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Arts

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Yesterday’s Google Doodle Celebrates Little Nemo, Takes You Back to Childhood Fantasy Land

Yesterday’s Google Doodle celebrated the 107th anniversary of Little Nemo in Slumberland, a comic strip by Winsor McCay that hit the presses for nine years

Art.sy’s mission is to make all of the world’s art accessible to anyone with an Internet connection.

Mapping the Art Genome

A new Web site called Art.sy recommends art based on a visitor’s preference for a particular artist or artwork

Mo Yan and Chinese literature translator Howard Goldblatt speak at a literary festival.

China’s ‘Provocative and Vulgar’ Mo Yan Wins Nobel in Literature

Chinese author Mo Yan took this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature for his “hallucinatory realism”

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The Residents of Tolkien’s Middle Earth Are 81 Percent Male

Life expectancy, gender breakdown, and declining longevity, and interesting trivia abound

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Emily Dickinson: The Remix

An ode to the poet, in four takes

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Why Pencils Are Way Better Than Pens

Count Wolfgang, head of a huge pencil company, explains why pencils are wonderful

British Architects Plan to Build a House Entirely From Waste

England will soon begin construction on its first building built entirely from waste

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Share a Bit of Earth’s Majesty With Every Letter You Send

A new stamp collection pulls together beautiful top-down views of the Earth

David Blaine at a recent NYC performance.

David Blaine’s Going to Have 1 Million Volts of Electricity Shot at Him for 72 Hours

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Blind Photographer Paints With Light, Creating Stunning Images

Her photos are modeled after walks through the park or moments on the street that she experiences through sound and smell

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Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Went on His Own Adventures—to the Arctic

When he was a 20-year-old medical student, Conan Doyle became the ship’s surgeon on board a whaling ship, the Hope

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The Silence that Preceded China’s Great Leap into Famine

Mao Zedong encouraged critics of his government—and then betrayed them just when their advice might have prevented a calamity

A bog oak floor.

Giant Tree Trunk Unearthed After 5,000 Years in a Bog

A 44 foot-long piece of a 5,000 year old tree trunk was uncovered on September 25 in the UK

Palmyra, Syria

Looters Are Selling Artifacts to Fund War in Syria

War zones are dangerous places, for both people and cultural heritage

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Artist Builds House, Invites Partiers to Trash It

Can a party ever be art?

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These Thin Sections of Rock Look Like Beautiful Stained Glass

The beautiful MicROCKScopica project was created by Bernardo Cesare, a professor of petrology and a photographer, who combined his talents in an absolutely stunning way

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The Best Bits of XKCD’s Really, Really Big Comic

Cartoonist Randall Munroe designed a giant world that can be explored in the comic by clicking and dragging

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This Story Has a Picture With It, So It Must Be True

A recent study found that statements accompanied by pictures are more likely to be taken as true than those without

The famous painting

Mona Lisa’s Body Might Soon Be Exhumed

The woman suspected to be the subject of Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous painting might be buried in a church in Florence

This paper doll could end up with a nasty rash.

How Common Are Infections From Tattoo Ink?

A recent set of infections from tattoos has shed light on just how unregulated ink really is

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