Pinned
Wake up the cat piano and ignite the fire organ because "The Madman's Orchestra: The Greatest Curiosities From the History of Music" is out TODAY!
The history of music as you wouldn't believe it...
simonandschuster.co.uk/books/The-Madm…
Edward Brooke-Hitching
3,824 posts
Edward Brooke-Hitching
@foxtosser
Author of The Madman's Orchestra, Madman's Library (Times Lit Book of the Year) and others. QI Elfing veteran. RGS Fellow. @CCampbell_Agent
- A little love story - Edward James, patron of the surrealists, was so besotted with his wife, the dancer Tilly Losch, that when he saw the trail of wet footprints she left up the stairs after her bath at Monkton House, he had them woven into the carpet.
- 16th-century portrait thought to be of Hungarian nobleman Gregor Baci, who was impaled with a lance during a tournament. He lived for another YEAR with the sawn-off piece lodged in his head (The white paint was likely made of zinc oxide, which would have helped prevent infection)
- Replying to @foxtosserIf you like these kinds of little nuggets, check out Love: Curious History:
- Volume #474839 of the Madman’s Library - a custom prayer-book pistol made for Francesco Morisini. Duke of Venice (1619-1694). Tug the silk bookmark to fire while the book is closed! hyperurl.co/madmanslibrary
- Enter The Madman's Gallery and discover the strangest art in history. From the bestselling author of The Phantom Atlas, and The Madman's Gallery - Times Literature Book of the Year.
- So here’s a thing: yesterday I went to find Hell. The small church of St Peter and St Paul’s is in the village of Chaldon, Surrey. It’s in the Domesday Book (1085) but seems to have existed in wooden form as early as 675. Inside is something utterly breathtaking...
- Screaming sculptures, magical manuscripts, impossible architecture, flying monks... Discover the stories behind some of the most curious artworks in history simonandschuster.co.uk/books/The-Madm…
- Good lord. The Chief Constable in charge of combatting UK knife crime is called Alfred Hitchcock
- The Moche civilisation of northern Peru (flourished c.100-800) believed the ground to be fertilised by these living zombie cadavers in the underworld, who could yank their cranks to produce great quantities of semen to feed the living earth #halloweencostume
- Happy birthday Terry Pratchett, ye gods are you missed. I'm still discovering how many wildly obscure historical references there are in his Discworld books that he disguised with parody. What a purely funny, ingenious man.
- Replying to @jrawsonThis all boils down to her misunderstanding the phrase 'share the screen'
- Replying to @PFTompkinsOoh, that's an antique Death's Head watch, an antique memento mori popular since Mary Queen of Scots. Nice bit of symbolism. timepiecechronicle.com/features/2015/…
