Category Archive: HISTORY
Pompeii by Mary Beard
A Modern Dog in Pompeii
Mary Beard’s television programmes are about the ancients and not the presenter, which is a nice change. Beard does insert herself into her excellent work, “Pompeii”, but only to ask the questions which the reader would ask. If you want to know what (we think) the Pompeiians ate (they loved dormice and a revolting fermented fish sauce called garum), drank (lots of alcohol), ) and watched (horrible gladiator and animal maulings), then this is the book for you. There is unavoidably, a lot of supposition in the recreation of the life of the ancients. Some of it seems a bit dubious (determining which…
Continue Reading →Historical Mysteries
(Photo by Bjørn Christian Tørrissen)
(Edited by Ian Pindar) P loves Folio books but is allergic to outlaying big money for their gorgeous products, at least, too often.. L has no such malady fortunately, so we have shelves bulging with these strongboxes of literary treasure. The Folio Book of Historical Mysteries is one such treat, a sumptuous volume you can skip about to kill time, during an afternoon at the cricket, say, or while waiting for guests to arrive. Written by various historical experts, judiciously argued, properly footnoted with lists of suggested further reading, and filled with lovely illustrations, dare one say (?), it’s a “perfect…
Continue Reading →Das Ende
"Wakey, wakey Brunhild!" (Otto Donner von Richter) (c. 1892)
17 August, 1876 In Bayreuth, Wagner’s great dream of a music festival playing nothing but Wagner (specifically, the Ring Cycle), concluded today 140 years ago. How many in the crowd cried “Danke Gott!” Or maybe, being mostly Bavarian and made of sterner stuff than most, many said “Grüß got!” For it had been a good day, a great week in fact. The Twilight of the Gods ended some 16 hours of music drama that left the audience drained and etiolated, but in a good way, like a pious married couple on the morning after the wedding. For his part Wagner…
Continue Reading →Ghost Empire – Launch by Richard Fidler
Bob Hawke PM Centre, 11 August 2016 It was said that a Greek, Byzas, founded Byzantium about 658BC. It is accepted that Constantine the Great (converted but not baptized after the Battle of the Milvian Bridge had shown him the sign Hoc Vince) appropriated it for his ‘new Rome’ in 330 and called it Constantinople. The Christian Centre in the East endured till its fall in 1453, when the great city became the prize of the Ottoman Empire (til 1922), Istanbul being a Turkish transfiguration. Mehmet II wisely retained much of the infrastructure, converting Sainte Sophie into the famous mosque. Enter…
Continue Reading →Aren’t Those the Eagle’s Claws?
20 July, 1969: Apollo 11 Mission lands men on the Moon, in the Sea of Tranquillity. In these days of rapid technological advances and diminishing personal heroism, it is easy to forget how earth-shaking this achievement was. But anyone alive and out of nappies in July 1969 won’t forget. “From time immemorial men have gazed into the sky and pondered, theorised, even worshipped ‘the silver ornament of night‘”.* At Rice University in Houston, 12 September 1962, President John Kennedy said: “…the eyes of the world now look into space, to the moon and the planets beyond…We have vowed that we shall…
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