Clik here to view.
Postcards from the Threshold – Dianne Hofmeyr
Albert Memorial 1904 This is not exactly a Boxing Day post – for that you’ll have to go to Dec 26th 2011 but Essie Fox’s on Christmas cards reminded me of how each year my mother-in-law put the same...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Artificial Person, by Louisa Young
Earlier this year I got involved with an Art Collective, which felt magnificently 1960s, and was a lot of fun as it was full of youngsters, and I don't usually do art. I made various items based on The...
View ArticleWhere the Dickens is my Club Card, by K. M. Grant
I'm now so hooked on audio books that those two little earphony white snails dangle permanently down my front. This is a boon and a curse. It's a boon, in that what wouldn't our ancestors have given...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Magnificent Obsession by Helen Rappaport
Photo by Pete WareHELEN RAPPAPORT is an historian and Russianist with a specialism in the Victorians and revolutionary Russia. Her books include Ekaterinburg: The Last Days of the Romanovs and No Place...
View ArticleClik here to view.
OLIVER CROMWELL...a historical character I can't warm to. By Adèle Geras
It's not his fault, it's mine. It all began when I was very young indeed and my history education came from the wonderful '1066 and all that," In this version of our island story, the Roundheads were...
View ArticleDecember Competition
Tell us in the Comments below about another monarch's obsession, to win a copy of Helen Rappaport's book, Magnificent Obsession. Closing date 8th JanuaryOur competitions are limited to UK residents only.
View ArticleClik here to view.
Anniversaries by Mary Hoffman
by Carfax2 (creative commons)Everybody knows that 2012 saw the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, the 60th anniversary of her accession to the throne. And in 2013 those who wish to celebrate her long reign can...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Dry And Moonshine - Lucy Inglis
On New Year’s day 1660, the twenty-six year old Samuel Pepys decided to keep a diary. He would cease a decade later. His entries are a fascinating insight into the life of a seventeenth century public...
View ArticleClik here to view.
It wasn't the end of the world: 2012 by Eve Edwards
It was quite a year, wasn't it? I know that now we've tippled over into 2013 we are supposed to be looking ahead but I wanted to take a moment to consider how the history books will regard last year...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Volcano Gods and the Golden Boy - Katherine Langrish
I’ve been reading a remarkable book by Elizabeth Wayland Barber and Paul T Barber, ‘When they Severed Earth from Sky: How the Human Mind Shapes Myth’, Princeton UP, 2005. It’s about the persistence of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Into Africa - Joan Lennon
Mary Kingsley was a model Victorian female. She was a good little girl who lived with her parents, helped her mother with the house and her father with his hobbies and interests. She was a good young...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Twelfth Night – Katherine Roberts
Today is Epiphany, the 12th day of Christmas, when by tradition all decorations must be taken down and packed away unless you want to risk an unlucky year. Historically speaking of course, Twelfth...
View ArticleClik here to view.
THE SCENT OF DEATH by Andrew Taylor: review and interview by Adèle Geras
I first came across Andrew Taylor's work when I read one of his Roth Trilogy novels in the 1990s. I was attracted to the cover image of a stone angel. This trilogy of novels so impressed me that I...
View ArticleClik here to view.
If you think you've had a bad holiday... by Karen Maitland
It's that time of year when a small forest of holiday brochures start tumbling through my letter box. As I’ve been flicking through them, fantasising about all the places I could go, if only I could...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Was the Son of Achilles a Psychopath?
Neoptolemus kills Priamby Caroline LawrencePyrrhus will soon be here, soaked in the blood of Priam. He is the one who murders the son before the face of the father, and the father at the altar. (Aeneid...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The real deal or the raw deal? - Michelle Lovric
I’ve been offered some Air mile tickets, so I’m facing a tough choice. Should I go home to shabby old Venice or should I try the shiny, new, improved, chlorinated Venice experience that I could get at...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Keeping Score, by Laurie Graham
The History Girls are an impressive bunch of scholars and writers. I sometimes worry that my lack of erudition shows up like a gorilla costume at a Buckingham Palace garden party, but then I think...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Preparing to Write, by H.M. Castor
Portrait of Jean Miélot by Jean Le Tavernier [Public domain], via Wikimedia CommonsJust a small thought for the day, today. I have recently discovered the genius of Jane Gardam (oh, where on earth have...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Colossus: The First Computer by Manda Scott
I am watching the first flurry of 2013 snow spin down outside the winter and very glad that we have central heating. And that the dog is with my step daughter and is not pleading to go out, regardless...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Old Man in the Fireplace and the Knife with a Name Catherine Johnson
History is so often something that doesn't touch our own lives now. It's long frocks, long hair and long names. It's castles and big houses, it might be battles or knights in armour. Even if it...
View Article