What Fire Teaches About What Survives

What Fire Teaches About What Survives

London, September 1940The German bombing has been continuous since September 7th. Last night the fires in the East End were visible from here, orange against low clouds, the kind of light that makes the city look like something from the industrial paintings that Dore...
Alchemy: What Prague Taught Me

Alchemy: What Prague Taught Me

Prague, late 16th centuryRudolf II’s Prague was a city organized around the belief that the world’s hidden laws could be discovered through sustained, systematic investigation of matter. The alchemists were wrong about the chemistry: base metal cannot be...