Professor Emerita, University of Reading; Director: https://xitter.cf/t.co/vw0kVSQMPT; Shakespeare, drama, manuscripts expert.🇺🇸 Rep: @doujohyou @pew_literary

London, England
Joined May 2010
A young 18th-century student practiced penmanship by copying out names in an indenture (now @UkNatArchives) on the verso. The student eventually wrote, “Blockhead” a few times and finally wrote, “I am a Blockhead” in a neat, calligraphic hand!
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This copy of Magna Carta in the Abbey's Library collection was made in 1300 and is one of just six known to have survived from this date. The charter was sealed by King John in 1215 and established the universal right to justice and a fair trial. #ManuscriptMonday
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Poet Geoffrey Chaucer died #onthisday in 1400. For almost 80 years, Chaucer, 'the father of English poetry', was commemorated with a stained-glass window in the Abbey. It illustrated scenes from The Canterbury Tales and was installed in 1868 above his tomb in Poets’ Corner. The window was destroyed during the Blitz, and no fragments of the original glass survived. The Abbey’s collection does though hold a cartoon of one of the panels which gives a sense of how the window, designed by JG Waller, would have appeared: a procession of elegantly drawn scenes from the Tales, the medieval characters depicted with the detail and idealism characteristic of the Pre-Raphaelite Movement. Chaucer lived beside the Abbey for the final year of his life and was the first notable writer to be buried in what would come to be known as Poets’ Corner. The window was, for some decades, a further testament to his stature in the history of literature. Even though the window is no more, the undimmed popularity of his work speaks to the enduring attraction of pilgrimage.
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Happy St Crispin’s Day. “This day is called the feast of Crispian: He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named, And rouse him at the name of Crispian.” (#Shakespeare, Henry V)
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Today in 1415, an English army led by Henry V defeats a much larger French force near Calais at Azincourt (or Agincourt). A play by Shakespeare will later immortalize the battle: "Gentlemen in England shall think themselves accursed they were not here."
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An oldie but a goodie. In 1968 a bunch of entitled hippy bastards sent a letter detailing their specious demands to the Warden and Fellows of Wadham College, Oxford. This was their letter of reply, which speaks to how far the academy has since fallen.
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Lorna Sharkey, contemporary artist, known for her hand painted stained glass artworks #Womensart
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Brittany, France early 20thc, women making 'picot bigouden' a form of intricate and complex crochet linking to Irish crochet #WomensArt
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Pooh wandered into the Hundred Acre Wood, and was standing in front of what had once been Owl’s House. It didn’t look like a house now; it looked like a tree which had been blown down; and as soon as a house looks like that, it is time to find another one. ~A.A.Milne #StormBoelo
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'The hour before the heavenly-harness'd team begins his golden progress in the east' - Henry IV, Part I (III, 1) #ShakespeareSunday #Nighttime
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“I want to be able to sleep in an open field, to travel west, to walk freely at night” - US poet Sylvia Plath Sleeping lace figure by Hungarian artist Agnes Herczeg #womensart
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The angel ceiling over the chancel of All Saints North Street, York. The ceiling with its carved angels dates to 1470 and was colourfully repainted in the 1970s
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'Autumn light' by contemporary US painter Erin Hanson #Womensart #October
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Pooh woke up suddenly in the middle of the night and listened. He heard the noise again. “Is that you, Piglet?” he said. But it wasn’t. “Come in, Christopher Robin,” he said. But the noise went on. “Worraworraworraworraworra,” said Whatever-it-was. ~A.A.Milne #clocksbacktonight
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Raminou, c.1920 by Suzanne Valadon #womensart
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#OTD in 1537, Jane Seymour died at Hampton Court Palace. Assistant Curator Minette Butler shows us the Silverstick Staircase, which leads up to the old Tudor Queen's apartments where Jane gave birth to Edward VI only 12 days earlier. It is said that this staircase is haunted.
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Staff repositioning the Stones at #Stonehenge today ready for the the end of British Summer Time on Sunday ⏰⬅️ #BST #clocksgoback #thattimeofyear 😀 Lighter mornings, darker evenings and a WHOLE extra hour in bed! 🙏
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CAT ADVISORY: Storm Austen has brought strong winds and rain to Wales and the South of England. Cats are advised to find the cosiest spot in the house and stay there. Humans are advised to bring them snacks.
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St. John writing his gospel, assisted by an eagle holding an ink-well and pen-case in its beak, in exile on the Greek island of Patmos (f. 15) Ms. 15079 @kbrbe, Book of Hours, Latin and French, Paris, c. 1475, from the collection of Charles Van Hulthem uurl.kbr.be/2406338
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