K.N. Das Gupta and Margaret Mitchell in an Indian Dramatic Society production of The Maharani of Arakan, 1913?
Book sent to George Calderon in Russia by his mother, Christmas 1895.
Patrick Miles in his summer house, 11 December 2016
A happy memory of Trinity College: undergraduates breakfast together in Downy V. Green, p. 77.
Captain of the 11
Monarch Butterfly Madeira
Basic form of the Calderon coat of arms
George and Kittie Calderon 1905
Figure from Gauguin’s 1899 painting ‘Tahitian Women with Mango Blossoms’ (left); George Calderon’s pencil sketch ‘Manu’ (right)
George Calderon c.1901
Frontis piece by Frank Calderon
Michel and Vera Fokine in “Scheherazade”, 1914 (The Music And Theatre Library of Sweden, creative commons)
George Calderon, 1912
Unpublished watercolour by George Calderon, Tahiti 1906
The entrance to Fort Brockhurst (picture from Britain’s Past)
Sir Richard Vincent Sutton c. 1913
Jean Ryckaert, May 1916.
Christmas 1901 Cartoon by George Calderon
Colonel Sir Walter Coote Hedley c. 1920Recent Comments
- Jim D G Miles on From the diary of a writer-publisher: 28 Excellent entry, Dad. I like the escape room picture, of course, but the story about the Russian and the hole-in-the-wall is exceptional! (28/03/2024 at 9:58 PM)
- Patrick Miles on Short story: ‘Crox’ Thank you, dear anonymous Theo...it is so refreshing to hear the reaction of a Man of the People! Keep a good grip on those cords! 'Part II'?! The rest is secreted in lines (18/12/2023 at 10:33 PM)
- Theo on Short story: ‘Crox’ Delicious! "Are you being Served?" meets "Keeping up Appearances" via Calderotica. But Patrick, you cannot leave us dangling like that just before Christmas! One thing - c (18/12/2023 at 1:35 PM)
- Patrick Miles on Cambridge Tales 8: ‘Black Tie’ Thank you, Damian, for sharing your problem with us. It's difficult to know what to prescribe. Perhaps try examining the facts of the story (e.g. there are not 6 medics in the (20/11/2023 at 9:44 AM)
- Damian Grant on Cambridge Tales 8: ‘Black Tie’ Patrick: I read your story 'Black Tie' on Monday, and knew immediately that it didn't work for me. There was something forced, factitious; something that didn't let the elemen (17/11/2023 at 2:26 PM)
Category Archives: Personal commentary
A writer-publisher’s Ukrainian diary: 5
7 May 2022 People are, I know, frightened by Putin’s threats to use nuclear weapons. I have suggested that even western leaders have been sufficiently frightened by these threats to be militarily unproactive. This means that Putin doesn’t need to … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Anatolii Chubais, anecdotes, Boris Yel'tsin, comedy, comments, Commonwealth of Independent States, Czechoslovakia, Empire style, Finland, Hungary, irony, Jill Biden, Leonid Brezhnev, Mikhail Gorbachev, Moscow, Nancy Pelosi, nuclear weapons, Pavel Palazhchenko, Pierre Trudeau, Poland, rakes, Russo-Ukrainian War, Stalin, The Crimea, Ukraine, Victory Day, Vladimir Putin, Vladislav Zubok, Volodymyr Zelensky, World War 2
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War and woof poetry
Judging by allusions and quotations in his speeches, Volodymyr Zelensky either has a good knowledge of literature himself, or his team does. Unlike Putin, he speaks in a cultured manner, beautifully clearly and expressively, with a literary turn. In an … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Alexander Blok, Alexander Pushkin, Berlin, compromise, dogs, Nazi Germany, Peter Levi, propaganda, Red Army, Robin Milner-Gulland, Russia, Russian poetry, sentimentality, Sergei Yesenin, talant, To Russia's Slanderers, translation, USSR, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Vladimir Putin, Volodomyr Zelensky, war poetry, World War 2, Yevgeny Yevtushenko
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A writer-publisher’s Ukrainian diary: 4
23 April 2022 It is St George’s Day, hypothetically William Shakespeare’s birthday, and we are in Stratford-upon-Avon witnessing the civic celebrations, which are beautifully done, inclusive, happy, humorous, almost a Spring flower festival, and a really moving tribute to Shakespeare’s … Continue reading
Posted in Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Aleksei Gromyko, Aleksei Kozyrev, Alexander Gorchakov, atonement, catacomb Christians, Charles Talleyrand, Chester Wilmot, comments, David Aaronovitch, David Petraeus, General Dvornikov, General Gerasimov, General Mezintsev, Henry VI, Joachim von Ribbentrop, KGB, Khar'kiv, Mariupol, medical diagnoses, military strategy, Moldova, Moscow Patriarchate, Nadezhda Mandel'shtam, NATO, Nikolai Gogol, proxy war, repentance, Rett Syndrome, Russia, Saddam Hussein, salients, Sergei Lavrov, St George's Day, steroids, Stratford-upon-Avon, tank battles, Tariq Aziz, The Donbas, Transnistria, trench warfare, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin, Volodymyr Zelensky, Wagner Group, William Shakespeare, World War 2, World War I
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A Not Nursery Rhyme
DANDLING SONG … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged cats, chub, cockroaches, comments, cowboys, dandling songs, dark blue, folklore, hares, KGB, kikimora, mice, nonsense rhymes, nursery rhymes, oven-prong, poems, pribautki, Rus', Russia, The New Dark Blue Cowboys
1 Comment
The strange workings of ‘tourbillions of Time’
Long-term followers of Calderonia, and readers of George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, will know that I’m interested in different forms of Time and very fond of the expression ‘tourbillions of Time’ from Robert Graves’s poem ‘On Portents’… Piecing together the narrative behind … Continue reading
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Tagged 'Dandling Song', 'On Portents', aleatory, chronotopes, colours, dark blue, Edward Lear, folklore, George Calderon, Igor' Stravinsky, KGB, Lenin's mausoleum, Margaret Thatcher, naive, nonsense poetry, nursery rhymes, Penguin Russian Course, pribautki, Robert Graves, Russian grammar, Russian language, teaching Russian, The New Dark Blue Cowboys, tourbillions of Time, Valdimir Putin
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‘The negation of everything worth living for’
In 2010, when the Putin Project was still just a monocracy and one could converse freely over the phone with friends in Russia, I remarked to one that Russia seemed to have ‘reached about 1892’, i.e. a point during the … Continue reading
Posted in Modern parallels, Personal commentary
Tagged Alexander III, anarchy, Andrei Amal'rik, Angela Merkel, anti-Semitism, apocalypse, autocracy, censorship, Communism, democracy, dogs, Estonia, ideology, irrationalism, Jewish people, Joseph Conrad, Konstantin Pobedonostsev, Moscow Patriarchate, Otto von Bismarck, perestroika, Poland, Putin Project, rule of law, satanry, State capitalism, Ukraine, USSR, Vladimir Putin
2 Comments
A writer-publisher’s Ukrainian diary: 2
5 April 2022 When I contemplated the image from Kyiv that I posted last week, as well as Bruegel I thought of Isaac Babel’s stories Red Cavalry about the Russo-Polish War of 1919-21. Some of that war took place in … Continue reading
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Tagged 'The Prince', Aleksandr Lukashenko, Andrew Tatham, Anton Chekhov, atrocities, Babi Yar, Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Centre, Belarus, Belorussia, Bucha, Chris Deverell, comments, Crimea, David McDuff, Donald Trump, Donbas, EU, Fiona Hill, Georg Trakl, Isaac Babel, Joe Biden, Kyiv, L'viv, Mariupol, Military Intelligence, NATO, Nazis, Niccolo Machiavelli, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Red Cavalry, The Times, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin, weapons, World War I, Zbrucz
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A writer-publisher’s Ukrainian diary: 1
16 March 2022 Tony Blair has said that to keep telling Putin all the things we won’t do in the face of Putin’s carnage (e.g. enforce a no-fly zone, give Ukraine Polish MiGs, co-occupy and safeguard Western Ukraine with the … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Alexander Litvinenko, Alexei Navalny, Anna Politkovskaya, Belgium, comments, fear, Iuliia Skripal, Joe Biden, Kaiser Wilhelm II, MiG fighters, peace negotiations, Pityriasis rosea, Roman Abramovich, Sergei Skripal, The Times, Tony Blair, Treaty of London, Ukraine, Viktor Yushchenko, Vladimir Putin, Volodymyr Zelensky, World War I
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Bruegel, reality and truth
We all, I imagine, have photographs of terrible events (World War 1, say, the Holocaust, or Hiroshima) indelibly seared on our brains. Where Ukraine 2022 is concerned, the above is the one I shall never forget. The face is straight … Continue reading
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Tagged comments, death, Four Quartets, grief, Hiroshima, Kiev, love, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, reality, Russia, T.S. Eliot, The Holocaust, truth, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin, World War I
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A year of promise
A very happy new year to all Calderonia’s subscribers and viewers! Thank you for staying with us through 2021, which was our eighth calendar year, and I can promise you at least another year of posts from me and my … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged Anton Chekhov, Anton Chekhov: A Short Life, BASEES, biographies, British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies, Calderonia, comments, COVID-19, George Calderon, George Calderon: Edwardian Genius, Gleb Yakunin, Jim Miles, pandemics, promises, Robinson College, Sam&Sam, Sergei Bychkov, Spanish Flu, The Great War, World War I
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Guest post by Jim Miles: ‘DONG!’
The most striking aspect of Japan, right from the moment I arrived, was how different from the UK it wasn’t. People talk about culture shock and in particular how Japan ‘just does things differently’ (often with an almost-patronising ‘isn’t this … Continue reading
Posted in Personal commentary
Tagged bells, Buddhist monks, Buddhist temples, Cambridge, Casillero del Diablo, Christmas, culture shock, England, etiquette, food, friendliness, Goto family, islands, James Miles, Japan, KFC, kindergarten, language teaching, New Year, population densities, Shōgatsu, Snickers, Toyohashi, traffic lights
4 Comments
Sensei Pulvers’ miraculous year
A friend of Jim’s in Japan brought Roger Pulvers and me together three years ago. The friend referred to Pulvers in the most natural way as ‘Sensei Pulvers’. And this is totally appropriate. Anyone whose children have attended karate classes … Continue reading
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Tagged annus mirabilis, entanglement, EPR Effect, fly swats, George Calderon, haiku, If There Were No Japan, Japan, Japanese poetry, John Polkinghorne, Masaoka Shiki, Miyazawa Kenji, My Japan: A Cultural Memoir, Night on the Milky Way Train, Poems 2020, poetry in translation, Polish poetry, polymaths, quantum physics, Roger Pulvers, Russian poetry, sensei, Sergei Esenin, snails, The Dream of Lafcadio Hearn, The Unmaking of an American, Wholly Esenin
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‘These magnificent metal beasts’
Sam2 gave me this book last Christmas and it’s been a source of endless delight ever since. At 8.5 x 12.0 inches and beautifully produced, it may seem like a coffee table book, but it is much more. I have … Continue reading
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Tagged aesthetics, balance, cigarettes, cold drinks, comments, design, hot drinks, Japan, Japanese art, Japanese poetry, Japanese technology, machines, photographs, Sam2, semiotics, souvenirs, T-shirts, Tim Easley, Tokyo, vending machines
3 Comments
Very Old Cambridge Tales: 1
A LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF GRANTA POEM: Horror O The Studio, Fowlmere. 4.11.67 … Continue reading →