Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 7hChrist, what will happen if Xi finds out that H P Lovecraft was a bit racist? 010
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 8hTopics Kemi BadEnoch might well up about in her conference speech: - no bail for RNLI boat-slashing Danny Tommo - lower number of heat exhaustion deaths than hoped for this summer - more legal routes for asylum claims from refugees from war zones - Grant Shapps's face pressed up against conf window 021
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 29/09/2026This weekend I'm giving a 30-minute talk just on the wink to the camera, the final shot in Hitchcock's Family Plot (and the final shot of Hitchcock's final film). Loads of stuff on looks really great!macguffin.mediaHitchCon '26 | Hitchcockian Wizardry: Myth, Magic & the Macabre — MacGuffin MediaHitchCon ’26 International Alfred Hitchcock Film Conference returns online October 3–4, 2026. Hosted by MacGuffin Media, the conference explores Alfred Hitchcock’s classic films, cinematic legacy and ... 060
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 27/09/2026I lost interest in this community event when it turned out that the ‘free face painting’ only applied to yourself, you couldnt just go up to council officials and add whiskers or turn them into orcas 040
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 26/09/2026Delighted to discover belatedly that earlier this year the American Analog Set put out an EP of even longer, even dronier versions of songs from their 2005 disbanding album Set Free. 040
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 26/09/20266.33am I woke up from a horrible nightmare which involved time running backwards. The next time I looked at the clock, though, it was 3.20am which completely freaked me out. News headlines when I finally fully woke up all seem to be from the racist 1970s, so this all seems to track. 050
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 24/09/2026Ok which of you bastards put acid in my tea? 1113
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 24/09/2026The first thing you see on the new Quick Student Guide on AI and Academic Integrity document is an option to ‘get an AI summary of this PDF’ 052
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 24/09/2026I believe the correct technical term for this is: fucked 052
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 24/09/2026Another attempt at vocational qualifications, a noble and ongoing struggle since the origins of state education in the 19thC and one where any hoped for equality of academic/vocational strands can only ever be really solved by abolishing the class system. 153
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 23/09/2026I find Boris Johnson’s post-political career quite bewildering 010
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 23/09/2026On this form I must write a detailed report of the meeting, and then underneath, just below, where you always forget it, is the question 'Did this meeting take place?' which requires a yes/no answer but I want a dialogue box so I can put 'do meetings ever, really, *take place* as such, though?' 130
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 23/09/2026Is this backed up with a pledge that each pensioner will get a gift of a couple of million from a cryptoloon so that they can buy as many Ferraris as they like? 001
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 23/09/2026I don't know about you, but we now get a daily 'workflow reminder' which essentially reads 'Workflow diagnosis: you seem quite constipated and we will be issuing an enema order within the next 48 hours.' 010
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 22/09/2026“We’ll turn now to the thoughts of Chief Political Correspondent Chris Mason — although it may be just the sounds a balloon makes if you rib it up and down on your jumper, you decide” 050
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 21/09/2026I reviewed Miéville’s extraordinary, intimidating novel The Rouse here:lareviewofbooks.orgDecolonizing the Dead | Los Angeles Review of BooksChina Miéville’s first solo novel in over a decade is part Lovecraft, part le Carré—and quintessentially weird. 1188
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 21/09/2026Will Reform UK have done enough background checks on their new leader in Wales? 010
Reposted by Roger LuckhurstIan Dunt @iandunt.bsky.social · 21/09/2026Lots of talk of growth ahead of the Budget, as if it were a baroque puzzle. Our problem is basic. It's that we no longer support the things which facilitate growth: Europe, immigration, higher education, tax simplification, policy stability. These are all choices and could stop making them anytime. 591608420
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 21/09/2026Hmm, something not quite right about this Monday morning's emergency fluffy kitten 110
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 20/09/2026Lurkers around the soon-to-be-ready rotisserie chickens in Waitrose. Bit late this morning. Statistically this contest is the highest cause of violent death in the English middle classes, we’ve all read the research, wish me luck 150
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 18/09/2026DO YOU MIND IF I JUST SIT HERE AND BELLOW SOME LIFE COACHING BANALITIES INTO MY LAPTOP? 030
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 18/09/2026British Academy: Govt: We’ve set up two extra apprenticeships at the Beckton Sewage Treatment Worksthebritishacademy.ac.ukBritish Academy President: UK higher education crisis risks irreversible damageAs course closures, shrinking provision and widening regional inequalities threaten the future of UK higher education and research, President of the British Academy, Susan J Smith calls for an immedia... 052
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 17/09/2026A frankly trying modern literature university job for someone, being forced to live in Lausanne on a very good salary for years on endtimeshighereducation.comAssistant Professor (Tenure Track Directly to Professor Ordinaire) in Modern English Literature - Lausanne, Canton of Vaud (CH) job with UNIVERSITY OF LAUSANNE - UNIL | 415561The University of Lausanne seeks a tenure-track Assistant Professor in Modern English Literature, leading to Professor Ordinaire ... 2139
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 16/09/2026DO YOU MIND IF I SIT HERE AND BELLOW INTO MY PHONE ABOUT MY DRAMATURGICAL PRACTICE? 141
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 16/09/2026Ah man. Lucky enough to see him talk about his films twice at London Film Festival, always compelling. Complete retrospective NOW. RIP.deadline.comPatricio Guzmán Dies: Chilean Documentarian Was 85Patricio Guzmán Dies: Documentarian Who Chronicled Chile's Turbulent Political History Was 85 030
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 15/09/2026Was in Paris for the 8 days straight above 30C, often not dropping below 25C at night 151
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 15/09/2026You have to admire human persistence in sending along Excel spreadsheets, even though only 2.37% of humans actually know how to use it properly because it has the worst interface ever invented 031
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 14/09/2026How did we get to the point where a train driver saying ‘I will be detraining everyone at Acton’ is a sentence that not only exists but is also immediately understood? 040
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 13/09/2026Emails from Labour HQ campaigning to match that donation. With this kind of majority they did have a a chance to shore up key elements of the democratic state by banning this shit, but it's now too late. Frustrated by liberal trust that democratic institutions will just sort themselves out somehow 1110
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Must be about twenty years ago on a blustery, rainy day in Normandy in late September when we and about 5 other people had the Bayeux Tapestry pretty much to ourselves for a couple of hours 291
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 11/09/2026Watched 9/11 unfold on a scratchy, ghostly black and white TV in a rental in remote village of Achiltibuie overlooking the Summer Isles — which felt at once immensely safe and entirely sawn off from the new dispensation 120
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 11/09/2026Here is an emergency fluffy kitten for Friday morning 051
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 10/09/2026When there are about 12 professors left in post in the UK in 2029, I’m pretty sure Smith will be giving speeches saying ‘this problem is definitely Brian’s fault’ 060
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 10/09/2026In yesterday’s fascist-fash Beautiful Knees contest, No.6 (L-R) is going onto the world finals for both his shapely patellas and his rejection of hopes for world peace, longing instead for ‘relentless hatred and perpetual race war.’ Congrats, Tristram! 181
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 09/09/2026At least the feeble, decadent class of book reviewers got this in two volumes— get in training for the single volume release next week, as this is a doozy! 130
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 08/09/2026BREAKING hundreds of men have flooded Clacton dressed in bright yellow beanie hats, waxed moustaches and ironic, or possibly post-ironic, dungarees, intimidating cafe owners by asking for oat macchiatos and loudly discussing whether Olivia Laing's fiction or non-fiction is the best starting point 060
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 08/09/2026Have you had your choices insidiously undermined by the Wordle-bot yet today? 001
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 07/09/2026I still don’t understand why these theatre technicians flash mobbed a whole town — unless there was a major scene change needed for Act 2? 110
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 06/09/2026Yeah I’m not opening that in case the answer is they dip it in their own urine and I can never eat sushi again 040
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 05/09/2026Stylist’s defence: “frankly, I wasn’t even listening.” 040
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 04/09/20266 o’clock news: ‘The thoughts of our Chief Political Correspondent Chris Mason will be at the end of this bulletin, after they’ve been collected from the soft play area where they’ve been finger painting all afternoon’ 040
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 03/09/2026Day conference on Conan Doyle and the Orient comin’ upies.sas.ac.ukConan Doyle’s Orient 0126
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 03/09/2026Just a reminder that from today I will also need to be displayed flat to be protected from gravity #Bayeux 0156
Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 31/08/2026Snapped up ticket to see these bands together, but this is a quite eye-opening blog/appeal on how much they need to crowdfund to break even. I’m beginning to suspect capitalism may have some flaws 032