Patrick Miles in his summer house, 11 December 2016
Sir Richard Vincent Sutton c. 1913
Unpublished watercolour by George Calderon, Tahiti 1906
Jean Ryckaert, May 1916.
Monarch Butterfly Madeira
Captain of the 11
Michel and Vera Fokine in “Scheherazade”, 1914 (The Music And Theatre Library of Sweden, creative commons)
Figure from Gauguin’s 1899 painting ‘Tahitian Women with Mango Blossoms’ (left); George Calderon’s pencil sketch ‘Manu’ (right)
George Calderon c.1901
George Calderon, 1912
Basic form of the Calderon coat of arms
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
Frontis piece by Frank Calderon
Colonel Sir Walter Coote Hedley c. 1920
A happy memory of Trinity College: undergraduates breakfast together in Downy V. Green, p. 77.
The entrance to Fort Brockhurst (picture from Britain’s Past)
George and Kittie Calderon 1905
Book sent to George Calderon in Russia by his mother, Christmas 1895.Recent Comments
- Patrick Miles on Guest Post by John Pym: A Soviet film of ‘The Lady with the Little Dog’ Many, many thanks for reprising, Johnnie, for I know how busy you are. How serendipitous that you had just seen a 'live' performance of Murnau's b&w Sunrise! I gather from... (March 14, 2025 at 10:21 am)
- John Pym on Guest Post by John Pym: A Soviet film of ‘The Lady with the Little Dog’ March 8, 2025: Last evening, I watched a digital transfer of a black-and-white movie, made by an expatriate German in California nearly a hundred years ago, in a packed town... (March 10, 2025 at 4:36 pm)
- Patrick Miles on Guest Post by John Pym: A Soviet film of ‘The Lady with the Little Dog’ Your response here is (obviously) deeply informed... Thank you very much indeed. In comparing the coach ride to Simferopol in Heifitz's film with the chariot race in Ben-Hur... (March 5, 2025 at 10:01 am)
- John Pym on Guest Post by John Pym: A Soviet film of ‘The Lady with the Little Dog’ Black-and-white camerawork was, I suspect, as natural to the director of The Lady with the Little Dog as breathing in and out or eating his breakfast. I doubt that he was... (February 28, 2025 at 11:01 pm)
- Patrick Miles on Guest Post by John Pym: A Soviet film of ‘The Lady with the Little Dog’ We are deeply favoured and honoured to publish on Calderonia the eminent film critic John Pym's magnificent tribute to Heifitz's film The Lady with the Little Dog, perfectly... (February 24, 2025 at 10:56 am)
Author Archives: Patrick Miles
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
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Edwardian marriage, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Achi Baba, Anton Chekhov, biographies, biography, British Expeditionary Force, comments, Dardanelles, Gallipoli, George Calderon, King's Own Scottish Borderers, Kittie Calderon, KOSB, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, Royal Horse Guards, Tahiti, The Blues, The Great War, Third Battle of Krithia, Twelve Tree Copse, World War I, Ypres
Leave a comment
The War Is Over
I went to attend the Armistice commemoration on Sunday in my home town of Sandwich, whence my grandfather set out for Gallipoli in 1915 and whither he fortunately returned from Ypres in 1918. This was the programme: As you can … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Armistice, Book of Common Prayer, comments, Gallipoli, George Calderon, memorialisation, memory, National Memorial Arboretum, Peter Jackson, Remembrance Sunday, Sandwich, St Clement's Church, The Great War, They Shall Not Grown Old, World War I, Ypres
2 Comments
‘Bugles calling for them…’
It is a source of sorrow to me that for unforeseeable reasons I have not been able to honour my acceptance two years ago of an extremely kind invitation from the Wilfred Owen Association (France) to attend the commemoration today … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Anthem for Doomed Youth, British Expeditionary Force, bugles, commemoration, comments, Dulce et Decorum, English language, George Calderon, Greater Love, historians, Ivor Gurney, Ors, Poets Corner, Rupert Brooke, Sambre-Oise Canal, Siegfried Sassoon, The Great War, war poetry, War Poets, Wilfred Owen, Wilfred Owen Association, World War I
2 Comments
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
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Achilles, Aristotle, comments, Crusades, Dardanelles, Edith Cavell, Gallipoli, George Calderon, hamartia, heroes, Horatio Nelson, hubris, Iliad, Karsh, Lemuel Francis Abbott, Moscow Arts, patri-passionism, patriotism, Patroclus, Peter Jackson, Prospect Theatre Company, Richard Westmancott, self-sacrifice, St John Hankin, The Great War, They Shall Not Grow Old, Third Battle of Krithia, Toby Robertson, war heroes, war victims, Wellington Memorial, Winston Churchill, World War I
Leave a comment
Thank you, Blackwell’s of Oxford!
One day, perhaps, I will describe how my whole post-7 September marketing strategy was upset and I had to re-focus immediately on my potential Russianist readership worldwide… Thank you to ALL Russianists everywhere who have responded magnificently! I know there … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian literature, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Anton Chekhov, biographies, Blackwell's, Bookseller of the Year, Clare Hopkins, comments, George Calderon, Heffers, Laurence Binyon, marketing, Oxford, Sam&Sam, St Andrews, Toppings, translation, Trinity College Oxford
Leave a comment
The War, chronotopia and commemoration
Many people deny the existence of a ‘national mood’ and ‘national consciousness’. I certainly don’t believe in the latter, any more than I accept the idea of a collective soul (the ‘Russian Soul’ etc). But I think there is a … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged A Group Photograph, Alrewas, Andrew Tatham, Armistice Day, biographies, biography, British Expeditionary Force, C.F. Aspinall-Oglander, chronotopia, closure, commemoration, comments, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Dan Snow, Dardanelles, Gallipoli, Gallipoli Memorial, George Calderon, Imperial War Museum, Kemal Atatürk, Laurence Brockliss, March Offensive, memorialisation, Mustafa Kemal, Nadir Imamoğlu, national consciousness, National Memorial Arboretum, national mood, On This Day, Patrick Cordingley, Remembrance Sunday, Russian Soul, SANDS, Shot at Dawn Memorial, Tate Britain, The Great War, Third Battle of Krithia, Twelve Tree Copse, World War I
3 Comments
23 August 1915
On this day in 1915, probably in response to appeals put out by Kittie and by Gertrude Bell at the Red Cross in London, a Captain Frank J. Martin of the Royal Worcestershire Regiment appeared at the office of a … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Heroism and Adventure, Personal commentary
Tagged 4 June 1915, B Company, biographies, biography, Bristol, Captain Paterson, comments, Dardanelles, Frank J. Martin, Gallipoli, George Calderon, Gertrude Bell, Jack Harley, King's Own Scottish Borderers, Kittie Calderon, Royal Worcestershire Regiment, The Great War, Third Battle of Krithia, trench warfare, Trinity College Oxford, World War I
Leave a comment
Countdown
It is only four weeks to publication day. A mind-focussing fact. On the day, 7 September, I shall have a post announcing publication, displaying the cover with its centenary bellyband, giving details of how to buy the book, and quoting … Continue reading
Posted in Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged 'real time', Alison Miles, biographies, biography, Calderonia, commemoration, comments, Dardanelles, Eric Ravilious, Gallipoli, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, Kittie Calderon, publication, reviews, The Great War, Third Battle of Krithia, William Rothenstein, World War I
Leave a comment
Guest post: John Dewey reviews the life of Rosa Newmarch
Rosa Newmarch (1857-1940) was an extraordinary woman of many talents – ‘une femme inoubliable’ as Sibelius once called her, a phrase adopted by Lewis Stevens as the title of this fascinating biography published by Matador in 2011. She achieved considerable … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Edwardian marriage, Personal commentary
Tagged Alexander Borodin, Alexander Glazunov, Bella Simpson, biographies, biography, Bolshevik regime, César Cui, comments, Czechoslovak music, Czechoslovakia, Feodor Chaliapin, George Calderon, Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Henry Wood, Jean Sibelius, John Dewey, Leoš Janaček, Lewis Stevens, Mighty Handful, Mily Balakirev, Modest Musorgsky, music, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Peter Tchaikovsky, Philip Ross Bullock, Rosa Newmarch, Russia, Russian music, The Great War, Thomas Beecham, Tomáš Masaryk, Vladimir Stasov, World War I
1 Comment
Biography’s unheard dimension
Biography is words. Personally, I hear words when I am writing rather than being focussed on their soundless written form — which is probably why I am less than 100% consistent in my presentation of the hieroglyphs on paper. I … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Edwardian English, Edwardian literature, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Airs Russes, Albert Cazabon, Aleksandr Glazunov, Alfred Wareing, Anatolii Liadov, Andante cantabile, Anton Chekhov, Ballets Russes, Basil de Sélincourt, biographies, biography, Chanson Trise, comments, Daniel Auber, Dardanelles, Eastcote, Edvard Grieg, eidetics, Gaetano Donizetti, George Calderon, Glasgow Repertory Theatre, Heathland Lodge, Henryk Wieniawski, Jean Sibelius, Kittie Calderon, Konstantin Stanislavsky, L'elisir d'amore, Le Philtre, Les Vendredis, Lev Tolstoi, Madeira, moods, Moscow Art Theatre, Nikolai Sokolov, Peter Tchaikovsky, smell, sound, The Seagull, Trinity College Oxford, Valse Triste, Well Walk
1 Comment
Does computer typesetting produce a ‘chaotic system’?
Like me, I expect you have wondered why a modern commercially published book that is to all appearances superbly produced can neverthless have typographical garbage and weird other phenomena in it, or why odd entries in its Index are consistently … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian literature, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Anton Chekhov, butterfly effect, chaology, chaos theory, comments, determinism, garbage, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, glitches, Grant Richards, italics, John Aubrey: My Own Life, morpho butterflies, PDF files, printers, proofs, publishers, random events, roman, Ruth Scurr, Sam&Sam, Sam2, Two Plays by Tchekhof, typesetting
Leave a comment
The tome weighs in
Here is what I believe to be the first side view of the newly printed biography: This is the heaviest book in every sense that I shall ever write… Pre-publication orders continue to flow in from loyal followers of this blog, … Continue reading
Interlude on a familiar theme
Clays have pleasantly surprised me by discovering that they have over-printed by not 20 copies, which is the number under/over contractually allowed, but 59 — which they offer me at an extraordinarily good price including free delivery. I have snapped … Continue reading
Posted in Edwardian character, Heroism and Adventure, Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged 14-18 NOW, Arts Council, biographies, biography, Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red, Brexit, British Expeditionary Force, commemoration, comments, Dalby Forest, Danny Boyle, Die Zeit, Europe, Fly By Night, George Calderon, Kenneth Bogle, Millicent Fawcett, official art, Paul Cummins, personal connection, Rachel Whiteread, Richard Morrison, Shrouds of the Somme, taxpayers, The Cenotaph, the government, The Great War, The Times, Tom Piper, Wilfred Owen, William Orpen, World War I
5 Comments
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 →