Monarch Butterfly Madeira
Jean Ryckaert, May 1916.
Sir Richard Vincent Sutton c. 1913
Book sent to George Calderon in Russia by his mother, Christmas 1895.
Unpublished watercolour by George Calderon, Tahiti 1906
Colonel Sir Walter Coote Hedley c. 1920
K.N. Das Gupta and Margaret Mitchell in an Indian Dramatic Society production of The Maharani of Arakan, 1913?
Christmas 1901 Cartoon by George Calderon
The entrance to Fort Brockhurst (picture from Britain’s Past)
Michel and Vera Fokine in “Scheherazade”, 1914 (The Music And Theatre Library of Sweden, creative commons)
George Calderon c.1901
Figure from Gauguin’s 1899 painting ‘Tahitian Women with Mango Blossoms’ (left); George Calderon’s pencil sketch ‘Manu’ (right)
A happy memory of Trinity College: undergraduates breakfast together in Downy V. Green, p. 77.
Basic form of the Calderon coat of arms
George and Kittie Calderon 1905
Frontis piece by Frank Calderon
George Calderon, 1912
Patrick Miles in his summer house, 11 December 2016
Captain of the 11Recent Comments
- John Pym on Two anniversaries We are all, followers and occasional contributors, beholden to you, Patrick, for reminding us for ten years that the past is worth remembering and for keeping alive the... (August 17, 2024 at 1:06 pm)
- Patrick Miles on A second Family Bible Very many thanks for fleshing that point out -- and so entertainingly! (I love your reference to creative writing courses, which are a phobia of mine.) Although several... (August 2, 2024 at 11:03 am)
- Laurence Brockliss on A second Family Bible When I say that the British Republic of Letters was dead by 1880, I don't mean to imply that thereafter there were no men and women outside universities, institutes and... (August 2, 2024 at 9:19 am)
- Patrick Miles on A second Family Bible Thank you for devoting valuable time to writing this fascinating Comment. If I may say so, it is awe-inspiring to see the author of a monumental work standing back from that... (July 31, 2024 at 5:32 pm)
- Laurence Brockliss on A second Family Bible Male Professionals in Nineteenth Century Britain was a new departure for me. For most of my adult life I have worked on seventeenth and eighteenth century France. It is also... (July 24, 2024 at 11:31 am)
Category Archives: Personal commentary
Resolution
A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL OUR SUBSCRIBERS, OTHER FOLLOWERS, AND CASUAL VISITORS! 2019 was a good year for Calderonia, with a slight increase in views despite the fact that the book has now been out for sixteen months. … Continue reading
From the diary of a writer-publisher: 6
6 December Our post office is inside the local supermarket, and next to the queue is a stand with all the British newspapers. In an Orwellian spirit of studying what people across the whole political spectrum are thinking, I occasionally … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged agnosticism, Amazon, And now the coffin has been lowered, biographies, biography, birds, Calderonia, death, East-West Review, eschatology, Fedor Tiutchev, Four Funerals and a Tyutchev Poem, I grob opushchen uz v mogilu, John Dewey, Labour Party, Lutheranism, Mirror of the Soul: A Life of the Poet Tyutchev, Morning Star, obituary, Protestantism, Russianists, self-publishing, translation
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Christmas in St Petersburg, 1895
St Petersburg, 27 December 1895 (N.S.) English Christmas Evening I spent at the Wildings: of the guests were Mr and Mrs Alfred Whishaw, Dick Whishaw (18) and Miss blank Whishaw (say 19); James Whishaw (V.C., not the cross but Vice … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Personal commentary
Tagged Alfred Whishaw, charades, Charlie Fletcher, Christmas, Clumps, Dick Whishaw, Francke family, George Calderon, icehills, James Whishaw, Julian Calendar, methylated spirits, Miss Whishaw, Mrs Alfred Whishaw, Philip Hermogenes Calderon, plum pudding, skating, St Petersburg, Trinity College Oxford, Turkey, Wylie family
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A signing
Alison baked a perfect Victoria sponge and last Wednesday we took it along for tea with John Polkinghorne and his carer. He likes a nice cake (foregrounded in the photograph below). The five of us had a very lively conversation … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Alison Miles, Amazon, book launch, Jim Miles, John Polkinghorne, sales, Sam&Sam, Sam2, signing, tea, typesetting, Victoria sponge, What Can We Hope For?
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Guest Post: Alison Miles on ‘What Can We Hope For?’ from the edge of the epicentre
John Polkinghorne lives near us and we have known him for many years. In 2015 the Church Times published an interview in which he answered questions about science and religion put to him by my husband, Patrick. It celebrated John’s … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Alison Miles, Amazon, Amazon UK, Clays of Bungay, cosmology, cover designs, Dialogues about the Future, editing, eschatology, James Miles, Johannes Gutenberg, John Polkinghorne, Kettle's Yard, mathematical physics, Naum Gabo, Patrick Miles, philosophy, Poland, print on demand, proofs, religion, Sam&Sam, science, The Church Times, theology, transcription, voice recording, What Can We Hope For?
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And the exhibition?
The actual exhibition The Rising Tide: Women at Cambridge is one of the best I have seen at the University Library in fifty years. Subsequent to my experience of the PR, I have visited it twice, spending a total of an … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian marriage, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Agnata Ramsay, Behave Badly, Cambridge University Library, Chrystabel Proctor, Clare College, degrees for women, Elizabeth Hughes, Emily Davies, Emma Thompson, Emmeline Pankhurst, George Calderon, Germaine Greer, Girton College, Joanna Womack, lavatory paper, marketing, Men's League for Opposing Woman Suffrage, Millicent Fawcett, National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies, Newnham College, Philip Snowden, PR, Queen Anne, Sandi Toksvig, suffragettism, suffragism, The Rising Tide: Women at Cambridge, Votes for Women, Women's Social and Political Union
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A stone cries out
I have assiduously avoided expressing my own views about controversial matters on Calderonia, as it is simply not a personal blog in that sense. I am as silent as a stone on such things. Sometimes, however, as someone said, even … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Anton Chekhov, Behave Badly badges, Cambridge University Library, comments, gender equality, marketing, merchandise, Milstein Exhibition Centre, PR, The Rising Tide: Women at Cambridge, Three Sisters, Votes for Women
2 Comments
From the diary of a writer-publisher: 5
2 October I arrived in St Andrews as the guest of the best owner of a private archive in Britain, who had unfailingly facilitated and nurtured my work on George’s biography over a period of twenty years, and without whom … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian literature, Edwardian marriage, Personal commentary
Tagged 'Gone with a Basilisk', Acton Reynald, Anton Chekhov, biographies, biography, Brexit, Cambridge Chekhov Company, Cambridge Festival, comments, Cromwell: Mall o' Monks, Edinburgh Festival, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, Jim Corbet, Kittie Calderon, Lesbia Corbet, Manya Ross, Nina Corbet, Pall Mall Gazette, Peter the Great, Queen Victoria, Russia, Samuel Hynes, Sir Walter Corbet, St Andrews, St Petersburg, Susan de Guardiola, The Cherry Orchard, The Edwardian Turn of Mind
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Grow old they shall not
It is the time of year again when I tussle with the question of how George’s friend Laurence Binyon’s half-line ‘They shall grow not old’ should be spoken (or mutely read), what it means depending on how you speak it, … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Heroism and Adventure, Personal commentary
Tagged Alexander Pushkin, Alfred Tennyson, Armistice Day, commemoration, comments, Elizabeth Browning, Eric Griffiths, For the Fallen, Freya Johnston, Friedrich Hölderlin, George Calderon, Gerard Manley Hopkins, John Dewey, John Mullan, Laurence Binyon, Patmos, Remembrance Sunday, Robert Browning, The Bronze Horseman, The Great War, Thomas Hardy, Victorian poetry, war poetry, World War I
4 Comments
The War again
As readers of George Calderon: Edwardian Genius will know (go on, try it!), George and Kittie were very close to the Pym family, whose home was Foxwold at Brasted Chart in Kent. Violet Pym was Kittie’s niece by her first marriage and, … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian marriage, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Alan Moorehead, Aubrey Herbert, Brasted Chart, Charles Evelyn Pym, comments, Dardanelles, Foxwold, Gallipoli, Geoge Calderon: Edwardian Genius, George Calderon, Ian Hamilton, intercultural contact, Islam, Jack Pym, John Pym, Kittie Calderon, The Great War, Third Battle of Krithia, Turkish army, Violet Pym, World War I
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A TLS review!!!
I was rendered soundless and motionless last Thursday when a stalwart subscriber emailed to tell me that a full-length review of George Calderon: Edwardian Genius had appeared that morning in The Times Literary Supplement. A Zen moment indeed. For consider: … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Edwardian marriage, Personal commentary
Tagged Anglo-Russian cultural relations, Anton Chekhov, Ballets Russes, biographies, biography, Calderonia, Charlotte Jones, comments, Constance Garnett, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, Kittie Calderon, Laurence Binyon, Laurence Sterne, life-writing, modernism, Nina Corbet, Professor Rose of Leipzig, reviews, Russomania, Tahiti, The Seagull, Times Literary Supplement, TLS, Tristram Shandy, William John Rose
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Guest Post: Sam2 on… ‘How to Typeset A Second Book’
The final act of Tarkovsky’s Andrei Rublev concerns a boy and a bell. In this hour-long conclusion to the film, the son of a deceased bellmaker persuades his village that the father bequeathed to him a secret bellmaking recipe. He … Continue reading
Posted in Modern parallels, Personal commentary, Uncategorized
Tagged Amazon, Amazon KDP, Andrei Rublev, Andrei Tarkovsky, biographies, Chris Johnson, Church Times, comments, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, James Miles, John Polkinghorne, Kindle Direct Publishing, LibreOffice, OpenOffice, Patrick Miles, PDF, publishers, Sam&Sam, Sam1, Sam2, TeX, TeXWorks, typesetting, What Can We Hope For?
6 Comments
From the diary of a writer-publisher: 4
16 August Walked from King’s Cross arriving at Foyles in Charing Cross Road 10.00 a.m. to pick up unsold copies of George. Was intending to walk with them from there to the National Theatre, but by now it was raining … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian literature, Heroism and Adventure, Personal commentary
Tagged Annotranslate, Anton Chekhov, biographies, biography, Blithe Spirit, bookshops, British Library, butterflies, Che Guevara, comments, Cossus cossus, dragonflies, fishing, Foyles, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, Goat Moth, haiku, Haiku Quarterly, Heywood Hill, honesty pods, Horatio Nelson, John Sandoe Books, Laurence Brockliss, Lesbia Corbet, Meiji, National Theatre, poetry magazines, Presence, tench, The Great War, William Beatty, willow, World War I
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Publication!
All of a sudden things went right with Amazon, and we have received our first customer copy of What Can We Hope For? Dialogues about the Future. The book is ONLY available from Amazon, i.e. by print on demand. This … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Amazon, book formats, Clays Ltd, cosmology, James Miles, John Polkinghorne, Patrick Miles, printing, publishers, Sam&Sam, Sam1, theology, typesetting, What Can We Hope For?
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…and two back covers
By the time you read this, Sam&Sam’s new book should be available through Amazon. No, I can’t say that… The penny has finally dropped: having Amazon print your book is a complete, utter, irreparable and gut-wrenching break with the previous … Continue reading
From the diary of a writer-publisher: 7
27 December I was given this book for Christmas and have consumed it by the end of today. To begin with, I was rather disappointed. Three and a quarter thousand Rugbeians fought in the War. An appendix lists the 637 … Continue reading →