Something Beautiful

The New Lifetime Reading Plan

The New Lifetime Reading Plan: The Classical Guide to World Literature, Revised and Expanded, by Clifton Fadiman, John S. Major.

Astrophoto site

The photos here are so stunning, so unexpected, so unimaginably beautiful and strange, that some of them bring tears to the eye -- Astrophoto gallery.

Night Sky

A spectacular night sky over the Grand Tetons.

Calvin Coolidge

"Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil. Our great hope lies in developing what is good." -- Calvin Coolidge

Flowers with Animals (still life)

To appreciate these Flowers with Animals, 1704, by Johann Adalbert Angermayer, be sure to check out the larger version.   

Les Belles Heures (of the Duc de Berry)

Here is one leaf from the Belles Heures of the Duke of Berry -- Body of St Catherine, carried to Mt. Sinai.    (You can see a zoom version of this leaf by choosing the bottom-most thumbnail here.)

I hope to add more to this entry over the next few days.

August Sander

For some time I've felt a special affection for the pre-World War II photographs of German photographer August Sander.  The Getty Museum site presents 40 of them. 

My favorite is unquestionably --

Blacksmiths, 1926.   

These are, I think, also very good --

Peasant woman, 1912

Socialist leader, Paul Fröhlich, 1929

Self-portrait, ca. 1940

Landscape with bare tree and plowman (drawing)

Here is a drawing that seems to me quite exquisite -- Landscape with a Bare Tree and a Plowman, 1864, by Léon Bonvin (Pen and brown ink, watercolor, and gum arabic)