Huygens, senior and junior

I only learned a couple of months ago that Christiaan's dad was a famous ambassador of Willam III of Orange, during the Glorious Revolution. The book is "Oranje tegen de Zonnekoning", which describes the epic rivalry between William and the "roi soleil". Amazing read (unfortunately only in Dutch I think)

If you want to read more about the Huygenses, I (also accidentally) got "Dutch Light: Christiaan Huygens and the Making of Science in Europe" for Christmas, and it seems pretty well written too.

I'm always amazed by how much we know about the inner thoughts of people that lived 400 years ago, simply because their most private conversations were all by mail.

Geert Mak traces the 20th century, by using a narrative focused on his father ("My father’s century", good read too). He says that as of the 70's it is hard to get an idea of what was happening in his family, simply because the phone entered the household. No more long letters to the rest of the family.

I wonder sometimes the challenges that will face historians in 100 years, when they will analyse our culture.