Cultural

Confronting the brutal facts of history can be difficult. But how far should we protect ourselves from them before it becomes censorship? 

An exhibition at the Bodleian Libraries, Oxford.

Michael Greenhalgh describes how Roman architecture and Graeco-Roman statues made a profound impression upon the great Renaissance artists.

Though he exercised little political influence, Victor Hugo’s genius and his ardent championship of liberty had made him a legendary figure long before his death.

The visit of the Baroque master in 1665, writes Michael Greenhalgh, coincided with a rejection of Italian influence by French taste.

In 1773, writes A. Lentin, the radical philosophe paid a difficult visit to his patroness in St Petersburg.

Revisiting one of the first historical studies in the developing ‘science’ of well-being. By Sandie McHugh and Jerome Carson.

Queen Victoria’s Consort was a man of exceptional intelligence; among his many interests, writes Winslow Ames, was the collection of early German and Italian paintings and the encouragement of contemporary artists.

J.T. Ward describes how romantic views of the Middle Ages and a dislike for the horrors of industrialism inspired an able group of young Conservatives in the House of Commons during the 1840s.

J.L. Carr describes how, in revolutionary France, the debonair delights of civilization were replaced by a more virtuous albeit often stale cultural climate.