The Higher the Hair…
The higher the hair the closer to God or the roof of your carriage- whichever is nearer. A witty one liner from the wonderful Dolly Parton of course (although not the carriage bit- queen of song though she is, Dolly doesn’t have a carriage) an icon and diva for our times- the unapologetic owner of...
Synchronicity
I imagine time like an arch from here and now in 2021 reaching back to Japan in the late eighteenth century. The moon shines down into artist Kitagawa Utamaro’s studio in Edo, modern day Tokyo. It’s late and he is at last satisfied with the final drawing of what will become a tryptic called Women...
Love Potion No 9
“It is a truth universally acknowledged that the single mouse in possession of Darcin must be in want of a mate”. Rather wittily Jane Hurst, an animal behaviourist particularly interested in house mice, borrowed the opening sentence from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice: “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession...
Storm Darcy Hits Bath
It’s February. Storm Darcy has roared in across Europe from the Ukraine, stealing through the gates of Sydney gardens and across the lawns, pressing against the firmly shut doors of the Holburne. Here, in the illustration of “The Three Graces” (1810), we see satirical cartoonist James Gillray has lovingly drawn scantily clad figures of fine...
From Bath with Jane Austen and the Penguin
Come with me and take a few steps into the world of Jane Austen and the Penguin- a slip in time between 2021 and 1801 when the Austen family took up their first Bath residency. Here we are at the front door of 4 Sydney Place, just round the corner from the grandeur of Great...