Touching the past
'Oh, you haven't heard,' said the librarian in the Duke Humphrey Library, the oldest and most beautiful part of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, with its carrels of deeply polished oak…
Tolstoy – a lesson in diction
For those of us reading War and Peace as part of 'Team Tolstoy' on dovegreyreader's blog, here's a little lesson in diction, as powerful as it is short. It was…
Great radio
I'm listening to a great programme on history and literature, coming from Cheltenham Literary Festival and broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Repeated tonight at 9.30, or available as a podcast.…
Tolstoy – October soiree
All those who joined Team Tolstoy on dovegreyreader.typepad.com will be at Troika Stop One today, enjoying Lynne's post which, quite rightly, focuses on the characters. Tolstoy is the master of…
St Francis Day
When I started this calendar theme, it wasn't with the intention of reminding lapsed atheists of the saints, but to get into the rhythm of the agricultural/liturgical year that we…