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Tag Archives: letters

Small-town radio

The second (Stanley) instalment of my exchange of Falklands War/1982 letters with Dominic Hilton in Argentina. — For The Critic

No April fools

The opening salvo in a projected 10-week exchange of letters on/around the Falklands War, with Dominic Hilton in the Argentina capital. — For The Critic

In-line, online, and where to draw the line?

Notes on Colombo’s books and bookmen in the time of Covid-19. — For The Critic

May Day, May Day…

A lockdown letter from Colombo. — For The Critic

NEWS AT A GLANCE

. The diamond, in sufficient heat, will burn like a piece of charcoal. — The Nelson Evening Mail, Saturday, November 17 1906 . Podcasts will soon be like porn. The first three volumes of TS Eliot’s letters have been remaindered. Confidence travels. The door is a jar. Roken is dodelijk. Humans’ rubbish is the filthiest stuff […]

Extracts from the letters of Gerald Spence Smyth, Capt., 1st South African Irish Regt., Abyssinian campaign, 1941

6.2.41 I am given to understand that this is the 6th day of Feb. but for the life of me I don’t know what day of the week it is. Anyhow it doesn’t make any difference here. Excuse the dirt. A.A.¹ has just spilt some tea on my pad. The journey from the forest² to these […]

Portrait of a ‘lady’ – Constance Markievicz, by Sarah Purser

Tonight, the Irish journalist Mary Kenny has a play on at the Irish Cultural Centre. Entitled Dearest Old Darling, it’s based on letters sent between the Dublin feminist, socialist, communist, Sinn Fein MP (elect, but never sitting) Constance Markievicz – née Gore-Booth – and her sister Eva. My great-great-great-aunt, Sarah Purser, portraitist, landscape artist, and […]

Two birds, one stone

Dear Amorist, I recently made a joke about my pregnant wife – and found myself receiving several pointers. ‘Have lots of sex before the baby’s born,’ said one. ‘Watch loads of movies,’ said another. Couldn’t we just watch porn, and kill two birds with one stone? Yours, &c. ASH Smyth, by email

Luck of the Irish – two letters

I NAT. TEL. JESMOND 343. Imperial Hotel, Jesmond Road, Newcastle on Tyne 15th Dec 1907 . My dear Victor, …………………..It is my good fortune once more to ask you for your congratulations! This time it is on a very fine appointment as Navigating Officer of H.M.S. “Lord Nelson”, a battleship almost completed, and which is […]

St Paul’s (Knightsbridge) and the Great War

A blog piece for Culture House on the Royal Naval mobilisation of the Rev Wilfrid Hannay Gibbins, and the parish mags of a church in West London over the course of the First World War. — For The Spectator