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The Cultural Tutor

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Apr 23

Only one building in London is allowed to have a thatched roof — the Globe Theatre, where Shakespeare acted and plays like Hamlet were first performed.

But this isn't the original Globe Theatre; that burned down 400 years ago.

This one is less than 30 years old...

In the 1590s William Shakespeare was part-owner of an acting company called The Lord Chamberlain's Men.

He wrote their plays and even took part in performances.

They were based in a playhouse in north London, simply called The Theatre.

A legal dispute led to the Theatre being shut down.

But the landlord only owned the land and not the building itself — so the actors dismantled the Theatre, took it south of the Thames, and rebuilt it piece by piece.

In honour of this Herculean task it was named the Globe.

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The Cultural Tutor

@culturaltutor

Apr 21

A brief introduction to the architecture of universities:

Starting with Kyung Hee University in South Korea...

The great scholar Erasmus once said that the main hope of every society lies in the education of its youth.

What he said 500 years ago remains true.

But it's not only about what you teach; it's also about where you teach.

Because the design of buildings has a colossal influence on how we think, feel, and behave.

Studies have shown what we instinctively know to be true — that the way a building looks and the way it is laid out goes beyond mere "appearance".

Good architecture uplifts us.

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The Cultural Tutor

@culturaltutor

Apr 19

Exactly 200 years ago today one of history's most influential and controversial writers died.

He kept a pet bear at university, (allegedly) had an affair with his half-sister, fought for Greek Independence — and also wrote some poetry.

This is the story of Lord Byron...

Byron dominated 19th century European culture.

Artists including Hayez, Delacroix, and Turner painted scenes from his poems, and composers including Beethoven, Verdi, and Tchaikovsky set his work to music.

A cultural icon who has shaped literature for two centuries.

The details of the wild life of Lord Byron are impossible to retell in full.

But, in brief, George Gordon Byron was born in London in 1788 to a Scottish heiress, Catherine Gordon, and a philandering British army captain known as John "Mad Jack" Byron.

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The Cultural Tutor

@culturaltutor

Apr 18

"Hanami" is underway in Japan — the season when people gather to watch cherry blossom trees, or sakura, in bloom.

It is an ancient tradition that has since become globally popular, with similar gatherings all around the world.

But hanami isn't just about pretty flowers...

The place to begin is with an old story about the King of Persia. He supposedly gathered the wisest men in the land and asked them if there was any sentence which would always be true, whenever it was spoken.

They found an answer — this too shall pass.

As Abraham Lincoln said:

The idea that "this too shall pass" — that nothing in life is permanent — is found in cultures all around the world.

But they haven't always drawn the same conclusions from it...

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The Cultural Tutor

@culturaltutor

Apr 17

A brief history of the colour orange:

First: the word itself.

A strange word, one of few that famously cannot be rhymed.

It comes to modern English from Middle English, itself from Old French, via a host of other languages, originating in Sanskrit and before that Dravidian, as a name for the fruit.

So the word orange was originally used in English to refer to the fruit.

From there, at some point in the 16th century, it was adapted to refer to the colour of that fruit.

Before that? The colour orange was simply called red-yellow.

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The Cultural Tutor

@culturaltutor

Apr 15

150 years ago today, at precisely 8pm, the world of art changed forever.

What happened? A small, independent art exhibition opened in Paris.

It was a financial failure and barely 3,000 people went — but, in time, these artists would come to be known as "the Impressionists"...

15th April. 1874. Paris.

On the top floor of the studio of a photographer called Nadar, at No. 35 on the Boulevard des Capucines, about 170 works of art have been gathered for an exhibition.

It is hosted by the "Société anonyme des artistes peintres, sculpteurs, graveurs, etc."

Some of the artists whose works are being shown might be familiar to you: Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, Berthe Morisot (the only female artist), Alfred Sisley, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Cézanne, and Claude Monet.

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