Unchecked avarice has always been, and remains, a destructive force.
#Dante #Literature #Greed
"Zum Hassen oder Lieben
Ist alle Welt getrieben,
Es bleibet keine Wahl,
der Teufel ist neutral."
"To hate or to love
All the world is driven,
There is no choice,
the devil is neutral."
~Clemens Brentano (9 September 1778 – 28 July 1842)
Introducing Beatrix Potter.
Beatrix Potter remains one of the world's best-selling and best-loved children's authors. She wrote and illustrated 28 books, including her 23 Tales which have sold more than 250 million copies worldwide. In her later years, she became a farmer and sheep breeder and helped protect thousands of acres of land in the Lake District.
https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/introducing-beatrix-potter
Beatrix Potter (28 July 1866 – 22 December 1943)
English-born Australian novelist, journalist, and poet Marcus Clarke died #OTD in 1881.
He is best known for his 1874 novel For the Term of His Natural Life, about the convict system in Australia, and widely regarded as a classic of Australian literature. The novel is based on historical facts and it was originally serialized in the Australian Journal before being published as a book.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Clarke
Books by Marcus Clarke at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/1193
In August 1922.
T. E. Lawrence is recruited into the British Royal Air Force as Ordinary Aircraftman 352087 John Hume Ross by Flying Officer W. E. Johns in London. Lawrence later writes The Mint about his experiences.
The book is notable, despite flaws noted by critics, for its sharp observation, for the insight it gives into Lawrence himself, and for the censorship issues around its publication. It was published posthumously in 1955.
In August 1869.
Ambrose Bierce, writing a satirical column for the San Francisco News Letter, begins to produce the cynical definitions which will eventually become The Devil's Dictionary.
Bierce's witty definitions were imitated & plagiarized for years before he gathered them into books, first as The Cynic's Word Book in 1906 & then in a more complete version as The Devil's Dictionary in 1911.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Devil%27s_Dictionary
The Devil's Dictionary at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/972
"Aristocracy has three successive ages, — the age of superiorities, the age of privileges, and the age of vanities; having passed out of the first, it degenerates in the second, and dies away in the third."
Book I, Ch. 1 : The Vallé-aux-loups
In August 1830.
François-René de Chateaubriand sacrifices his political career by refusing to swear an oath of allegiance to Louis-Philippe, and retires to write his memoirs.
Books by Chateaubriand at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/7255
"Heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke sobbing for joy."
Wuthering Heights (ed. 1858)
~Emily Brontë (30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848)
Books by Emily Brontë at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/405
Well how do you do, Private William McBride?
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside?
And I’ll rest for a while in the warm summer sun,
I’ve been walking all day long, and I’m nearly done…
—Eric Bogle, “No Man’s Land”
A Fierce Devotion to the “Empress of Hell”
Medieval dramatizations of the confrontation between the Virgin Mary and King Herod offered a symbolic resistance to tyranny.
By: H.M.A. Leow
https://daily.jstor.org/a-fierce-devotion-to-the-empress-of-hell/
Theater history at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/subjects/search/?query=theater+history
When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale battalions go,
Say not soft things as other men have said,
That you’ll remember. For you need not so…
—Charles Hamilton Sorley (1895–1915)
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47427/when-you-see-millions-of-the-mouthless-dead
#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #warpoetry #WW1
Past life, past tears, far past the grave,
The tryst is set for me,
Since, for our all, your all you gave
On the slopes of Picardy…
—Violet Jacob, “To A.H.J.”
Violet Jacob’s only son, Harry, was killed at the Battle of the Somme on 16 July 1916, aged 20
https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/casualty-details/502598/arthur-henry-augustus-jacob/
#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #warpoetry #WW1
"It Shouldn't Be Printed At All. It Should Be Burnt" — 23 Books Writers Regret Writing
The author of 'Little Women' wrote in her journal that she "never liked girls or knew many."
by Amy Glover via @buzzfeed
https://www.buzzfeed.com/aglover/books-writers-regret-writing
Chan fhaca mi Lannes aig Ratasbon
no MacGillFhinnein aig Allt Èire
no Gill-Ìosa aig Cùil Lodair,
ach chunnaic mi Sasannach san Èipheit.
(I did not see Lannes at Ratisbon
nor MacLennan at Auldearn
nor Gillies MacBain at Culloden,
but I saw an Englishman in Egypt.)
—Somhairle MacGill-Eain (Sorley MacLean), “Curaidhean” (“Heroes”)
Sorley MacLean was severely wounded at El Alamein, 1942
#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature #Gaelic #Gaidhlig #poem #poetry #warpoetry #WW2
Call for Papers
Regional Perspectives, Planetary Reach: Themes, Genres, Forms of Narration in Contemporary Irish & Scottish Fiction
28–29 May 2026, Università di Naploli L’Orientale, Italy
The European Anglophone literary scene has seen a growing prominence of Scottish & Irish fiction. This conference will look at the latest trends in fiction, poetry, drama, film, TV, digital media, & critical theory
@litstudies
German poet Sibylla Schwarz died #OTD in 1638.
Her verse reflects the difficult times in the middle of the Thirty Years' War, of which she saw neither the beginning nor the end. Her verse was published posthumously in 1650 by her teacher Samuel Gerlach under the title Deutsche Poëtische Gedichte in two parts containing over 100 poems. She was famous as the "Pomeranian Sappho", but her work fell into oblivion in the 18th century.
He lacks the ordnance of words.
A self-portrait shows
stitches where his mouth should be;
eyes like empty casings.
He left a part of himself in the desert,
this ultra-Marine…
—Sandra Ireland, “Ultramarine”
published in New Writing Scotland 36 (2018)
#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #trauma
"I am no bird, and no net ensnares me,..."
Between 7-24 August 1847.
Charlotte Brontë completes Jane Eyre at Haworth and sends the manuscript to her publisher, who has rejected The Professor.
It was published under her pen name "Currer Bell" on 19 October 1847 by Smith, Elder & Co. of London. The first American edition was published the following year by Harper & Brothers of New York.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Eyre
Jane Eyre at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/1260
Ravens are kekklin’ prophecies o’ woe,
Pyots in black an’ white spiel superstitions,
The rooks mak’ bedlam i’ the elms below,
An’ saft-winged hoolets plan their midnicht missions…
—Helen Cruickshank, “Corstorphine Woods”
pulished in A KIST O SKINKLAN THINGS (ASL, 2017)
https://asls.org.uk/publications/books/volumes/a-kist-o-skinlan-things/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Scots #Scotslanguage #naturewriting
Did Odysseus Really Travel All Around the Mediterranean?
"The traditional view of the Odyssey is that Odysseus traveled all over the Mediterranean. Is that really what Homer described?"
https://www.thecollector.com/odysseus-travels-mediterranean/
The Odyssey at PG:
British writer George Griffith was born #OTD in 1857.
He was active mainly in the science fiction genre—or as it was known at the time, scientific romance—in particular writing many future-war stories and playing a significant role in shaping that emerging subgenre. He was a contemporary of H.G. Wells and Jules Verne, and his works contributed to the development of the science fiction genre.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Griffith
Books by George Griffith at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/8557
Ethnomusicologist, photographer, folklorist, & scholar Margaret Fay Shaw (1903–2004) was born #OTD, 9 Nov. She gave up a privileged upbringing & classical music training in 1920s New York to help build the first proper archive of traditional Hebridean song & folklore
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rmks
#Scottish #literature #music #song #folklore #Hebrides #Gaelic #Gaidhlig #ethnology #photography
British writer and soldier Sapper died #OTD in 1937.
"Sapper" was the pen name of Herman Cyril McNeile, known primarily for his popular series of adventure novels featuring the character Bulldog Drummond. He began his writing career by contributing stories to magazines and newspapers while still in the army. After the war, he adopted the pseudonym "Sapper," derived from his service in the Royal Engineers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._C._McNeile
H.C. McNeile at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/26827
#OTD in 1857
Performances of Wilkie Collins' drama The Frozen Deep at the Free Trade Hall for the benefit of the widow of writer Douglas W. Jerrold, during which Charles Dickens, becomes infatuated with the professional actress Ellen Ternan.
Dickens's hand was so prominent—beside acting in the play for several performances, he added a preface, altered lines, & attended to most of the props and sets.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Frozen_Deep
The Frozen Deep at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1625
#OTD in 1939.
The Wizard of Oz premieres at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles, California.
It stars Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley, Billie Burke and Margaret Hamilton. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, while others made uncredited contributions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wizard_of_Oz
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55