Josh Mcloughlin

Beyond the urban mask: 10 dirty movies that shred urban stereotypes James Mcloughlin digs through the history of cinema and discusses the films that reveal the dirty facets of world cities such as London, Rio, New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Naples, Liverpool, and more!

From Taxi Driver to Shoplifters, cinema peels back the postcard propaganda to reveal the truth about our cities.

Me, for @dmovies.bsky.social :

dmovies.org/2025/02/25/b...

Another great piece by @jamesamcloughlin.bsky.social - the first in a new series analysing the opening acts of screenplays, building on Jim’s excellent First Pages series

Thanks for reading, I really appreciate it!

My only excuse is that I ran out of room…

The art of death For centuries, ars moriendi depicted death, suicide—and what comes after. As MPs consider legalising assisted dying, they would be wise to look back a...

For centuries, ars moriendi depicted death, suicide—and what comes after. As MPs consider legalising assisted dying, they would be wise to look back at a long tradition, writes @drjoshmcloughlin.bsky.social.
www.prospectmagazine...

The lost art of chorography Chorography is one of English literature’s most eccentric and mercurial forms, mixing antiquarianism, history, poetry, and geography into a patriotic paean to the land and its people.

I really loved writing this for @Engelsbergideas.bsky.social
on chorography, feat. Ptolemy, Ranulf Higden, William Camden, Spenser, Shakespeare, John Stow, William Blake, Patrick Leigh Fermor, Nicolas Bouvier, Paul Devereux, Iain Sinclair, Mark Cocker & more engelsbergideas.com/essays/the-l...

The art of death For centuries, ars moriendi depicted death, suicide—and what comes after. As MPs consider legalising assisted dying, they would be wise to look back a...

For centuries, ars moriendi depicted death, suicide—and what comes after. As MPs consider legalising assisted dying, they would be wise to look back at a long tradition, writes @drjoshmcloughlin.bsky.social.
www.prospectmagazine...

The art of death For centuries, ars moriendi depicted death, suicide—and what comes after. As MPs consider legalising assisted dying, they would be wise to look back a...

For @prospectmagazine.co.uk’s Good Death series, I wrote about ars moriendi, the art of death & assisted dying, feat. Plato, Henry Suso, the Black Death, Hamlet, Keats, Burke, Hume, Tagore, Derrida, physician associates, a privatised NHS & for-profit dying www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/a-good...

Print magazines are thriving in the digital age - MediaCat The birth of new titles tells us print still offers brand opportunities

For MediaCat Magazine, I wrote about the survival and flourishing of print media, the lack of trust in business, the symbiosis of advertising and political campaigning, and the magic of cinema mediacat.uk/how-print-ma...

The group exhibition "Thread Count" ranges in scale from delicate miniatures to immersive large-scale installations to examine the concepts, questions and uses of soft sculpture Imagine a sculpture. What do you see? Michelangelo’s immovable David, perhaps.

For Whitehot Magazine, I wrote about sculpture hard and soft, the ‘expanded field’, textiles, and the art/craft hierarchy in a review of group show Thread Count whitehotmagazine.com/articles/que...

The curious history of imaginary libraries Just as potent as the libraries that once existed are the libraries that never did. The imaginary library has never ceased to enthral poets, prelates, politicians and pranksters.

For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about imaginary libriaries, feat. lost libraries, the Bible, the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, Marlowe, Shakespeare and Donne, Borges, Márquez, Harry Potter and Star Wars &c engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

Poetry, prose and the battle for Paradise Lost When first published, John Milton's Paradise Lost ignited criticism and controversy for its lack of rhyming poetry and it became part of a battle for the soul of English literature in the 17th century...

For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about Paradise Lost's 'boundless Continent' of blank verse, Milton's beef with 'jingling', English prosody, Campion v Daniel, Dryden rewriting Milton, Marvell's Dryden diss &c engelsbergideas.com/essays/parad...

Sport is more than just a game Sport clearly reflects the grubby, greedy world that feeds on it, but it also stands apart to some degree, preserving a spectacle of effort and emotion, mind and body, flesh and feeling.

For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about philosophies of sport, feat. Plato, athletic monks, John Milton 'unsweating...regularly', James Milner b2b Georg Hegel, Adorno's anti-football, Zidane's headbutt, Mourinho's affects & more engelsbergideas.com/essays/sport...

Mullā Ṣadrā, Islam’s greatest modern philosopher Despite being widely considered the greatest philosopher in modern Islamic thought, the Persian ‘theosopher’ Mullā Ṣadrā (1571-1635), who flourished under the Safavid dynasty, remains little known to ...

For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about the Safavid polymath Mullā Ṣadrā's life, career and ‘transcendent philosophy’, with connections to Western philosophers including Aquinas, Kant, Leibniz and Heidegger engelsbergideas.com/portraits/mu...

The forgotten art of memory For centuries, mnemonics was valued by societies and cultures across the world. We would be wise to rediscover it.

For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about the forgotten art of memory, feat. Hamlet, Cicero, digital dementia, Homer, Socrates' fear that writing caused forgetfulness, Proust, Islamic ḥuffāẓ, Australian 'songlines', West African griots, and 'cloud' storage engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

Muddle class | Perspective Media International I have always thought of myself as working class. I spent a chunk of my childhood in a council house on Merseyside. Our mum, who was eighteen when she gave ...

For Perspective Magazine, I wrote about class anxiety/ambiguity; growing up poor & getting a posh education; Orwell & Thatcher; Lady Bird, Saltburn & Normal People; the British Social Attitudes survey; code-switching; property, landlordism, inheritance &c www.perspectivemedia.com/muddle-class/

In the age of apology, does forgiveness mean anything? Public mea culpas are becoming more and more common. But that doesn’t mean real accountability—or reconciliation

For @prospectmagazine.co.uk, I also wrote about forgiveness in the age of apology, feat. Phil Schofield's vape, disgraced MPs, water companies, footballers on IG, wobbly lecterns, & political (un)forgiveness from lex talionis to Russia–Ukraine & Israel–Gaza www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/society/6567...

The lucrative pursuit of happiness In the past few decades, we have become obsessed with defining, measuring, maximising and monetising happiness. But can you really buy the good life?

For @prospectmagazine.co.uk, I wrote about 'The lucrative pursuit of happiness', the oil and gas of the soul, feat. McKinsey, Aristotle, Oprah, al-Fārābī, John Locke, New Labour, Gen Z, and the trillion-dollar 'wellness market' www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/philos...

George Rawlins kindly invited me to provide an Afterword for the second printing of Cheapside Afterlife (Longleaf Press), his magnificent sonnet sequence reimagining the life of Thomas Chatterton.

An Apology for January (But April is still the coolest month.)

In January, I wrote 'An apology for January' for @thefence.bsky.social, explaining why the first month is the best of the year, feat. the 'blue monday' myth, Susan Sontag, Edmund Spenser, the American ruination of October &c www.the-fence.com/an-apology-f...

This year, I finished my PhD @uclofficial.bsky.social. Sadly, my thesis title didn't attract a global far-right abuse campaign, but I remain hopeful that it might offend a Greek statue twitter account sometime soon.

2024 round up so I don't forget everything and can tell my Nana what I've been doing over Christmas dinner, feat:
- Becoming a Dr
- Pieces for @thefence.bsky.social, @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, @prospectmagazine.co.uk, Perspective Magazine, Whitehot Magazine, and MediaCat Magazine

We're currently on 1,702 new subscribers for the year. Help us summit Mount Sub:

the-fence.com/shop/

Thank you!

I would love to see a PL puppet show!

Poetry, prose and the battle for Paradise Lost When first published, John Milton's Paradise Lost ignited criticism and controversy for its lack of rhyming poetry and it became part of a battle for the soul of English literature in the 17th century...

It’s John Milton’s birthday.
For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about Paradise Lost's 'boundless Continent' of blank verse, Milton's beef with 'jingling', English prosody, Campion v Daniel, Dryden rewriting Milton, & Marvell's Dryden diss

engelsbergideas.com/essays/parad...

The curious history of imaginary libraries Just as potent as the libraries that once existed are the libraries that never did. The imaginary library has never ceased to enthral poets, prelates, politicians and pranksters.

Long shot but does anyone here like books? Or libraries? How about IMAGINARY books and libraries? For @engelsbergideas.bsky.social, I wrote about lost and invented libraries, the Bible, the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, Marlowe, Shakespeare and Donne, Borges, Márquez, Harry Potter and Star Wars

The Chic Young Divorcée Personal essays can often be undignified.

One of the best articles we've ever published, in which @roisinlanigan.bsky.social examines her own marriage, and the myth of the 'chic young divorcée'.

www.the-fence.com/the-chic-you...

The Cinema of Presence Stillness Reigns in the Films of Beat Takeshi

Gangster films that rein in spectacle and opt for stillness can build menace and leave a lasting impact.

Me on Takeshi Kitano and the ‘Cinema of Presence’

#film #writing #takeshi

open.substack.com/pub/thelines...

Great question. I've never used it, so can't comment with any authority. Perhaps the sense of touch – as oppose to reading with sight or hearing audiobooks – makes braille another unique way of consuming texts. They all equally 'count' (as OP put it), but are different sensory–cognitive processes