Most of us have a picture of the Victorians in our minds. Straight-laced (on the surface). Women bound into suffocating corsets. Piano legs covered for the sake of decency. Industrious pioneers in science and technology. Innovative creators of our railway system. Capitalists. Ruthless exploiters of the industrial poor whilst at the same time being great […]
Victorians Undone by Kathryn Hughes Read More »
Many attributes have been posited to distinguish humans from other animals. Tool making, complex social organisation, moral sensibility, ritual practice, self-conscious awareness. All are now known to be shared by other animals in some degree. Sophisticated communication is also known to be employed by other animals, although this also had been used as an absolute
How Language Began Read More »
Annie Murray has been infantalising the minds of her readers with carelessly crafted novels of no power and less conviction for some time. Her 22nd, The Doorstep Child, is available now and her devoted readership can expect many a pot boiler to follow. Murray prepared for a literary career by training as a journalist and working for
The Doorstep Child Read More »
Lyn Andrews has been infantalising the minds of her readers with carelessly crafted novels of no power and less conviction for some time. Her 34th, Liverpool Sisters, is available now and her devoted readership can expect many a pot boiler to follow. Andrews prepared for a literary career by attending secretarial college in Liverpool. Find out
Dilly Court has been enriching the lives of her readers with carelessly crafted novels of no power and less conviction for some time. Her 23th, The Button Box, is available now and her devoted readership can expect many a pot boiler to follow. Court writes Dillygently every morning before rewarding herself with a custard cream and
Katie Fforde (http://www.katiefforde.com/) describes on her website how being addicted to Mills & Boon novels prepared her for the literary life. It is love, indeed, which motivates this ‘Sunday Times No.1 Bestseller’. Ambrose Bierce may have quipped that love is ‘a temporary insanity curable by marriage’. His view was that body chemistry has to
Ambrose Bierce quipped that love is ‘a temporary insanity curable by marriage’. Body chemistry has to overcome reason to compel the sticky intimacy required for reproduction. It’s the price extracted from the individual for sexual reproduction. The subject of countless narratives in poetry, song, story and novel, the insanity of reading about love shows no
Ambrose Bierce quipped that love is ‘a temporary insanity curable by marriage’. Body chemistry has to overcome reason to compel the sticky intimacy required for reproduction. It’s the price extracted from the individual for sexual reproduction. The subject of countless narratives in poetry, song, story and novel, the insanity of reading about love shows no
Paper Hearts & Summer Kisses Read More »
There is scarcely a corner of these damp islands of ours without some beauty or interest value. Even Essex. Holidaying in Colchester last Summer allowed me to enjoy the rich history of the area. Sarah Perry’s (http://www.sarahperry.net/) second novel, The Essex Serpent is set in Victorian London and an Essex village in the 1890’s. It
