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Nick Hall

@penwys.bsky.social
65 followers 103 following 124 posts

I write, if I may. Doctorate in History (Soviet things) / novels (faintly unreal things) nicholasshall.com

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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Thank you for this, a wee bomb of clarity. One could add that a training in history not only gives us this skill set but countless examples of where rationality is not applied - even deliberately. In turn, that provokes another historical skill: dealing with doubt, with people as they are.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
idiocyoflife complaint. Has anyone, ever, anywhere, thought this was a good experience?
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
I've long thought LLMs are like the pool of Narcissus. Not entirely, but it seems their deepest, most essential, function. The arrogance that is implied, let alone the loss of serendipity, of solidarity, in 'personal music' is striking when you step back. 'I know everything already'.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I suspect there's a mental autocue that's fairly reliable.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
@emmaruthrundle.bsky.social 's new album is mint. Loving it.
emmaruthrundle.bandcamp.com
These Killing Times, by Emma Ruth Rundle
8 track album
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Number three - six thousand words underway. #writing
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Just as Mozart intended, I have absolutely no doubt.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I don't go to see the Magic Flute for it to make sense. I go to be put before... all that.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
'here, you see the... studio kitchen' 'ah yes, and that's a cupboard?' 'that's the sniper ammo store, all the apartments have one' 'oh thank god.'
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Deborah @deborahzafer.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
If anyone knows what it means, it is Czeslaw Milosz 🖤
What Does It Mean
Czeslaw Milosz
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
No comment.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Again: what are universities for? And, by implication, grand and sweeping and yet an actual question we seem to always be interested in: why are we alive? What are we for?
app.the-tls.com
Exeter
On June 24, at an event I had prophetically named “shit meeting” in my diary, the University of Exeter’s vice-chancellor, Lisa Roberts, announced to thousands of staff members that 500 of us were “at ...
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
You'd like to imagine universities were the one place the wider implications of such tech were grasped, in the fullest sense - actual disruption, beyond performative captial-chasing - but then one remembers the difference between the arms of a university, and, well, there goes another hope.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
The fundamental lie of populism, this: in speaking for 'the people', it is speaking for a valorised subset of the people only, exclusively, and eternally. Its success lies in making that the only group that 'counts'. Further caveat: that subset is then exploited by the very logic it supports.
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Alex Prichard @profalexp.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
A thread on the dispute at Exeter Uni. #ucu #defendexeteruni @ucu.org.uk On 15 June HR called Exeter UCU into a confidential meeting and informed us they would be putting over 500 colleagues at risk of redundancy and expected to loose around 200 staff. The number of c.150 you’ll have seen is FTE.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 23/08/2026
Take a fraction of the cash used to make these machines and use it for social creativity programmes. Access to musical instruments and education. Access to books and literary education. Access to etc etc etc. No? Oh.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
It started drizzling after this. Drizzle of course actually being the fall of spray from the ocean as the prow crashes into the waves, the mizzen top'sl halyards whistling and Strawberry Jim laughing his (????)
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
There is little better than reading O'Brian in the sunshine of a new city. His control of character and action is complete. Aubrey facing Linois, Maturin playing cello somewhere deep below. Words I barely understand and yet it's still boyishly thrilling, in the best way. Total, total mastery.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
The stairwells of the Old Bod often had a poster inviting people to a talk about how to deal with this, as I recall. One would hope social media has shown how unwise (and unkind) so many clever people can be, but focus on the issue seems pertinent, still.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
If I had fewer morals and an ounce of drive, I'd be writing the business plan. As it is I...
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
Everything they said about him was not true, because part of what they said about him is he is emblematic of this happening everywhere, implying that there's no chance ('race realism', after all) a black person could legitimately achieve the position. It's the damned epitome of culture warrior.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
And it's impossible to decry both tokenism and culture warrior berserk because...?
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Agreed. The challenge is negotiating the instinctive, everyday desire to be special and secure as against the necessary links between ourselves and *everything else*. I don't propose 'balance', I don't propose it's easy, but it feels very necessary as a tension to hold. All else being equal...
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Assuming we accept the latter (some do not seem to; most accept the former fairly easily...!), even then we hop across it so often, back and forth. It's an incredibly productive tension: art can play with this, endlessly. That's the positive side...
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Don't know how to break it to you, but... he'll be back.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
If only there was an entire branch of the publishing industry dedicated to books to be read on a beach.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Katherine Rundell, as ever, on the nose. This framing only accentuates the key point, underneath all the noise of AI: that it is an accelerant of far older trends; a new lever on an ancient machine. That is, the concentration of power, the narrowing of horizons. It's not just jobs. Never was.
theguardian.com
‘I hate what AI is doing to the minds and happiness of the young’: Katherine Rundell on the view from the classroom
Education is at a crossroads, argues the author and academic. Should we embrace new technology in the name of efficiency, or is it time to fight back?
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
And 'if nice environments help people greatly', perhaps it's a stronger argument for... nicer environments outside prison, too? And, if 'deterrence is the only thing that works', I'm not sure one can ignore the vast majority of history that shows deterrence... clearly has limits.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
Linos Piano Trio at St Michael and All Angels. Wonderful. The Elgar encore had me blubbing in my pew. More I say.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
'The ordinary person' that just happened to appear before us, sui generis, and whose views are sacrosanct* *unless they're somehow not 'ordinary' because they espouse views other than the 'ordinary person' views. Trust us on this, it's watertight analysis.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
I'm not sure there's anything more conventional than the 'anti-conventional' journalist, heralded in private for being a good egg and yet, to everyone else, being a reactionary bore - and proud of it.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
And on that day, there'll still be some person saying 'and they said global warming, I ask you!!'
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
this is empowering. Being able to see both common logical structures and relational meaning, and the radically different possibilities different languages enable (new words, concepts, attitudes) shows languages are never a problem to 'solve'. They are necessary 'prompts'. Pun intended. (2/2)
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
Thinking on threats to, particularly, Modern Languages. Languages often seen as 'problems' to solve. Achieve translation a la Star Trek and we're done. Babel predicated on the idea of this radical diversity as being bad, damaging. Yet anyone who engages with languages sincerely will know that (1/2)
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
A day at Ashley Court, Tiverton, writing and meeting other writers. Lovely food, excellent company, a novel commenced. Everything very cool, calm, collected. Splendid. Incredibly fortunate to have such opportunities. www.ashleycourtdevon.co.uk
ashleycourtdevon.co.uk
Home - Ashley Court
An enchanting Regency house set in 19 acres of woodland, gardens and pasture overlooking the Exe Valley Welcome Welcome to Ashley Court This enchanting Regency house invites you to escape from modern ...
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University and College Union (UCU) @ucu.org.uk · 15/07/2026
"Humanities are being extinguished by university bosses across the country. We desperately need an emergency rescue package to stop the death-rattle of Britain's great universities." @drjogrady.bsky.social in the Guardian 👇 www.theguardian.com/education/20...
theguardian.com
Humanities among degrees being ‘extinguished’ by hard-up universities
Exclusive: Experts fear rise in education ‘cold spots’ and social immobility as 4,000 academic posts lost in one year
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
The acquiescence of society to a narrow logic of a literally tiny group of people, because 'tech solves problems' still rings truer, somehow, than 'tech also causes lots of problems', despite everyone and their dog bemoaning social media daily. You'd hope the reporters would understand framing...
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
I recently finished the first draft of a novel. On Wednesday I am commencing the framing of the next. I don't know where the energy comes from. It will go. Hoping to enjoy it as much as possible whilst it's here. #writing
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
ah sod it 3/2 - (some) great novels and great historical works are centered on that human subjectivity at the edge of history. This is truly what history 'was', whether 10,000 years ago or 10 years ago. A story is a necessary 'reducer' of that impossible complexity. But it is never the 'answer'.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
The key link between history, fiction, and ethics, as I see it is what narrative history - when done and used badly - allows: the destruction of contingency and the occluding of *what things meant to people at the time, at the edge of historical progress*. That is where *we live*. 2/2
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
Catching up on my PPF, this is a greatl episode that succinctly articulates what for me is a core concern - not only in historiography, but in how we live generally. Story as explainer, reducer, evocation: brill. Story that allows us to say we have answered something definitively: not brill. 1/2
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
The contrast with Spain is surely the most telling, if we squint. That is, national set-ups to funnel elite talent upwards, aimed at international success. But the telling difference between Spanish and English style isn't necessarily individual talent as such. It feels like calmness against vibes.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
'I really hate scrutiny' says man trying to... become PM... or... something
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Max Rushden @maxrushden.bsky.social · 01/07/2026
❤️❤️❤️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 01/07/2026
Barry will, of course, have the last laugh.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
Handling senior management's cluelessness about *how stuff actually works*. Heartening to see the greats do it too.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
Job cuts here. A handful of ultra-competitive interviews there. Academia really is splendid.
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Peter Whitewood @pwhitewood.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
Great letter in the LRB on the managerial university and its consequences.
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Nick Hall @penwys.bsky.social · 23/06/2026
What are Universities for?
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Ben Phillips @benphillips1989.bsky.social · 23/06/2026
A statement from Exeter UCU branch @ucu.org.uk - please share far and wide.
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