The Dabbler is proud to present The Whartons of Winchendon, a major new serialisation of Jonathan Law's latest book, which is published for Kindle by Dabbler Editions and available to buy from Amazon now. By turns hilarious and tragic, it tells the tale of the rise and fall of one of the ... Read More...
England
This coming Monday is Michaelmas, so you've still got time to get yourself a goose. Just make sure you don't pick any blackberries afterwards. Professor Nick Groom explains.... September 29 is Michaelmas: the Feast of Michael and All Angels. It was also one of the four quarter days of the English business ... Read More...
Forget Glastonbury and the Notting Hill carnival - the Bartholomew Fairs of old would have dwarfed them, and far outdone them for debauched behaviour too. For his August post, Prof Nick Groom looks at England's history of late summer fairs... The end of harvest in England was usually celebrated in the ... Read More...
Today is St Swithin's Day, and if it's raining you can expect another forty days' worth of it. But why? As ever, Prof Nick Groom is our guide to English legends, lore and seasons... In the Roman calendar, this month was named Julius to honour Julius Caesar. In English this was ... Read More...
On a stage at the Festival of Nature – one of Bristol’s many, many spurious summer festivals – a man and a woman wearing flat caps with fox ears were performing a song about a rabbit going hop, hop, hop. My girls were hopping away on the Floating Harbour’s cobbled ground. ... Read More...
Today is midsummer, and Professor Nick Groom turns his attention to the woods. Trees are a special part of our national identity, and they need us as much as we need them... Woods occupy a special place in the imaginative topography of England. The greenwood is the haunt and habitat of ... Read More...
To the Watershed cinema and ‘digital creativity centre’, to hear Jonathan Meades talk about his new book. The event was part of the Bristol Festival of Ideas, and my escort was the combative Islington-based journalist Pippa Tregaskis, who two years ago interviewed Meades for The Dabbler ahead of his bewildering BBC ... Read More...
Next time you complain about your GP, spare a thought for the Victorians... From The Reverend Prince And His Abode Of Love by Charles Mander (1976): As a doctor his bedside manner was startling. He seemed more intent on reducing his patients to gibbering mental wrecks over the state of their souls ... Read More...
Visiting Stonehenge this half-term? Here's Alexandra Harris' post on its influence on British culture, from Turner to Hepworth... Stonehenge is a good example of how a particular landmark in the English countryside could inspire different kinds of appreciation. Its image was particularly potent because it signified strength and endurance while at ... Read More...
From speaking in tongues to cheese rolling in Gloucester, this month Professor Nick Groom looks at the origins, customs and meaning of Whitsun... Whit Sunday is the seventh Sunday after Easter, also known as ‘Pentecost’ (from the Greek for fiftieth, counting inclusively). It is therefore part of the cat’s cradle of Eastertide dates ... Read More...