Harvey Mansfield may wax nostalgic about love and sex before the fall, but Margaret Soltan at University Diaries is making naughty with this. We scandal mongers gather at Invisible Adjunct, where the invisible one has a better tale. It's about"Professor" Matthew Richardson, who seems well positioned for a notable career in academic fraud.
Update: Here is the Naomi Wolf article with the allegations against Harold Bloom. It is well worth reading. Unfortunately, it includes allegations against one of my former research assistants. It's been a fertile week. There is still more scandal over at Critical Mass.

Scribbling Woman and Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber recommend Tim Burke's Quicksilver and Foucault. The appeal of Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver is its attempt to occupy that space between history and fiction as alternative histories. Burke allows that the result may be neither a great modern novel nor good history. Yet, it is stimulating as genealogy, raising fascinating questions about our relationship with early modern Europe as the reader shifts between the strangely familiar and the intimately other.
Update: Scribbling Woman recommends this interview with Stephenson.

Speaking of alternate narratives, Scarybug offers up Pirate Jesus. Thanks to Brian Ulrich at Brian's Study Breaks for the tip.

Thanks to Steve Horwitz at Liberty & Power, check out this cool graphic, the online version of the Visual Thesaurus. As Steve says:"It gives you a spatial ‘map' of words similar in meaning to the one you've entered. You have to see it to see just how cool it is. It's a great teaching tool also, especially for students who are visual learners."

Andrew Bayer is Dreaming of China and David at Academy of Harvested Discourse, take note: Cliopatria now has an RSS feed. I don't really know what this means, but it is said to be a good thing. I suppose it depends on what you're being fed.

Cliopatria welcomes Thomas C. Reeves to the roster of HNN blogs. A professor of history, emeritus, at the University of Wisconsin, Parkside, and Senior Fellow at the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, he is the author of Gentleman Boss: The Life of Chester Alan Arthur, The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy: A Biography, A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy, The Empty Church: The Suicide of Liberal Christianity, America's Bishop: The Life and Times of Fulton J. Sheen, and Twentieth Century America: A Brief History. Professor Reeves is not lacking in opinions, can be tough in debate, and may offer much with which to agree and disagree.