Mark Vernon+

I so hope that the forthcoming Blake 200 year is one in which people hear more t

I so hope that the forthcoming Blake 200 year is one in which people hear more than William Blake was brilliant but crazy, inspiring but confusing. Help make that so! youtu.be/PNVvhX2HvZM?...

William Blake: A Golden String

A short film with Mark Vernon

William Blake: A Golden String. A short film with Mark Vernon

William Blake was born when England was at war. Conflict and the threat of conflict shaped politics for much of his life. And yet, simultaneously, Albion was booming, materially and with an influx of ideas from its empire. Blake saw Jesus walking amongst these spirited exchanges, quite as much as he discerned the powerful presence of dark Satanic Mills. His era and ours were times of contraries. And yet, he forged a way of embracing these energies so as to see everything transformed. Further still, he passed on that capacity in his tremendous lines, startling images and divine vision. This s

Science and Spiritual Practices: what makes the difference?

Why is beauty so important to scientists, even those without religious convictions? And is that in some way connected to the failure of New Atheism, which began two decades ago this year? In this Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogue, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon consider how trials of spiritual practices suggest that the spiritual element makes a measurable difference, which in turn suggests ways to answers questions about beauty and the persistence of a sense that the universe is enchanted. Rupert’s two books on science and spiritual practices inform the conversation, as does research by Guy Hay

The Nazis were keen on the Cathars. The detail brought me up short. I was vaguel

The Nazis were keen on the Cathars. The detail brought me up short. I was vaguely aware that the Cathars were unlikely to have been a Languedocian para-church, so who were they? Or, as it turns out, better still: were they at all? markvernon942268.substack.com/p/the-mists-...

The Mists of Tyranny

Cathar Lessons and the Albigensian Crusade

Unveiling Transcendence. William Blake and the Book of Daniel. What if apocalyp

Unveiling Transcendence. William Blake and the Book of Daniel. What if apocalyptic biblical literature is not best interpreted through historical events, or through the symbolic? Instead, these texts are educations in imagination, reorientating readers to the vision of God. youtu.be/4mzmKfMao5o?...

Unveiling Transcendence. William Blake and the Book of Daniel

What if apocalyptic biblical literature is not best interpreted through historical events, though they certainly have a bearing, nor through the symbolic, as if the imagery should be decoded? Instead, these texts are educations in imagination, reorientating readers to the vision of God. Such an understanding of the apocalyptic, which means “unveiling”, was certainly the view of William Blake and is a way to read the Book of Daniel, according to Professor Stephen Cook. His new commentary on Daniel brings Blake and others into conversation with the Old Testament book, which doubly makes sense a

New essay at my Substack, A Golden String, on the linguistic spirits active in o

New essay at my Substack, A Golden String, on the linguistic spirits active in our lives. markvernon942268.substack.com/p/speak-dagg...

Speak Daggers

Blasphemy, Panics and the Power Of Words

Make Blake200 Your Own!

Launching the year with an invocation

Make Blake200 your own! #WilliamBlake

Blake200 is marking the bicentenary of his death in August 2027. For more Temenos Academy events see www.temenosacademy.org. Also see The Blake Society. Plus Mark's website and book "Awake!".

Psychologists don’t call it idling, of course, but “spontaneous thought”, and th

Psychologists don’t call it idling, of course, but “spontaneous thought”, and there’s big disagreement on whether its good for happiness or not. But, hey, that’s psychology. New @idlermagazine out now! My slot for the month…

An extract from “History in English Words” by Owen Barfield, marking its centena

An extract from “History in English Words” by Owen Barfield, marking its centenary, first published in 1926. At my Substack, A Golden String, markvernon942268.substack.com/p/the-norman...

The Norman Conquest in English Words

We refer to “oxen” and “sheep” in the field, so why “beef” and “mutton” on the table? Owen Barfield’s fascinating reflection on the linguistic influx that followed 1066

The extraordinary brilliance of LLMs is often a cause for alarm. But theology su

The extraordinary brilliance of LLMs is often a cause for alarm. But theology suggests a less melodramatic and more marvellous understanding. New essay at my Substack, A Golden String, on the unreasonable effectiveness of words in machine learning. markvernon942268.substack.com/p/the-logos-...

The Logos In The Data Centre

The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Words in Machine Learning

The latest conversation with Rupert Sheldrake and myself. A perhaps surprisingly

The latest conversation with Rupert Sheldrake and myself. A perhaps surprisingly fecund subject… youtu.be/CikfKeYGypo?...

The very extraordinary life of plants. A conversation with Rupert Sheldrake

An ancient intuition is that plants have souls and even participate in the life of God by virtue of being alive. But what sense can be made of that today? In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon consider the Neoplatonic understanding that all living creatures, and perhaps all self-organising things, have a soul as part of their existence. But what does this imply about plant perception, plant intelligence, and plant awareness? Why do plants so inspire artists, mystics, and scientists - as well as worldwide activities such as the cut flower indust

Ethics and identity, as liberals and nationalists respectively stress, miss the

Ethics and identity, as liberals and nationalists respectively stress, miss the vastness of the human soul. New essay at my Substack, A Golden String. #Christianity #Nationalism #Humanism markvernon942268.substack.com/p/bidding-fo...

Bidding For The Soul Of Christian Britain

Ethics and identity, as liberals and nationalists respectively stress, miss the vastness of the human soul

The Souls of Plants

A conversation with Rupert Sheldrake

Poignant moment, relics of St Benedict

‘We are waiting not for a Godot, but for another — doubtless very different — St Benedict.’ Alastair MacIntyre A visit to Abbey Fleury, Saint Benoir sur Loire.

August Angst and Infantilising, Frictionless Worlds

This is the script of my Thought For The Day broadcast on BBC Radio 4 this morning.

The new Idler magazine! I am all at sea in a beautiful pea-green boat.

The new Idler magazine! I am all at sea in a beautiful pea-green boat.

There's something not quite being got at in the discussion of Nolan's #Odyssey.

There's something not quite being got at in the discussion of Nolan's #Odyssey. And it has to do with the knock-on effects of flatlanding the gods. A psychological worldview, a moral one, even when filled out with the nuance in #Homer's original, isn't enough for we humans. youtu.be/UkkLVuCCLjs

Homer's Odyssey, Nolan's telling. Crucial losses in the movie version of nostos, homecoming

The Odyssey movie is brilliant. The combination of spectacle and seriousness that characterises Christopher Nolan’s film-making makes this one a must-see. I can wholeheartedly recommend it. However, this telling is Nolan's telling. The opening title reads: “A time of apparent magic”, which is a clear signal. Throughout a psychological option is offered for the presence of gods, sorcery and monsters and, quite explicitly, a moral imperative provides coherence to the meandering story. There are also, inevitably, elements from Homer’s original that are absent in the cinema epic and that gives m

I’ve been reflecting on the discussion of the gods in The Odyssey, following the

I’ve been reflecting on the discussion of the gods in The Odyssey, following the release of Christopher Nolan’s film, unsatisfied by what is made of the awareness of deities. There is another story to tell. New article at my Substack, A Golden String. open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

When Gods Walked Amongst Mortals And Mortals Loved Violence

Odysseus conversing with Athena is a perception shared by ancient Greeks and Hebrews

This telling of the #Odyssey epic is Nolan's epic telling. The opening title rea

This telling of the #Odyssey epic is Nolan's epic telling. The opening title reads: “A time of apparent magic”, which is a clear signal. But the original tale asks more: who are we, not merely, how should we behave? markvernon942268.substack.com/p/sing-for-o...

Blake vs Nolan! The gods or the psyche, the cosmological or the moral?

Sing a new song, oh muse! More at my Substack, A Golden String. #TheOdyssey #WilliamBlake #Homer

Largest #WilliamBlake exhibition on show this year.

Thank you National Gallery Dublin! Don't forget #Blake200 coming up in 2027!

Sing For Our Time Too! The Divine Song Of The Odyssey

The spiritual way was the original way of reading Homer's tale of homecoming

Art and the Sacred Today. A dialogue between Rupert Sheldrake & Mark Vernon

Does art need to have a sacred dimension to be art at all? What are the sources of inspiration? In this dialogue, which is the 102nd in the series, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon, explore how meaning and beauty, truth and connection might be manifested in the arts. What is the role of reverence and empathy, place and intelligence? Conversely, what is lost when art loses a reference beyond the human and mechanical world? If art energizes the human spirit, encourages awareness, and revitalises symbols, how might it speak to us today of what it is be human and to live in a more than human w

The most important person in ancient Athens, the priestess, Myrrhine!

Poison, trees, William Blake in Hampstead!

The invention of the ego! Talking @idler festival.

New post at my Substack, A Golden String - markvernon942268.substack.com/p/art-a

New post at my Substack, A Golden String - markvernon942268.substack.com/p/art-and-th...

Year 529 AD. Saint Benedict establishes the Abbey of Monte Cassino. The Platonic

Year 529 AD. Saint Benedict establishes the Abbey of Monte Cassino. The Platonic Academy in Athens closes after 900 years. A spiritual handing on of the baton. Happy Saint Benedict’s day!

Art and the Sacred Today

A Dialogue between Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon

Mystical androgeny and #Dante. Beatrice and the divine feminine. Wisdom and the psyche.

You don't have imagination! It's abundance has you! Talking #WilliamBlake @bradfordlitfest

Reflections on Mary Beard's Being Greek radio series and the ramifications of go

Reflections on Mary Beard's Being Greek radio series and the ramifications of god-blind discussions of premodern worlds. At my Substack, A Golden String, open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

In Search of Lost Gods

On ancient Greek tales of sexual misadventure and priestly election

#WilliamBlake had mixed feelings about American Independence. He shared his frie

#WilliamBlake had mixed feelings about American Independence. He shared his friend Thomas Paine’s championing of liberty, but knew, too, that revolution can become caught in endless cycles of violence: an incomplete apocalypse, or revelation, ruled by Urizen, not Eternity. #fourthjulyweekend🇺🇸

New post at my Substack, A Golden String. open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

New post at my Substack, A Golden String. open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

Anteros: the forgotten brother of love

When Eros was an infant, his mother, Aphrodite grew troubled…

#kierstarmer #andyburnham #primeminister #politics

#kierstarmer #andyburnham #primeminister #politics

New post at my Substack, A Golden String. open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

New post at my Substack, A Golden String. open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

The Art Of Dialogue. What would Plato say?

The public mood is discordant, politics chaotic, a wider imagination lost, though it can be refound

On their podcast…

On their podcast…

New on my Substack, A Golden String…

New on my Substack, A Golden String…

“Take Therefore No Thought For The Morrow”

Non-attachment and attention in the present moment

Home of English Philosophy!

LAST FEW TICKETS. The Realisation Festival is at St Giles House, Dorset, from 25-28 June 2026. For more see realisationfestival.com

Realisation Festival - Last Few Tickets! The Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury.

The Realisation Festival is at St Giles House, Dorset, from 25-28 June 2026. For more see realisationfestival.com.

The imagination available to embrace contemporary troubles, particularly when th

The imagination available to embrace contemporary troubles, particularly when they are threaded with fatalism and declinism, rests much on the richness, or paucity, of the vision held about what it is to be human. New essay at my Substack, A Golden String, open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

Magnifica Humanitas In Temporibus Anxietatis

The Pope knows anthropology is key to contemporary troubles because Christianity redefined what it means to be human

Craftivism and gentle protest. Conversation with Sarah Corbett, contributor to Realisation Festival

Full conversation at the Realisation Festival Podcast, via podcast feeds! Handicrafts, including knitting, sewing, cross-stitching, as a form of activism? Speaking with Mark Vernon, Sarah explains how this quiet, multi-sensory, and mindful approach to pressing matters helps gather thoughts and process feelings. She will be speaking and offering a workshop at the Realisation Festival 2026. Arising from her own story and activist work, Sarah also discusses the crucial important of a space for inner reflection and compassionate conversation. Craftivism offers a form that is useful tool to pr

The @idlermagazine arrives. And relax. My piece this month on mundane ecstasy, s

The @idlermagazine arrives. And relax. My piece this month on mundane ecstasy, such as guided #Bowie in “boring Bromley”. Available from idler.co.uk and in good newsagents.

I much enjoyed talking with Monika Beisner, the greatest living illustrator of D

I much enjoyed talking with Monika Beisner, the greatest living illustrator of Dante’s Divine Comedy, on her work and #Dante. youtu.be/9dPzcZYzRGE?...

I talk with Tim Nash at Nomad Podcast on why, I feel, the apophatic way offering

I talk with Tim Nash at Nomad Podcast on why, I feel, the apophatic way offerings something like no other… open.substack.com/pub/markvern...

Under The Radar Mystics

The Cloud of Unknowing and why all shall be well

Massive year for #WilliamBlake in 2027! His bicentenary.

Lots in planning @temenos_academy, @blakesociety and no doubt elsewhere. Watch this space! His grave is in Bunhill Fields, London.

Local myths transform lives and how they do it. A conversation with Kim Willis

Full conversation at the Realisation Festival Podcast, via podcast feeds! There is another world that is also here and it can empower people in times of trouble. Kim Willis tells Mark Vernon that she stepped outside, bringing her expertise in systems thinking and the value of stories, to discover resources in England, Wales and Scotland that modern culture often overlooks. She describes her discoveries and their impact in her new book, "No Fair Maidens", and will bring that energy to the Realisation Festival 2026. What difference can an imaginative encounter with enchantment bring? How do s

Awake, Awake, Oh Sleeper in the Land of Shadows!

Glorious to talk with Susanne Sklar about William Blake's Jerusalem the Emanation of the Giant Albion. More readings, images and the full conversation on my YouTube channel.

How to read William Blake's "Jerusalem the Emanation of the Giant Albion." Brill

How to read William Blake's "Jerusalem the Emanation of the Giant Albion." Brilliant to talk with Susanne Sklar about this great, epic poem. #WilliamBlake #Jesus #Christianity youtu.be/EkBcFrygTKY

Jung was asked about God and said, he knew. But what did he know and why might t

Jung was asked about God and said, he knew. But what did he know and why might that much matter? New essay at my Substack, A Golden String. substack.com/@markvernon9...

Carl Jung’s Penultimate Concerns

Depth psychology illuminates modern phenomena from overwork to UFOs. But Jung's ambivalences need critique

It's never not a good moment to contemplate the vital, engaged, felt qualities o

It's never not a good moment to contemplate the vital, engaged, felt qualities of our participation in life. New essay at my Substack, A Golden String. markvernon942268.substack.com/p/the-nature...

The Campaign For Real Intelligence

AI hype and reality is confusing, but also an opportunity

Vegetal mysticism, the mind a plant, is not some shroom-head extravagance, but t

Vegetal mysticism, the mind a plant, is not some shroom-head extravagance, but the very essence of contemplation. New essay at my Substack, A Golden String markvernon942268.substack.com/p/trust-your...

Trust Your Inner Plant, As The Mystics Say

Psychedelics dominate vegetal spirituality. But there is another herbaceous tradition

Making Sense of the Resurrection of the Body

A conversation with Rupert Sheldrake & Mark Vernon

A new episode of Philosphy Slam! the podcast just released. Two randomly generat

A new episode of Philosphy Slam! the podcast just released. Two randomly generated words, “carpet” and “relieve”, turn out to have unexpectedly close connections… Do have a listen with Robert Rowland Smith and myself. youtu.be/clPoTLx7-Ag

I like the idea that the man who fled naked from the arrest of Jesus, strangely

I like the idea that the man who fled naked from the arrest of Jesus, strangely detailed in the Gospel of Mark, was indeed Saint Mark. Fear strips us but is not the end of the story. Happy Saint Mark’s Day. Image: “The Betrayal of Christ”, Hendrick Goltzius

New post at my Substack, A Golden String. markvernon942268.substack.com/p/what-i

New post at my Substack, A Golden String. markvernon942268.substack.com/p/what-is-me...

What is meant by health?

There is a field of existence maybe without solutions but with presence

Congratulations to Simon Conway Morris for being awarded the 2026 Templeton Priz

Congratulations to Simon Conway Morris for being awarded the 2026 Templeton Prize. To my mind, he is one of the most interesting Darwinian evolutionary biologists... markvernon942268.substack.com/p/simon-conw...

Simon Conway Morris on Owen Barfield, consciousness and the significance of language

The 2026 winner of the Templeton Prize and a fuller account of evolution

Paradiso: Images and Thoughts - 2

The third canticle in Dante’s brilliant Commedia illuminates his destiny and ours

Paradiso: Images and Thoughts - 1

The third canticle in Dante’s brilliant Commedia reads his day and ours

Purgatorio: Images and Thoughts - 2

The second canticle in Dante’s brilliant Commedia reads his day and ours

Purgatorio: Images and Thoughts - 1

The second canticle in Dante’s brilliant Commedia reads his day and ours

"I will not cease from Mental Fight"

Widening the war in the time of mercurial Trump and the monstrous mullahs

Transhumanize! Dante In A Technological Age

In prison, in mourning, in war, The Divine Comedy inspires

What is Your Spiritual Path?

Ways of affirmation and negation

"Our wars are wars of life & wounds of love."

Sexual drives wreck lives. And yet, the erotic opens paths to paradise

Inferno: Images and Thoughts - 2

The first canticle in Dante’s brilliant Commedia reads his day and ours

Inferno: Images And Thoughts - 1

The first canticle in Dante’s brilliant Commedia reads his day and ours