Sarah Pyke
@sarahpyke.bsky.social
teaching children's and YA literature at the University of Münster
london.ac.uk/seized-books | #QueerBibliography
researching and writing various things
close reading forever
london.ac.uk/seized-books | #QueerBibliography
researching and writing various things
close reading forever
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
Sleeping in Hannah's office while the mattress for our new bed arrives, and the academic books all have titles like 'Porkopolis' or 'Fish versus Power'.
November 28, 2025 at 10:21 PM
Sleeping in Hannah's office while the mattress for our new bed arrives, and the academic books all have titles like 'Porkopolis' or 'Fish versus Power'.
I really really love this kind of strangely intimate list. It reminds me of an email newsletter I used to get, the name of which I’ve forgotten and I will now look up, which I guess has petered out, where people would record everything they ate in a week
What painter Jacopo Pontormo ate in 1554:
On Sunday, I ate lunch with Bronzino—chicken and veal—and felt well... In the evening I ate a bit of roasted dry meat which made me thirsty.
Saturday I went to the tavern: salad and omelet, and cheese, and I felt good. cabinetmagazine.org/issues/18/pi...
On Sunday, I ate lunch with Bronzino—chicken and veal—and felt well... In the evening I ate a bit of roasted dry meat which made me thirsty.
Saturday I went to the tavern: salad and omelet, and cheese, and I felt good. cabinetmagazine.org/issues/18/pi...
Ingestion / Pontormo’s “Diary” | Elizabeth Pilliod
Food and the management of the artist’s melancholy
cabinetmagazine.org
November 28, 2025 at 7:56 PM
I really really love this kind of strangely intimate list. It reminds me of an email newsletter I used to get, the name of which I’ve forgotten and I will now look up, which I guess has petered out, where people would record everything they ate in a week
dreamed a German word: tschüsselig
what would it mean
the quality of saying goodbye?
what would it mean
the quality of saying goodbye?
November 28, 2025 at 12:04 PM
dreamed a German word: tschüsselig
what would it mean
the quality of saying goodbye?
what would it mean
the quality of saying goodbye?
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
I'm no Luddite - far from it - but the ways in which in this development has been spoken of seem blind to, or completely uninterested in, what cannot be machine read and searched for: the pounce, sweat marks, soot, or wax; the non-semantic yet semiotically rich substrate that OCR strips away.
November 26, 2025 at 10:12 PM
I'm no Luddite - far from it - but the ways in which in this development has been spoken of seem blind to, or completely uninterested in, what cannot be machine read and searched for: the pounce, sweat marks, soot, or wax; the non-semantic yet semiotically rich substrate that OCR strips away.
“I learned about close reading when I asked them to take their own thinking seriously—to take themselves seriously. Doing so, I found, forced me to take my job more seriously.”
I wrote an essay for @bostonreview.bsky.social about what I learned about close reading when I taught at West Virginia University
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review
Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.
www.bostonreview.net
November 27, 2025 at 7:11 AM
“I learned about close reading when I asked them to take their own thinking seriously—to take themselves seriously. Doing so, I found, forced me to take my job more seriously.”
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
1776: White frost, grey, frost all day, grey, frost.
November 27, 2025 at 7:00 AM
1776: White frost, grey, frost all day, grey, frost.
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
What else won't matter? Evidence from an author's handwriting, watermarks, paper, parchment, mold, folds, stains, seals, signatures, or other signs of usage. Guido Fawkes' signature after having been tortured will look the same as after he recovered; Emily's Dickinson's dashes will be em-dashes
November 26, 2025 at 10:12 PM
What else won't matter? Evidence from an author's handwriting, watermarks, paper, parchment, mold, folds, stains, seals, signatures, or other signs of usage. Guido Fawkes' signature after having been tortured will look the same as after he recovered; Emily's Dickinson's dashes will be em-dashes
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
10 years later, soulless people wander the wasteland that was this country thinking
“hmm i wonder why there are no great nonfiction books these days or plays or art or happiness or tenderness or regret.
oh well fuck it time to log onto torment nexus for my afternoon torment!”
“hmm i wonder why there are no great nonfiction books these days or plays or art or happiness or tenderness or regret.
oh well fuck it time to log onto torment nexus for my afternoon torment!”
November 26, 2025 at 7:06 PM
10 years later, soulless people wander the wasteland that was this country thinking
“hmm i wonder why there are no great nonfiction books these days or plays or art or happiness or tenderness or regret.
oh well fuck it time to log onto torment nexus for my afternoon torment!”
“hmm i wonder why there are no great nonfiction books these days or plays or art or happiness or tenderness or regret.
oh well fuck it time to log onto torment nexus for my afternoon torment!”
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
the problem wasn’t pitching the value of the humanities. hard to see what other options there were? but fair credit to all those who said “there’s no point trying to prove value on these terms”
November 26, 2025 at 7:02 PM
the problem wasn’t pitching the value of the humanities. hard to see what other options there were? but fair credit to all those who said “there’s no point trying to prove value on these terms”
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
'Exiting the market' is such a crap euphemism. It's not like the 'university' will then go and apply all its assets to another market. Those assets (human and non-human) will be dispersed, wasted, destroyed. Un-creative destruction. Which we can't afford as a society.
Chief exec of OfS 'said the OfS believes there are 24 institutions at risk of exiting the market in the next 12 months, seven of which are large providers with more than 3,000 students. There are another 25 or so institutions of various sizes at risk over a two- to three-year period, she added.'
Seven ‘large providers’ at risk of going under in the next year
Skills minister says no higher education institutions are at imminent risk of collapse this year but OfS confirms more than 20 providers are being closely monitored
www.timeshighereducation.com
November 26, 2025 at 9:54 AM
'Exiting the market' is such a crap euphemism. It's not like the 'university' will then go and apply all its assets to another market. Those assets (human and non-human) will be dispersed, wasted, destroyed. Un-creative destruction. Which we can't afford as a society.
Increasingly my top teaching moments are when I ask how a particular activity or concept has gone down and my students say ‘I feel like it made me want to spend *time* with the text’
yes! Yesssss
🎺🎺🎺
yes! Yesssss
🎺🎺🎺
November 25, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Increasingly my top teaching moments are when I ask how a particular activity or concept has gone down and my students say ‘I feel like it made me want to spend *time* with the text’
yes! Yesssss
🎺🎺🎺
yes! Yesssss
🎺🎺🎺
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
18th-century Dutch naturalist/collector Albertus Seba’s detailed engravings of hedgehogs (Thesaurus, 1734)
November 25, 2025 at 7:01 AM
18th-century Dutch naturalist/collector Albertus Seba’s detailed engravings of hedgehogs (Thesaurus, 1734)
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
1776: This is the first great frost. Gathered in all the grapes. Grapes are good.
November 25, 2025 at 7:00 AM
1776: This is the first great frost. Gathered in all the grapes. Grapes are good.
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
Come and apply to be the Professor of Bibliography & Modern Book History @engfacoutreach.bsky.social & @jesusoxford.bsky.social (and work closely with us @bodleian.ox.ac.uk). Following a long line of great scholars: Don McKenzie, Kathryn Sutherland, & Dirk van Hulle ... my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...
my.corehr.com
November 23, 2025 at 7:37 PM
Come and apply to be the Professor of Bibliography & Modern Book History @engfacoutreach.bsky.social & @jesusoxford.bsky.social (and work closely with us @bodleian.ox.ac.uk). Following a long line of great scholars: Don McKenzie, Kathryn Sutherland, & Dirk van Hulle ... my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...
‘the man who would do this, would do anything’
"He cut the margins of the leaves he preserved, often close round the edge of the text; and the man who would do this, would do anything. Honoured in dishonour, as a Biblioclast John Bagford takes the first place in Mr. Blades's Enemies of Books, and ..."
November 22, 2025 at 8:59 AM
‘the man who would do this, would do anything’
...and what L.L.Bean boots are, and that they're not cheap
This was pre-Internet! I guess I had to ask an adult or just figure it out!
(thank you Anastasia Krupnik/Lois Lowry)
This was pre-Internet! I guess I had to ask an adult or just figure it out!
(thank you Anastasia Krupnik/Lois Lowry)
...having such a funny madeleine moment here. I'm also remembering that these books taught me, reading them in south London in the early 90s, the meaning of the following: sloop, wok, Guam, Filene's Basement, garbage disposal, GSOH, rhinestone, Cadillac, Hill Street Blues
as well as 'crock of shit'
as well as 'crock of shit'
November 21, 2025 at 5:15 PM
...and what L.L.Bean boots are, and that they're not cheap
This was pre-Internet! I guess I had to ask an adult or just figure it out!
(thank you Anastasia Krupnik/Lois Lowry)
This was pre-Internet! I guess I had to ask an adult or just figure it out!
(thank you Anastasia Krupnik/Lois Lowry)
Ashes first Test day one, live
Oh for fuck's sake.
November 21, 2025 at 6:18 AM
Ashes first Test day one, live
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
WHAT
The U.S. Coast Guard will no longer classify the swastika, an emblem of fascism and white supremacy, as a hate symbol. Instead, the Coast Guard will classify the Nazi-era insignia as “potentially divisive” under its new guidelines.
—Washington Post
—Washington Post
November 20, 2025 at 7:11 PM
WHAT
happy Thursday
I'd do work but suddenly can't help but think what the cat's memories of its mother are
November 20, 2025 at 6:53 AM
happy Thursday
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
It’s an 8-bit owl compared to a proper and patient nature photo, but all I had was my phone, my torch, and my Sneakers slow walk through the leaf litter. Closing in and zooming out.
Saw an owl on this riverbank tree two years ago, so kept going back, with no luck until tonight.
Saw an owl on this riverbank tree two years ago, so kept going back, with no luck until tonight.
November 18, 2025 at 8:17 PM
It’s an 8-bit owl compared to a proper and patient nature photo, but all I had was my phone, my torch, and my Sneakers slow walk through the leaf litter. Closing in and zooming out.
Saw an owl on this riverbank tree two years ago, so kept going back, with no luck until tonight.
Saw an owl on this riverbank tree two years ago, so kept going back, with no luck until tonight.
A BA student who’s taking the second of two courses with me wants to write a thesis on queer reading & George from the Famous Five OR picturebooks, possibly Julián is a Mermaid
November 18, 2025 at 6:15 PM
A BA student who’s taking the second of two courses with me wants to write a thesis on queer reading & George from the Famous Five OR picturebooks, possibly Julián is a Mermaid
Someone recently expressed surprise that I’d moved to my current institution. I would’ve moved anyway, it’s dreamy, but also: THERE ARE NO JOBS. The only other job I was able to apply to in 2023-4 was a 1 year teaching job I wasn’t shortlisted for. I’ve been hugely lucky. There are literally no jobs
All of us from the post-2008 era (and before, no doubt) have traumatic memories of the academic job market, but I don't think the real problem was the hotel rooms (or the ballroom!), & I think it should be noticed that the real problem (no jobs, ridiculous power disparities) is now worse
November 18, 2025 at 6:20 AM
Someone recently expressed surprise that I’d moved to my current institution. I would’ve moved anyway, it’s dreamy, but also: THERE ARE NO JOBS. The only other job I was able to apply to in 2023-4 was a 1 year teaching job I wasn’t shortlisted for. I’ve been hugely lucky. There are literally no jobs
Reposted by Sarah Pyke
All of us from the post-2008 era (and before, no doubt) have traumatic memories of the academic job market, but I don't think the real problem was the hotel rooms (or the ballroom!), & I think it should be noticed that the real problem (no jobs, ridiculous power disparities) is now worse
November 16, 2025 at 9:11 PM
All of us from the post-2008 era (and before, no doubt) have traumatic memories of the academic job market, but I don't think the real problem was the hotel rooms (or the ballroom!), & I think it should be noticed that the real problem (no jobs, ridiculous power disparities) is now worse