The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Reads tagged with “public domain”

The Temple of Flora: Stunning Illustrations of Flowers Inspired by Erasmus Darwin’s Radical Scientific Poem About the Sexual Reproduction of Plants
The Temple of Flora: Stunning Illustrations of Flowers Inspired by Erasmus Darwin’s Radical Scientific Poem About the Sexual Reproduction of Plants

“If thou art perfectly at leisure… walk in, and view the wonders of my enchanted garden.”

read article

Beethoven and the Art of Amends
Beethoven and the Art of Amends

“When friends are at variance, it is always better to employ no mediator, but to communicate directly with each other.”

read article

Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens: Arthur Rackham’s Haunting Illustrations for the Barrie Classic
Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens: Arthur Rackham’s Haunting Illustrations for the Barrie Classic

“There is almost nothing that has such a keen sense of fun as a fallen leaf.”

read article

Apple Meditation: John Burroughs on the Portable Philosophy of Humanity’s Favorite Fruit
Apple Meditation: John Burroughs on the Portable Philosophy of Humanity’s Favorite Fruit

“I think if I could subsist on you… I should never have an intemperate or ignoble thought, never he feverish or despondent… I should be cheerful, continent, equitable, sweet-blooded, long-lived, and should shed warmths and contentment around.”

read article

Astronomy as Existential Calibration: A Poetic Manifesto for Science from Two Centuries Before the Golden Age of Space Telescopes
Astronomy as Existential Calibration: A Poetic Manifesto for Science from Two Centuries Before the Golden Age of Space Telescopes

“Astronomy has enlarged the sphere of our conceptions, and opened to us a universe without bounds, where the human Imagination is lost.”

read article

How to Be Un-Dead: Anaïs Nin and D.H. Lawrence on the Key to Living Fully
How to Be Un-Dead: Anaïs Nin and D.H. Lawrence on the Key to Living Fully

“Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death.”

read article

The Otherworldly Wonders of This World: Stunning 19th-Century Natural History Illustrations of Lizards
The Otherworldly Wonders of This World: Stunning 19th-Century Natural History Illustrations of Lizards

From geckos to chameleons, a scaly journey down the hallway of evolutionary time through the portal of beauty.

read article

How to Make the Best of Life: A Visionary Victorian Recipe for Lasting Self-Actualization
How to Make the Best of Life: A Visionary Victorian Recipe for Lasting Self-Actualization

“Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.”

read article

Darwin Among the Machines: A Victorian Visionary’s Prophetic Admonition for Saving Ourselves from Enslavement by Artificial Intelligence
Darwin Among the Machines: A Victorian Visionary’s Prophetic Admonition for Saving Ourselves from Enslavement by Artificial Intelligence

“We are ourselves creating our own successors… We are daily giving them… that self-regulating, self-acting power which will be to them what intellect has been to the human race. In the course of ages we shall find ourselves the inferior race.”

read article

A Chaos of Delight: Darwin on the Sublimity and Transcendence of Nature
A Chaos of Delight: Darwin on the Sublimity and Transcendence of Nature

“No one can stand in these solitudes unmoved, and not feel that there is more in man than the mere breath of his body.”

read article

View Full Site

The Marginalian participates in the Bookshop.org and Amazon.com affiliate programs, designed to provide a means for sites to earn commissions by linking to books. In more human terms, this means that whenever you buy a book from a link here, I receive a small percentage of its price, which goes straight back into my own colossal biblioexpenses. Privacy policy. (TLDR: You're safe — there are no nefarious "third parties" lurking on my watch or shedding crumbs of the "cookies" the rest of the internet uses.)