines bring to not only enriching the world in which we live, but also enhancing our understanding of it. In the first instalment this two-part Q&A, we spoke to Sophie Goldsworthy and Professor Julia Black to find out more about SHAPE and what it means to them.

Shakespeare and East Asia

Five themes in Asian Shakespeare adaptations

By Alexa Alice Joubin

Since the 19th century, stage and film directors have mounted hundreds of adaptations of Shakespeare drawn on East Asian motifs, and by the late 20th century, Shakespeare had become one of the most frequently performed playwrights in East Asia.

Oxford World's Classics

Which literary heroine are you? [quiz]

By Julia Baker

To best celebrate the online launch of the Oxford World’s Classics, discover which literary heroine you are most like with our quiz.

Henry James and the Art of Impressions

Impressionism’s sibling rivalry

By John Scholar

Sixty world-famous impressionist paintings arrived at the Royal Academy of Arts in London from Copenhagen in March of this year, a whisker before lockdown was imposed. Instead of drawing box-office crowds, they sat in storage for four months. But then the Academy reopened its doors in August with the Covid-secure ‘Gauguin and the Impressionists’. That this exhibition sold out so quickly is testament not only to our hunger for unmediated culture after a period of captivity, but also to the enduring popularity of impressionism.