Smells Like World Spirit
A newly translated book tells the fascinating interwoven histories of two perfumes with a shared origin, but what does it take to write the history of smell?
The sense of smell is bound up with memory. An unexpected waft of a particular scent can vividly evoke the textures of a particular time or place. The whiff of a lavender fabric softener recently returned me to my grandparents’ bungalow, steam rising from a library canteen in Berlin whisked me back to the kitchen […]
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