(Roughly) Daily

Readers may know that there has accumulated on YouTube quite a collection of “adaptations” of pop hits turned to the teaching of history…  e.g., “William the Conqueror” (to Justin Timberlake’s “Sexyback”), “Joan of Arc” (“Seven Nation Army” by White Stripes), “The French Revolution” (Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance”), “The Spanish Inquisition” (The Human League, “[Keep Feeling] Fascination”), and dozens of others…  The work of Honolulu-based “historyteachers” (“Mrs. B” and “Mr. H”– “history teachers, duh”), the videos are both amusing and illuminating…

But surely their masterpiece– and equally surely their most profoundly strange piece of work– is a little ditty devoted to Genghis Khan’s gift to Europe (via the Genoese at Kaffa)…

As we tap our toes, we might recall that it was on this date that Schindler’s List opened in New York, Los Angeles, and Toronto; it went on to gross $96.1 million in the United States, over $321.2 million worldwide, and to win seven Academy Awards– including director Steven Spielberg’s first.

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