Tag Archives: biographies

Guest post: Alison Miles, ‘A Dangerous Innocence’

The title of Artemis Cooper’s biography of Elizabeth Jane Howard (John Murray, 2016) certainly gives a clue to what lay behind Howard’s life. Jane (as she was known) developed childhood insecurities that appear to have stemmed from her need for … Continue reading

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‘He was away, far away…’

The S.S. Aguila, a cruise ship of the Yeoward Line, dropped anchor off Funchal, the capital of Madeira, on 31 March 1913, probably around lunchtime. There were twenty-nine passengers aboard, including George Calderon. Within a couple of hours he was sitting … Continue reading

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George L. Calderon, cartoonist

I am extremely grateful to James Miles for his vibrant guest post on Schulz and Peanuts. It certainly improved Calderonia’s viewing figures! I am always loth to ‘take down’ guest posts, because they have something unique and often definitive about them. … Continue reading

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Guest post: James Miles, ‘Schulz and Peanuts’

Schulz and Peanuts, by David Michaelis, is a scrupulously researched biography of Charles M. Schulz, the prolific cartoonist responsible for the hugely popular Peanuts comic. Indeed ‘responsible’ is particularly accurate here, as we learn in the book of Schulz’s determination … Continue reading

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Guest posts and…George a Labour man?

I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that biography is going through a particularly fertile and innovative time. I’m always interested, then, in biographies about new subjects and biographies that tell their stories in new ways. Next week, blogmaster … Continue reading

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Checking my wiring

To reprise a motif of my last post, ‘the first pancake was a lump’, in the admirable Russian phrase (pervyi blin upal komom). That’s to say in English that my carefully prepared approach to a group of publishers went off at half-cock. … Continue reading

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Publishing

After nearly fifty years of contact with publishers, I could bore for England on the subject…which means that I must make sure I don’t! I will try to keep this short and focussed on the task of finding the right … Continue reading

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‘Iconography’

Lest it be thought that my previous post expressed a scepticism towards or weariness with blogging, I hasten to reassure followers: the pleasures and benefits of running Calderonia have been a fantastic bonus to writing the actual book. I never … Continue reading

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Calderonia: the way forward

A very happy New Year to our subscribers, followers and visitors. May 2017 be a good year for you all. I doubt whether any of us will agree with George Calderon’s ‘brutal’ assertion in a letter to Katharine Ripley of … Continue reading

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A soft landing and season’s greetings!

After five and a half years living full time with writing this book, I am somewhat dazed by the soft landing of Bibliography, Acknowledgements and the odd tidying up. I am a bit light-headed. It feels unreal, especially compared with … Continue reading

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‘…but Mr Jones does look a nice dog’

After enduring a long bout of illness and the first anniversary of George’s disappearance at Gallipoli, in the summer of 1916 Kittie decided she must channel her energies into a number of useful and therapeutic activities. One of these was … Continue reading

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George’s alma maters

I little thought, when I visited the archives of Trinity College, Oxford, on 4 August 2011 to research aspects of George Calderon’s undergraduate years there, that five years later I would still be in invaluable contact with the Archivist, Clare … Continue reading

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‘bubbling with wit and good humour’

In a letter to the TLS  (9 July 2010) I appealed for unpublished letters or works of George Calderon, but also asked readers to contact me if they had ‘come across references to him in obscure publications’. My thinking was that … Continue reading

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Some ‘announcements’

I am staggered that my Introduction has passed its latest grilling, been tweaked yet again, and finalised as version 8. Deep down, though, I know I can’t write this sort of thing. To quote another favourite tag of Chekhovians, from Three … Continue reading

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Holroyd on biography

Whenever I re-read my typescript, I check the sources for a few facts or assertions chosen at random. The last time I was re-reading, one of the assertions that struck me as needing checking was that Augustus John had been … Continue reading

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One does the hokey cokey

I said in my post of 6 October (nearly two months ago!) that I was ‘fired up to put the last tittle on my biography by the end of November’, which meant in the first instance writing the Afterword (‘Who … Continue reading

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