Chronicles of worldly wonders by Jimmy Maher
Some of Shakespeare s plays were extremely popular during their author s lifetime, only to fall into relative obscurity in the centuries that followed his death. Others were less successful in their first runs, forced to wait centuries in some cases to have their genius fully recognized and their just desserts duly awarded. And a select few [ ]
After the events of 1471, King Edward IV seemed more secure on his throne than any English monarch in several decades. A king in such a position can afford to be munificent. Now that the House of York had won out, Edward strove for reconciliation with even the most fervent partisans of the Lancastrian side. [ ]
King Henry I know not what to say; my title s weak. The years after the Battle of St. Albans were a time of surface calm and secret plotting in and around the English royal court. Queen Margaret, who was proving to be a far stauncher defender of her husband and son than said husband himself, [ ]
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, had been slowly turning from friend to foe of Henry VI ever since Henry allowed Gloucester s wife Eleanor to be arrested and imprisoned for witchcraft and treason. The Treaty of Tours proved to be the last straw. Gloucester complained bitterly about the dishonorable peace Henry had made with France and his [ ]
Although there is much that we don t know about William Shakespeare the man, we can say confidently that he was not an individual who liked to be typecast. Right after completing his Comedy of Errors, a play so thin it threatened to blow away on the merest spring breeze, he embarked upon the theatrical project [ ]
We know more about the life of William Shakespeare than a lot of people think, but less than we would like. There is ample documentation of his commercial career as the most popular London playwright of his era. It comes in the form of notices, commentaries, and of course the plays themselves, about half of [ ]
Dromio S. Master, shall I be porter at the gate? Adriana Ay; and let none enter, lest I break your pate. Beginnings can be funny things. Before the Beatles could commence transforming pop and rock music in earnest, they had to make their first album Please Please Me, a collection of pleasant but largely unremarkable [ ]
A couple of anecdotes to start us off: Twenty years ago, I and the woman who is now my wife were in that early-to-middle, feeling-out phase of courtship, when the talk turns to existential matters of life and death, art and religion. I told Dorte that being the name of the love of my [ ]
Baer, Elizabeth. The Golem Redux: From Prage to Post-Holocaust Fiction. Wayne State University, 2012. Banville, John. Doctor Copernicus. Secker Warburg, 1976. Bell, Jim. The Space Book. Sterling, 2018. The Bible: Authorized King James Version with Apocrypha. Oxford University, 1997. Boorstin, Daniel J. The Discoverers. Vintage, 1983. Brewster, David. The Martyrs of Science, or, The Lives of…
Nicolaus Copernicus, Giordano Bruno, Tycho Brahe, Johannes Kepler, and Galileo Galilei were all to one extent or another hounded and harried during their lives by political and religious conflicts. All faced their deaths under less than ideal conditions, being forced to place their hope and faith in their posterity where their contemporaries had failed them. [ ]