A week of goodies: Edward Gorey’s covers, Freddie Mercury, costumes for The Crown, Women’s History Month, Erotica, Cookery, Potatoes, Green Books, Doll Houses, and Highwaywomen…

Edward Gorey’s covers for literary classics: https://lithub.com/edward-goreys-illustrated-covers-for-literary-classics/
-What’s scary is how many of the books with these covers I have actually owned…(that dates me!)

 

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Mary Wroth, a contemporary of Shakespeare, is the author of the Guardian’s poem of the week https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2019/jan/28/poem-of-the-week-from-a-crown-of-sonnets-dedicated-to-love-by-lady-mary-wroth

From A Crown of Sonnets Dedicated to Love:

In this strange labyrinth how shall I turn?

Ways are on all sides, while the way I miss:

If to the right hand, there, in love I burn;

Let me go forward, therein danger is.

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Now to the 21^st-century – here is the Freddie Mercury clone Marc Martel who sings some of the songs in the Bohemian Rhapsody biopic: http://www.openculture.com/2019/02/marc-martel-sings-just-like-freddie-mercury.html

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Opening at Winterthur at the end of March (through January 5, 2020): “Costuming The Crown” http://www.winterthur.org/exhibitions-events/exhibitions/future-exhibitions/thecrown/

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Waxing poetic on the Potato – more than you ever thought you needed to know: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/potato-idioms

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A Folger Shakespeare Library exhibition: “First Chefs: Fame and Foodways from Britain to the Americas” (Jan 19 – Mar 31, 2019): https://www.folger.edu/exhibitions/first-chefs-fame-foodways-britain-americas

-and some of the recipes, such as Hannah Wooley’s Orange and Lemon Marmalade, or William Hughes’s Hot Chocolate: https://www.folger.edu/exhibitions/first-chefs/recipes

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March is Women’s History Month!

Two databases that focus on Women Writers are FREE during the whole month of March:

1. Orlando: the subscription service Orlando:Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present will be available free for all through the month of March for Women’s History Month: http://orlando.cambridge.org/svHomePage

Here is the login information: (no caps, no spaces)

Id: womenshistory19
pw: orlando19

2. The Women Writers Online collection includes more than 400 texts written and translated by women, first published between 1526 and 1850 (no login info required: you can search and read the texts in the collection at: http://wwo.wwp.northeastern.edu/WWO

Peter Harrington has put out a catalogue: In Her Own Words: Works by Exceptional Women – you can read it here: https://www.peterharrington.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/151-final-low-res.pdf

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Erotica at the British Library: see this blog post at Untold Lives “Smutty stuff’ for ‘debauched readers’: The Merryland books in the Private Case” https://blogs.bl.uk/untoldlives/2019/02/smutty-stuff-for-debauched-readers-the-merryland-books-in-the-private-case.html

The Private Case is an historic collection of erotica segregated from the main British (Museum) Library collection on grounds of obscenity from the 1850s onwards in a moral climate of suppression and censorship. Now much of the work has been digitized for all the world to see (subscription through Gale or in the Reading Room of the British Library).

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The Doll’s House at the Victoria and Albert Museum of Childhood – with great pictures:
http://spitalfieldslife.com/2019/02/28/denton-welchs-dolls-house/

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Those of us watching Victoria might want more information on the Great Exhibition of 1851: here’s a very small sampling of what’s on the internet:

• Many illustrations here at the British Library, this written by the historian Liza Picard: https://www.bl.uk/victorian-britain/articles/the-great-exhibition
• And a great summary here at Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Palace

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Then there’s the scene in North and South with Margaret and John Thornton meeting at the Great Exhibition and where she first sees the respect with which he is held by others (and always nice to have a reason to post a pic with Richard Armitage…)

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For those of you wanting to know more about the Green Books that are the heart of the Green Book movie, The New York Public Library has a research guide and a digitized collection online here: https://www.nypl.org/blog/2019/02/25/explore-green-books-schomburg-center

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OK, are you a Miss, Mrs. or a Ms.? (all Misters – this is not about you…): Alexander Atkins at the Bookshelf gives us the history – it goes back a long time in case you didn’t know: https://atkinsbookshelf.wordpress.com/2019/03/02/what-is-mrs-short-for/

(you should follow this blog – always enlightening word and book history…)

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This week’s favorite “Found on the Internet and how will I ever read it all…”: https://gesteofrobinhood.com/

Here Begynneth A Lytell Geste of Robin Hood… Being A General and True History of the Lives and Robberies of the Most Notorious Highwaymen, Rogues, Cheats, Murderers and Rebel Leaders from the Medieval Period to the 19th Century

This post on “Female Highwaymen” is most arresting (pun intended)… https://gesteofrobinhood.com/2015/10/18/female-highwaymen/

Lady Katherine Ferrers (1634-1660) – do you think Jane Austen had her in mind when creating her Fanny Ferrars Dashwood (the sneaky thief of inheritances)?? Or perhaps that’s where Mrs. Ferrars money came from?

Happy reading! What has been your favorite internet find this week?

C2019 Jane Austen in Vermont