Monthly Archives: May 2023

If nations can be said to have ‘identities’, most of them have multiple ones. Usually these are based on ‘history’, or on what has been cherry-picked out of their histories by people wanting to make patriotic or counter-patriotic points. Often … Continue reading →

Who now remembers the 1950s? I do. I grew up then, from 9 to 19 years. To later generations the fifties have been presented as rather boring and repressive, especially when looked back on through the glass of the ‘swinging … Continue reading →

You’ll have seen the news from Britain, that a number of ‘Republicans’ intending to peacefully demonstrate at King Charles’s coronation procession were arrested by the police before even getting their placards up, on the grounds that they ‘might’ cause trouble; … Continue reading →

Warning: subjective artistic judgments ahead! Why were the medievals such supreme architects, and yet so shitty at all the other arts? The great Gothic cathedrals of France, especially, have never been surpassed, while the literature, music, sculpture, drama and painting … Continue reading →

Yes, I watched it. I was surprised to find SVT1 covering the whole thing, here in Sweden. And Dagens Nyheter devoting its front page to it this morning. Apparently foreigners admire us for this sort of thing – ‘no-one else … Continue reading →