Tag Archives: Dardanelles

A stunning discovery

Mr Garry Humphreys is writing a major book about the English composer Arthur Somervell (1863-1937), as well as compiling a catalogue raisonné of Somervell’s compositions. On 6 September last year he emailed me to ask whether I thought a typescript … Continue reading

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Was there an ‘Edwardian Age’, and was it ‘great’?

When I began to read George and Kittie Calderon’s archive for my biography of them both, I little thought I would be drawn deeper and deeper into the question of ‘Edwardianism’. Yet I instantly felt as I read George’s letters … Continue reading

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Henry James: Edwardian writer par excellence?

No series of posts about the ‘Edwardian Era’ would be complete without a reference to Henry James, often regarded as its greatest novelist. I have always admired his short stories. I have read ‘Daisy Miller’ every few years since 1974 … Continue reading

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George Calderon’s New Drama

Naturally, my foray into short videos had to end with one about George. I suddenly thought that although the contribution of his own plays to Edwardian ‘New Drama’ is now largely forgotten, one could claim that Chekhov’s plays, which he … Continue reading

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The Edwardian Re-turn

I hope you will forgive my pun on the title of one of the seminal works about the Edwaaaardian (as they pronounced it) era, Samuel Hynes’s The Edwardian Turn of Mind. A hundred and seven years ago today, at just after … Continue reading

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From the diary of a writer-publisher: 11

1 August It is now seven weeks since I submitted to The Spectator my 1500-word piece Save it for the (American) nation! How British archives fail us, so I fear they have missed an historic opportunity… It’s been delightful corresponding … Continue reading

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Guest Post: John Pym, ‘The Soldier, the Professor and the Portrait Photographer’

(A reminiscence with Calderonian associations) Once, when I was a boy in the 1950s, my mother led me to a large mansion block in Kensington, West London, so she could introduce me to her last surviving uncle, Hubert Gough, a … Continue reading

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‘Thunderer’

Curate your own stuff – British archives can’t cope PATRICK MILES Thinking of depositing your family papers in a public archive? Be prepared for nobody to answer your emails, promises to be broken, cataloguing never to happen, and to discover … Continue reading

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‘People are reading an awful lot…

…and many booksellers are doing mail order,’ writes Susan Hill in The Spectator. I should say they are! Click the prompt at the bottom of this post to buy my blockbuster biography from Sam&Sam while stocks last! Obsessed with self-image, … Continue reading

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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

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From the diary of a writer-publisher: 2

18 April The shortlist for this year’s James Tait Black Memorial Prize (biography) has been announced. Strong contenders are hip-hop artist Akala’s debut Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire and Susannah Walker’s The Life of Stuff: A … Continue reading

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From the diary of a writer-publisher: 1

27 March Took the train asap to Daunt Books in Hampstead. They had emailed that ‘unfortunately we haven’t sold a copy and if you don’t collect them they will be given to a charity shop’. That’s £180 worth of books! … Continue reading

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The 150th anniversary of a very remarkable man

One hundred and fifty years ago today, early in the morning, Clara Calderon (aged thirty-two) gave birth to George Leslie Calderon at 9 Marlborough Place, St John’s Wood. If not present at the actual birth, his father the Victorian painter … Continue reading

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First biography of Gallipoli war hero

Weep, you may weep, for you may touch them not. Wilfred Owen Although at 45 well over-age, George Calderon was determined in 1914 to get to the Front. He signed up on 4 August 1914 and went with the Blues … Continue reading

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Who are ‘war heroes’?

  Subscribers to Calderonia are probably unaware that the wording of the sales post below, which has been up since publication day on 7 September, has actually changed several times as we were obliged to re-target our marketing by theme … Continue reading

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FIRST BIOGRAPHY OF THE MAN WHO BROUGHT CHEKHOV TO BRITAIN!

This book, the first full-length biography of the significant Edwardian literary and political figure George Calderon, who lived in Russia 1895-97, was an expert on Russian folklore and literature, premiered Chekhov in Britain, wrote the best seller Tahiti, and was killed … Continue reading

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