Zachary Lesser
@zacharylesser.bsky.social
Book history, Shakespeare etc. Views my own, not my "neutral" employer's. Header is: https://shorturl.at/FtfZQ / Gen Ed., Arden Shakespeare / https://pennmaterialtexts.org / http://shakespearecensus.org / http://deepplaybooks.org
Pinned
Anti-semitism inside the GOP is skyrocketing under Trump: 37% of Republicans surveyed by the Manhattan Institute believe the Holocaust of Jews in Nazi Germany was either greatly exaggerated or did not happen. This is largely Jonathan Greenblatt's accomplishment.
The central thread here is conspiracy thinking, a diminished form of interpretation that rushes into the vacuum when people lack real interpretive agency. Exercising those muscles of interpreting and navigating complexity is the work that the humanities do from elementary school on up. It matters.
This was so interesting and exciting to work on with @heatherwolfe.bsky.social and Jeremy Lopez. Carl Berkhout spent about 40 years, off and on, investigating this book, and we edited this posthumously published text from his annotated drafts.
doi.org/10.1093/sq/q...
doi.org/10.1093/sq/q...
January 6, 2026 at 11:55 PM
This was so interesting and exciting to work on with @heatherwolfe.bsky.social and Jeremy Lopez. Carl Berkhout spent about 40 years, off and on, investigating this book, and we edited this posthumously published text from his annotated drafts.
doi.org/10.1093/sq/q...
doi.org/10.1093/sq/q...
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
‘If there’s a sense of individuality, here, it may be less in Rousseau’s bold words about singularity, and more in the messy surround – the contingent stuff of a particular time and a place.’
@adamwithbooks.bsky.social’s video response to Rousseau’s ‘Confessions’:
www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/de...
@adamwithbooks.bsky.social’s video response to Rousseau’s ‘Confessions’:
www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/de...
Adam Smyth | Like No One in Existence
One of the early meanings of ‘original’ was something which serves as a model, or something from which copies can...
www.lrb.co.uk
January 5, 2026 at 8:40 PM
‘If there’s a sense of individuality, here, it may be less in Rousseau’s bold words about singularity, and more in the messy surround – the contingent stuff of a particular time and a place.’
@adamwithbooks.bsky.social’s video response to Rousseau’s ‘Confessions’:
www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/de...
@adamwithbooks.bsky.social’s video response to Rousseau’s ‘Confessions’:
www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/de...
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
Statement Re: OU Discrimination Investigation
Today, my client, Mel Curth, submitted her appeal of the University's Institutional Equity Office finding that she engaged in arbitrary and capricious grading of a student's assignment in violation of that student's religious liberty.
Today, my client, Mel Curth, submitted her appeal of the University's Institutional Equity Office finding that she engaged in arbitrary and capricious grading of a student's assignment in violation of that student's religious liberty.
December 30, 2025 at 4:36 PM
Statement Re: OU Discrimination Investigation
Today, my client, Mel Curth, submitted her appeal of the University's Institutional Equity Office finding that she engaged in arbitrary and capricious grading of a student's assignment in violation of that student's religious liberty.
Today, my client, Mel Curth, submitted her appeal of the University's Institutional Equity Office finding that she engaged in arbitrary and capricious grading of a student's assignment in violation of that student's religious liberty.
I have measured out my life with two-factor authentications.
December 20, 2025 at 2:44 PM
I have measured out my life with two-factor authentications.
How it's going / How it will go
December 19, 2025 at 10:03 PM
How it's going / How it will go
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
Ich thynke but litel of a Mondaye bleake
Tuesdaye grey and Wednesdaye eke
Thursdaye Ich care nat for thee
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Mondaye thou kanst fall awaye
Tuesdaye, Wednesdaye, myne herte slaye
No mirthe ys founde upon Thursdaye
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Tuesdaye grey and Wednesdaye eke
Thursdaye Ich care nat for thee
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Mondaye thou kanst fall awaye
Tuesdaye, Wednesdaye, myne herte slaye
No mirthe ys founde upon Thursdaye
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
December 13, 2025 at 3:54 AM
Ich thynke but litel of a Mondaye bleake
Tuesdaye grey and Wednesdaye eke
Thursdaye Ich care nat for thee
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Mondaye thou kanst fall awaye
Tuesdaye, Wednesdaye, myne herte slaye
No mirthe ys founde upon Thursdaye
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Tuesdaye grey and Wednesdaye eke
Thursdaye Ich care nat for thee
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Mondaye thou kanst fall awaye
Tuesdaye, Wednesdaye, myne herte slaye
No mirthe ys founde upon Thursdaye
Yet Fridaye Ich do love
Just found out about Anna Barbauld's wonderful "Washing Day" which ends with these great Macbeth-inspired lines :
Earth, air, and sky, and ocean hath its bubbles,
And verse is one of them — this most of all.
Earth, air, and sky, and ocean hath its bubbles,
And verse is one of them — this most of all.
December 7, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Just found out about Anna Barbauld's wonderful "Washing Day" which ends with these great Macbeth-inspired lines :
Earth, air, and sky, and ocean hath its bubbles,
And verse is one of them — this most of all.
Earth, air, and sky, and ocean hath its bubbles,
And verse is one of them — this most of all.
Once again snubbed by the FIFA Peace Prize committee this year.
December 5, 2025 at 5:51 PM
Once again snubbed by the FIFA Peace Prize committee this year.
The central thread here is conspiracy thinking, a diminished form of interpretation that rushes into the vacuum when people lack real interpretive agency. Exercising those muscles of interpreting and navigating complexity is the work that the humanities do from elementary school on up. It matters.
Anti-semitism inside the GOP is skyrocketing under Trump: 37% of Republicans surveyed by the Manhattan Institute believe the Holocaust of Jews in Nazi Germany was either greatly exaggerated or did not happen. This is largely Jonathan Greenblatt's accomplishment.
December 4, 2025 at 4:22 PM
The central thread here is conspiracy thinking, a diminished form of interpretation that rushes into the vacuum when people lack real interpretive agency. Exercising those muscles of interpreting and navigating complexity is the work that the humanities do from elementary school on up. It matters.
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
Ad offers an amazing perspective on higher ed
November 26, 2025 at 10:25 PM
Ad offers an amazing perspective on higher ed
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
It’s all happening: Shakespeare in the Kitchen is slated for publication in April 2026 🍽️📗🎉 www.routledge.com/Shakespeare-...
Shakespeare in the Kitchen
Audiences and scholars alike have long remarked that Shakespeare’s poems and plays record the pleasures and perils of the table. Shakespeare in the Kitchen asks what Shakespeare’s works can tell us ab...
www.routledge.com
November 20, 2025 at 5:04 PM
It’s all happening: Shakespeare in the Kitchen is slated for publication in April 2026 🍽️📗🎉 www.routledge.com/Shakespeare-...
When Scott Enderle <https://pricelab.sas.upenn.edu/news/jonathan-scott-enderle-1979-2021> and I were building the Shakespeare Census, one of the first things he insisted on was making it open and easily adaptable for others. I'm so pleased to his hard work on that part of the project bearing fruit.
Pleased to announce the Wheatley Census is ready for 1.0 public release! As detailed a census as possible (right now) of the first six editions - those printed in the 18th century - of Phillis Wheatley’s Poems on Various Subjects, is available here: www.wheatleycensus.org.
Wheatley Census
www.wheatleycensus.org
November 17, 2025 at 4:48 PM
When Scott Enderle <https://pricelab.sas.upenn.edu/news/jonathan-scott-enderle-1979-2021> and I were building the Shakespeare Census, one of the first things he insisted on was making it open and easily adaptable for others. I'm so pleased to his hard work on that part of the project bearing fruit.
Getting excited to teach Paradise Lost again next semester. It is the text that most consistently blows students' minds and sticks with them, in my experience.
November 12, 2025 at 3:03 AM
Getting excited to teach Paradise Lost again next semester. It is the text that most consistently blows students' minds and sticks with them, in my experience.
I don't know, can you just put "Critical" before any word and "Studies" after it and you've got a field of study?
November 11, 2025 at 12:24 AM
I don't know, can you just put "Critical" before any word and "Studies" after it and you've got a field of study?
"The poorest persons on Twitter" is the new "The lowest and most dejected thing of Fortune" (King Lear 4.1.3)
November 9, 2025 at 5:10 PM
"The poorest persons on Twitter" is the new "The lowest and most dejected thing of Fortune" (King Lear 4.1.3)
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
Great news! This is out: Opening the black box of EEBO academic.oup.com/dsh/advance-...
Opening the black box of EEBO
Abstract. Digital archives that cover extended historical periods can create a misleading impression of comprehensiveness while in truth providing access t
academic.oup.com
November 9, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Great news! This is out: Opening the black box of EEBO academic.oup.com/dsh/advance-...
What's wild is that Trump has somehow turned David Brooks into a decent columnist. Stunning plot twist
November 9, 2025 at 12:12 AM
What's wild is that Trump has somehow turned David Brooks into a decent columnist. Stunning plot twist
People who tear gas little kids, and those who give orders to do so, should face consequences. Democrats in Congress should make clear now that when they are back in power they will seek those consequences. No turning the page.
“All of a sudden, my eyes were just burning and I couldn’t breathe,” a Chicago mom told @nbcnews.com
Then she heard her 2-year-old scream: “Mommy! Mommy! Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!”
She realized immigration agents were in the neighborhood and deployed chemical agents.
www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...
Then she heard her 2-year-old scream: “Mommy! Mommy! Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!”
She realized immigration agents were in the neighborhood and deployed chemical agents.
www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...
Chicago residents say kids tear-gassed due to nearby immigration enforcement
A Chicago mother tells NBC News she and her 2-year-old were hit with a chemical agent. Many residents say the city wasn’t a “war zone”— until immigration agents swept through.
www.nbcnews.com
November 8, 2025 at 6:47 PM
People who tear gas little kids, and those who give orders to do so, should face consequences. Democrats in Congress should make clear now that when they are back in power they will seek those consequences. No turning the page.
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
The #1 lesson from yesterday’s blowout:
Humanities majors killed on the job market
1) Mamdani- Africana Studies
2) Spanberger -French
3) Sherill - Global History
Humanities majors killed on the job market
1) Mamdani- Africana Studies
2) Spanberger -French
3) Sherill - Global History
November 5, 2025 at 3:59 PM
The #1 lesson from yesterday’s blowout:
Humanities majors killed on the job market
1) Mamdani- Africana Studies
2) Spanberger -French
3) Sherill - Global History
Humanities majors killed on the job market
1) Mamdani- Africana Studies
2) Spanberger -French
3) Sherill - Global History
You can't eat a golden ballroom
November 3, 2025 at 4:09 PM
You can't eat a golden ballroom
Surely the detective from Matsumoto's Tokyo Express
"Person trying to disprove the suspect's alibi"
(he's looking at a train schedule)
x.com/dailyportalz...
(he's looking at a train schedule)
x.com/dailyportalz...
November 2, 2025 at 9:00 PM
Surely the detective from Matsumoto's Tokyo Express
Looking forward to this talk by @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social !
For our next talk, we are thrilled to welcome Sonja Drimmer (UMass Amherst) for a talk titled: “Optics: Heraldry and the Preprint History of Print.”
Monday, November 3 at 5:15 PM Eastern — 6th floor of Penn's Van Pelt Library (and on Zoom). As always, full details at: pennmaterialtexts.org
Monday, November 3 at 5:15 PM Eastern — 6th floor of Penn's Van Pelt Library (and on Zoom). As always, full details at: pennmaterialtexts.org
November 2, 2025 at 8:53 PM
Looking forward to this talk by @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social !
Those following these orders to murder people ought to read up.
October 31, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Those following these orders to murder people ought to read up.
Reposted by Zachary Lesser
Will put pen to paper at some point about why Vandal Live is going to become a bigger part of podcast mix, but for now I just want to thank Penn English for jumpstarting this season with an event that clarified for me how these recordings can serve the whole humanities.
Also, the sound was perfect.
Also, the sound was perfect.
October 30, 2025 at 11:29 PM
Will put pen to paper at some point about why Vandal Live is going to become a bigger part of podcast mix, but for now I just want to thank Penn English for jumpstarting this season with an event that clarified for me how these recordings can serve the whole humanities.
Also, the sound was perfect.
Also, the sound was perfect.
This is delightful
October 26, 2025 at 8:34 PM
This is delightful