Tanya Kirk

It's wild that there appears to be more current concern for the Lost Library of Alexandria than for the British Library. The BL's crisis exemplifies the accelerating destruction--through apathy as much as by design--of human knowledge & learning. I'm not even being dramatic.

Leave Hamilton out of this! (I know which one you really mean)

Omg. This is wild

Lost medieval carol to be ‘brought to life’ on Advent Sunday Macaronic carol, including both English and Latin, comes from a manuscript, S. 54, in the old library of St John’s College, Cambridge

Nolo Mortem Peccatoris (& @tanyakirk.bsky.social!)

www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/202...

Paging @unamccormack.bsky.social !

The British library is in crisis: why does nobody care? The widespread indifference to the British Library's crippling cyberattack demonstrates a perilous failure to value the knowledge infrastructure vital for national prosperity

I’ve written a piece on the curious lack of media and political interest in the issues faced by our national @britishlibrary.bsky.social. This is strange given we live in a world where ideas, knowledge and research are a long-term source of innovation and insight
www.cityam.com/the-british-...

A headline that reads “Demonic wind in the willows jumper banned from westminster abbey

This headline ticks all the boxes for me.

The Haunted Library: Tales of Cursed Books and Forbidden Shelves, against a green background.

Cursed shelves and ghoulish libraries... 👻
Dive into fourteen tales featuring bewitched books in The Haunted Library, for lovers of the weird and the written word.

Available now: shop.bl.uk/products/the-haunted-library-tales-of-cursed-books-and-forbidden-shelves

The haunted library book plus art cards, bookmark and info card

Book mail: November Tales of the Weird from @blpublishing.bsky.social

The Haunted Library edited by @tanyakirk.bsky.social

This is not a new version of the original Haunted Library book they published (see post 2), but there are some crossover stories

#weird #horror #library #books

🩸📚💙

I too have watched this a… certain number of times

am reminded of the old joke: what did James Watson discover?

Rosalind Franklin’s notes.

Harvard Gazette: Gazette: “You are the mother of two In ten years you have produced three novels and two short-story collections. Can you talk about your process and how you manage work and family?” Groff: “I understand that this is a question of vital importance to a lot of people, particularly to other mothers who are artists trying to get their work done, and know that I feel for everyone in the struggle. But until I see a male writer asked that question, I am going to respectfully decline to answer it.”

If any of it is valuable (in monetary terms! I don't mean research value) I'd go for audit reasons and reference the BM debacle. The other one is reputation - relevant if you have high-profile users/researchers, or if donors have given material to the library but also funding to the institution?

I flipping hate Wuthering Heights (load of horrible people being horrible to each other) but nevertheless very much looking forward to listening to this

Calling English a 'rip-off degree' is one of the most blatant exhibitions of personal barbarism I've ever seen. You've demonstrated nothing but the poverty of your own mind.

A bingo card for the ghost stories of M.R. James. Boxes read: "Spiders Terrible hotel stay Narrator makes fun of golf Latin passages Eerie disembodied voices Confirmed bachelor main character Vengeful spirit Evil magician Working-class character as comic relief Bleak East Anglian coast Visit to an archive Narrator in guidebook mode FREE SPACE Unholy doings in a church Frogs or toads Queen Anne style house Cursed artifact Don't buy that rare book! Something hairy and horrible Someone gets too curious Tentacles Story told via old manuscript Research trip gone horribly wrong Beds are scary Tactile horror

I couldn't resist. #pleasingterror

I love this tradition so much

The kobo genre categories are an endless source of hilarity to me.

A book cover for a book called The Haunted Library: Tales of cursed books and forbidden shelves, edited by Tanya Kirk, published by British Library Tales of the Weird. The cover is black with an illustration in bright green, featuring ghostly figures in a library

The Haunted Library is out on 13 November! This is a collection of classic bookish ghost stories. Thanks @blpublishing.bsky.social for letting me moonlight even though I’ve left the BL

The whole heritage sector senior management are so scared of the telegraph they can barely function

Over the weekend, the world's richest man appeared on screens in central London to call for a race war and for the UK government to be overthrown. No arrests were made in connection with that communication.

How AI is undermining learning and teaching in universities | Letter Letter: Prof Leo McCann and Prof Simon Sweeney say student misuse of generative artificial intelligence is widespread and we must be sceptical of its usefulness

Entirely agree.

Argh! Absolutely gutted I didn’t know about this, looks great

This, from the Quakers, is a pretty good example of how to resist pressure from bigot lobbying groups. Effectively “we legally can allow trans people to use the loo, we morally should, and we tried it and nothing bad happened”

Ah thanks so much! That's lovely to hear! 🥰

I want to write a new blogpost, academic pals! What’s your best advice for sustaining your motivation as an early career scholar, post PhD, without institutional affiliation? How can you feel supported in carrying on with your work? And what can those of us lucky enough to have jobs do to help?

Very excited for this!

Still so gutted by the news that Johnny Flynn has agreed to be in the new TV series 😞

I really enjoyed the Frank Lloyd Wright house/museum in Oak Park