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Bruges-la-Morte photos
I just took the liberty of colour-adjusting the thirty-five beautiful photos by Ch.-G. Petit et Cie (Charles G. Petit & Co.) that illustrate Georges Rodenbach's 1892 novel in French,...
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The tinkle of the accordion ... and the concertina's melancholy string
The Athenaeum comment on Thomas Duncan's silly translated phrase from Bruges-la-Morte, "the tinkle of the accordion" put me in mind of the above scene from the 1985 A Room with a View.If this line is...
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The Great Sea Dragons and other weirdness
"Ow, me neck!"Lyme Regis Museum Blog just announced what looks an interesting talk by Stephen Locke at Woodmead Halls, Lyme Regis, on Thursday: Thomas Hawkins and his Sea Dragons – a mad, bad, fossil...
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The A'Court Smiths of Gurnard: fossil insects and pedestrianism
After reading about the appalling Thomas Hawkins, the story of Mr A'Court Smith of Gurnard makes a refreshing contrast. He was a fossil collector also with Isle of Wight connections, but of very...
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Cliff and Beach at Branscombe: review
I don't normally buy local history books, but I made an exception with Cliff and Beach at Branscombe (Barbara Farquharson & Sue Dymond, Branscombe Project, 2014), as it concerns an area that has...
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The South Devon Coast: #2 of 3
"Du Zummat"Continuing the gallery of the 70+ images from The South Devon Coast (Charles G Harper, London: Chapman & Hall, 1907, Internet Archive ID southdevoncoast00harpgoog), a travelogue that's...
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Latin at Anstey's Cove
Pursuing the reference in Harper's 1907 The South Devon Coast to the Latin sign that adorned Mr Thomas's tea-house, formerly at Anstey's Cove, Torquay: here's a transcript and a bit more about its...
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ATURFUQIL: philanthropy funded by snake oil
This is a fairly well-known local curiosity, but as it was a beautiful day, I decided to take an afternoon off to see it for myself: the "ATURFUQIL" memorial in Ringmore churchyard on the grave of...
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Five Fags a Day: life on the scrapheap
Continuing the posts on the Walsall author John Petty - whose work I've found surprisingly engaging - I just finished his Five Fags a Day (Secker & Warburg, 1956), a strongly autobiographical novel...
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Ask A Foolish Question
From Project Gutenberg: Robert Sheckley's 1953 short SF story Ask A Foolish Question, which is still worth reading, as well as having quite a bit of modern pertinence. The story concerns various...
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Aged Holmes stories
"Mr. Holmes"My current reading ran into a couple of Sherlockian topics. In UK newspapers, it's been hard to miss the story of the discovery of a lost Sherlock Holmes story in a 1903 fundraising...
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The South Devon Coast: #3 of 3
Concluding the gallery of the 70+ images from The South Devon Coast (Charles G Harper, London: Chapman & Hall, 1907, Internet Archive ID southdevoncoast00harpgoog). As I've said, Harper's...
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Charles G Harper: journalist, artist, sexist
With International Women's Day forthcoming, and its particular focus on the centenary (more or less) of the women's suffrage movement, it seems appropriate to mention an egregious example of the kind...
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Maxwell Gray in Sanatogen ad shock
Cross-posted from A Wren-like Note: the odd bit of detail on the Newport-born author Maxwell Gray (Mary Gleed Tuttiett) continues to surface, often via researching something else. A sidetrack on patent...
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S&W stupidity savaged again
Professor Geoffrey Pullum, co-author of The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (2002), has attacked Strunk & White's iconic The Elements of Style before (50 Years of Stupid Grammar Advice)....
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A Slight Trick of the Mind
Further to Aged Holmes stories, I just finished Mitch Cullin's A Slight Trick of the Mind, a novel imagining Sherlock Holmes at 93, long retired to the Sussex Downs and his bee-keeping. Although it...
View ArticleThe chapel on the tor
Video 2 of Torbay Council's renovation of Chapel Woods and the 13th century Chapel project. Other videos at barrie-james.co.uk.An example of the many brilliant topographical views made conveniently...
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"Oystericus"
Pursuing a loose end from our 2014 walk at Whippingham - see On the Medina - I've occasionally wondered about the origin of the local "Folly" names: Folly Lane, the Folly Works, and the Folly Inn....
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Letts lineage: a clarification
Another loose end from previous posts. I've mentioned the long-disappeared Southview, Blackgang, several times, along with its connection with Thomas Letts (see Letts, a relic). However, a skim of...
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Joe and the Jolly Gist
It's an unlikely jump from Victorian inspirational book to Cumbrian dialect stories, but J Milner Fothergill's 1888 The Will Power; Its Range in Action does exactly that. It's a bit of a curiosity, a...
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