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15 results
  • In pictures
  • In pictures

The celebrity physician and the plague

| Estelle Paranque

The iconic “plague prevention costume” invented by a 17th-century French doctor secured his fame in royal circles. But other aspects of Charles de Lorme’s career made him a controversial figure.

  • Article
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The making of ‘Quacks’

| Helen Babbs

How do you create a medical comedy that’s authentic and laugh-out-loud funny?

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  • Article

Western magic’s fascination with the foreigner

| Shelley Angelie SaggarThomas S G Farnetti

Could modern magic shows be perpetuating damaging cultural stereotypes? Shelley Saggar shows how ‘exotic’ costumes and imagery are far from harmless fun.

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How the magician’s assistant creates the illusion

| Naomi Paxton

Without breaking the spell, performer Naomi Paxton reveals the subtle ways the magician’s assistant helps the audience to keep believing.

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Mask, ritual and fertility

| Chimwemwe PhiriSteven Pocock

Today many of us learn about fertility, conception and pregnancy online. But that wasn’t always the way. Discover how masks and rituals played an important educational role.

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Native Americans and the dehumanising force of the photograph

| Allison C Meier

In the second part of Native Americans through the 19th-century lens, we delve deeper into the ambivalent messages within the images.

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What writing myself has revealed

| Caroline ButterwickKimberley Burrows

Caroline Butterwick talks to two creators about how lived experience feeds their art, and reflects on her own year of writing about her life.

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How to be poor and happy

| Em LedgerCamilla Greenwell

Money, security, self-sufficiency and charitable giving have long been linked to happiness. But what if you’re working class?

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We who can’t believe

| Anne BoyerNaki Narh

Unless she falls to the floor unconscious, Anne Boyer has always ignored signs of illness. Cancer, however, made her face her fallibility.

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Photographs as evidence of gender identity and sexuality

| Dr Jana Funke

Intriguing photographs from sexologists’ archives suggest they could have helped people explore their gender identity and sexuality.

  • Photo story
  • Photo story

Portraits, from a distance

| Michelle Sank

Join photographer Michelle Sank on her daily walk around Exeter. Strength, frustration, resilience and eccentricity all show in these candid images portraying life under the constraints of coronavirus lockdown.

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How not to play

| Holly GramazioThomas S G Farnetti

Here are seven ways to sidestep doing as you’re told in a game. But strangely, they seem to be as much a part of playing as the game itself.

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Father of the house

| Stuart EversThomas S G Farnetti

Stuart Evers thought he’d shaken off his family’s rigid definition of masculinity. But when he became a dad, those buried patriarchal ideas made an unexpected return.

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Hamlet, the melancholic Prince of Denmark

| Nelly Ekström

Hamlet clearly demonstrates an excess of black bile and is arguably the most famous literary melancholic.

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The joys and failures of audio description

| Alex LeeIan Treherne

Audio description enhances the experience of watching a film or TV show for people with a visual impairment, but it's not widely available in the UK. Alex Lee explains why.