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Dennis Duncan

@djbduncan.bsky.social
1.3K followers 647 following 230 posts

Associate Prof @ucl.ac.uk | FRHistS | INDEX, A HISTORY OF THE | NYT, LRB, Guardian, WaPo, TLS | Book history, Oulipo, translation | Rep: Anna Webber/A.M.Heath

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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
Tim Carmody @tcarmody.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
This is the funniest thing I've seen today, possibly ever
A tweet by SarahStarberry that says "oh god read the vertical axis" on top of a chart measuring AI models' release dates and model numbers rather than any real capabilities
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Galley photo looks fine. Extraordinarily proud to think that soon I’ll be a published poet. 🥲
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
A century ago today "Irene Iddesleigh" – first novel by Amanda McKittrick Ros, the worst novelist in the world – was reprinted by Nonesuch. “I am pleased to say this work now rests upon the shelf of ‘Classic’,” she wrote. “I am very proud of [Irene] sistering Shakespeare, Milton, Blake &c &c”
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
Greg Jenner (Historian) @gregjenner.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
This piece by @djbduncan.bsky.social is such delightful writing, like a gift wrapped in many layers of pretty paper (please forgive the tea stains, he didn’t provide those)
A friend and decided to start
a band. We needed a drummer so we tried out a few, but the one we really liked told us that she was also auditioning for a different band. They were pirate-themed.
She played with us a few more times before announcing that she had resolved to commit to the pirates. We put on a compelled valour, but it was to no avail. She never came back.
I was reminded of my antipathy to pirates this month when I saw a new black flag on the horizon: another author called Dennis Duncan. A few years ago I wrote a history book about book indexes. One of the things that happens when you bring out a book is that you are subjected to email spam from the service industry that exists just outside the publishing mainstream and feeds on the struggling and the selt-published. For example, the reader engagement' company, a kind of search engine optimisation for books, which pledges to bring your work the 'sustainable, meaningful visibility' it deserves. I was about to delete one of these messages when I noticed the title of the book they were offering to promote: Gasparilla and the Winds of Fortune. Odd, I thought. Not one of mine. Not even close. But a quick Google search revealed how the mistake must have occurred: Gasparilla is a real book, and its author is called Dennis Duncan. Another click took me to the cover illustration - a young man in tricorn hat and ruffled shirt - and that old sense of wounded outrage started up again. Gasparilla his best work. is a pirate novel.

Putting aside my previous
run-in with usurping pirates, I'm inclined to feel delighted about the whole thing. How funny to have a literary double, especially one whose work is so different - wilder, sexier, odder - from my own. A Mr Hyde to my Dr Jekyll. Perhaps I should lean into it. My editor at the Washington Post - before they scrapped their Books section - was called Nora Krug, a name she shared with a German graphic novelist who lived in New York. After the latter's Heimat won a Natio…
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Mr 'Ack, pork cutter. Ask me 'bout me griskins and me forced meat.
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 01/09/2026
‘Part of the pleasure of the books is that they present us with a less ethereal version of Woolf than we usually encounter. More granite, less rainbow.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the books that Virginia Woolf made at the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 27/08/2026
‘There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. Displaying them together like this reminds us that, when a book is bound in handmade papers, every copy is unique.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 21/08/2026
‘To a designer’s eye, after two years of making books, the Woolfs were still unable to balance text and white space. What is it about these books, then, that warrants a display like this?’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press’s first books. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
It's Pipes, Mum! Pipes is here! @scriblit.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
The Amidala talking to Anakin meme. 
1st panel, Anakin asks 'do you like plums?'
2nd panel, Amidala says 'yeah, I'm actually saving some for breakfast'
3rd panel, Anakin stares
4th panel, Amidala looks horrified
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 18/08/2026
‘The titles that the Woolfs continued to make themselves were overwhelmingly written by their closest friends. Vita Sackville-West, Forster and others: the same crowd they wanted to publish before they became professionals.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 17/08/2026
‘Part of the pleasure of the books is that they present us with a less ethereal version of Woolf than we usually encounter. More granite, less rainbow.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the books that Virginia Woolf made at the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 15/08/2026
‘There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. Displaying them together like this reminds us that, when a book is bound in handmade papers, every copy is unique.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 12/08/2026
‘𝘕𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘺 would be the last book she would bring out with a press other than her own. For the rest of her life, Woolf’s experiments in fiction went hand in hand with being her own publisher.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 11/08/2026
‘Virginia’s letters from the time are frank about how inexpert she is. “Heaven knows how one prints,” she wrote to Lady Cecil. To Violet Dickinson: “We have bought our Press! We don’t know how to work it.”’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
‘Our press you know, is to give birth to every monster in the vicinity,’ Virginia Woolf told Clive Bell. Hogarth’s...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 09/08/2026
‘The titles that the Woolfs continued to make themselves were overwhelmingly written by their closest friends. Vita Sackville-West, Forster and others: the same crowd they wanted to publish before they became professionals.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on Hogarth Press: www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. With their marbled,...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 08/08/2026
‘Part of the pleasure of the books is that they present us with a less ethereal version of Woolf than we usually encounter. More granite, less rainbow.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the books that Virginia Woolf made at the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. With their marbled,...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 06/08/2026
‘There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. Displaying them together like this reminds us that, when a book is bound in handmade papers, every copy is unique.’ @djbduncan.bsky.social on the Hogarth Press. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. With their marbled,...
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
Zoe Guttenplan @zoeguttenplan.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
The August issue of @litreview.bsky.social is a cabinet of curiosities containing @djbduncan.bsky.social on raunchy pirates, @harrstetler.bsky.social the French far Right, @oldfortunatus.bsky.social on New World imports, Seamus Perry on Sylvia Plath, and so much more: literaryreview.co.uk
literaryreview.co.uk
Literary Review - For People Who Devour Books
In the Current Issue: Emma Smith on New World imports * Ian Thomson on Mario Vargas Llosa * Seamus Perry on Sylvia Plath * Hamish de Bretton-Gordon on biological warfare * Daisy Dunn on Christopher No...
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
I wrote a thing about Virginia Woolf, and being a shonky printer, and making imperfect books that are really about playing with the people you love. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Dennis Duncan · At Charleston: Hogarth Press
There is something magnetic about the large case containing all 34 titles that Virginia Woolf made. With their marbled,...
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
One for @baindex.org
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
Duke University Press @dukepress.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
As we head into a long holiday weekend in the US, our staff share their summer reading recommendations, including books by @glumghost.bsky.social and @djbduncan.bsky.social ... and Moby Dick! buff.ly/bBLLeqj
Covers of Index, A History of the; Lake Effect, Lovers' Leap; Moby Dick; Tartufo; and Yesteryear, arranged in a 3x3 grid.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
A blog about posters, ballads, flawed children.
open.substack.com
Sammy Slap
Posters, Ballads, Flawed Children.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 25/05/2026
The final resting place of Amanda McKittrick Ros, the worst novelist in the English language.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 12/05/2026
Have you seen this fly?
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
W. Caleb McDaniel @wcaleb.org · 23/04/2026
A student in my Civil War history course brought by an interesting artifact she once found in a Baltimore used book store. It appears to be a scrapbook kept by a journalist during the 1860s, with an index of topics in the front. Very cool!
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 16/04/2026
A little blog about confetti open.substack.com/pub/scrapsan...
open.substack.com
Confetti
A few years ago, the bookshop Foyle’s moved next door to itself.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Maundy Thursday is named for St Maundy, or Mandy, who was a waitress at the last supper (Luke 22:14). In the Middle Ages a popular ballad, ‘Raundy Maundy’, celebrated her fertility.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 27/03/2026
Postdoc klaxon! Spend a year in our lovely English dept at UCL. English lang or lit, PhD awarded post Oct 23. www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...
ucl.ac.uk
UCL – University College London
UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 27/03/2026
Job klaxon! Come and be an Early Modernist at UCL: www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...
ucl.ac.uk
UCL – University College London
UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).
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Reposted by Dennis Duncan
Robin Bougie @robinbougie.bsky.social · 20/09/2025
Someone was trying to take a portrait of their two fave Chickens, and this happened.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 26/03/2026
“A shoe-dryer?!”
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
I wrote a little essay about the early English filmmaker Charles Goodwin Norton substack.com/home/post/p-...
substack.com
'The Bill Poster' (1899)
Charles Goodwin Norton on Marchmont Street
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 24/02/2026
Latest catalogue from @blackwells.bsky.social is books by – or owned by – Naomi Michison. One for you @jennykenyon.bsky.social? blackwells.co.uk/rarebooks/ca...
blackwells.co.uk
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Olivia Smith @oliviasmith.bsky.social · 21/02/2026
Would you be interested? Spotted by a friend in London
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 13/02/2026
The Lovejoy reboot you didn’t realise you needed
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 07/02/2026
Someone’s left a stuffed ferret outside the library on my road. Yours for the taking if you can get to Muswell Hill fast enough.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 06/02/2026
Charity shop find: early C20 scrap book. Somebody likes lobsters. @drbibliomane.bsky.social
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
My friend just bought me this book of found shopping lists and I can't stop imagining they're Emily Dickinson poems. “Chicken — Brockley — — Milk”. I think it’s about death.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 30/01/2026
At the Natural History Museum looking at mayflies trapped in amber. Biomatter that gets frozen in amber like this is called an "inclusion". Isn't that a wonderful word to conjure with.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 26/01/2026
Unhelpfully, this is what the weather forecast used to look like in the Times. I only wanted to say whether it was sunny or not in London. Can anyone translate?
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 16/01/2026
This is Winnie the Harris hawk. She comes to the British Library twice a week to scare away the pigeons.
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James Vincent @jjvincent.bsky.social · 27/12/2025
another robot highlight for 2025: man wearing humanoid mocap suit kicks himself in the balls
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 24/12/2025
A quick blog about funeral biscuits, the ephemera around them, and a boy who could eat a kilo of them in four minutes. open.substack.com/pub/scrapsan...
open.substack.com
Funeral Biscuits
And eighteenth-century speed eating
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Gretchen McCulloch @gretchenmcculloch.com · 19/12/2025
Mandarins, Italian paired with Index, a History of the by Dennis Duncan Day 19 of #BooksAreMyJam, in which I pair a language-y book from my shelves with today's jam from the Bonne Maman jamvent calendar
Index, A History of the: A bookish adventure from medieval manuscripts to the digital age by Dennis Duncan next to a tiny pot of Italian mandarins jam from the Bonne Maman jamvent calendar
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 17/12/2025
A little blog about printing, writing and funeral tickets open.substack.com/pub/scrapsan...
open.substack.com
Forms of Death
Remember to Die... And bring this Ticket with you.
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Fraga @fragarf.bsky.social · 01/12/2025
UM LIVRO PARA DOIDOS POR LIVROS (Índice, uma história do, de Dennis Duncan. Como alguém consegue pesquisar assunto tão obscuro e curioso? Eleito pela New Yorker um dos melhores livros de 2022, é irresistível para quem é amante das palavras, leitor de raridades ou viciado em linguagem.)
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 20/11/2025
Such a lot of bastards
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DIACRITIK @diacritik.bsky.social · 14/11/2025
Ne pas oublier Michèle Audin (1954-2025) Michèle Audin, mathématicienne, historienne, autrice, membre de l'Oulipo, spécialiste de la Commune, femme engagée et passionnée, fille de Maurice Audin, nous a quittés ce matin. En hommage, Diacritik republie un article sur son superbe Oublier Clémence,…
diacritik.com
Ne pas oublier Michèle Audin (1954-2025)
Michèle Audin, mathématicienne, historienne, autrice, membre de l'Oulipo, spécialiste de la Commune, femme engagée et passionnée, fille de Maurice Audin, nous a quittés ce matin. En hommage, Diacritik republie un article sur son superbe Oublier Clémence, paru en 2018. Lire, relire Michèle Audin.
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Where does Dora the Explorer buy drugs from? Boots! 🥁 #tooniche
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Dennis Duncan @djbduncan.bsky.social · 11/11/2025
"That enormous large Serpent, 16 feet long, that was shot in the act of killing a Deer, near LYNN, in Norfolk"! 😬
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