Anyone who has suffered writer’s block might take consolation from the life of John Ferrar Holms. Jonathan Law introduces perhaps the least productive ‘writer’ in the English language… A while ago on The Dabbler , Mark Pack wrote feelingly about the miseries of writers’ block – of self-doubt, procrastination, and hours spent … Read More…

From Wordsworth to Auden, a surprising number of famous poems have been blighted – or sometimes, improved – by printing errors, as Jonathan Law reveals… In a post a while back Frank Key gave us his startling revisionist take on a well-known poem by Sylvia Plath: In her mad poem ‘Daddy’, Sylvia Plath makes … Read More…

In the final part of our serialisation of The Whartons of Winchendon… Jonathan Law revisits Winchendon – a place both ‘perfectly mysterious and rather dull’ and considers the historical legacy of the remarkable Wharton family… I’m climbing the ridge road to Winchendon for the first time in months, the first since … Read More…

In the penultimate part of our serialisation of The Whartons of Winchendon, Jonathan Law addresses the question: ‘Just how mad was Goodwin Wharton?’ … Although the Glorious Revolution made the Wharton family one of the great powers in the land, the new regime was at first slow to recognize the merits of Goodwin – … Read More…

Continuing our 10-part weekly serialisation of Jonathan Law’s The Whartons of Winchendon… As we saw last week, Goodwin Wharton was able to communicate with the fairies. But that was merely a warm-up, as before long he was receiving messages direct from God, with bizarre consequences… It was in the October of 1684 … Read More…

If you thought The Hellfire Duke was something else, wait until you meet his uncle Goodwin – as we continue our weekly serialisation of Jonathan Law’s The Whartons of Winchendon… Rismin! Accoron! Osmindor! Rumbonium! High summer in deepest Bucks – and something very strange is stirring in the woods. The woman stalks slowly … Read More…

Continuing our weekly serialisation of Jonathan Law’s The Whartons of Winchendon, we meet Philip Wharton, son of Thomas. His pious grandfather had been known as ‘The Good Lord’, but Philip, founder of ‘the Hellfire Club’ (devoted to drinking, lewdness, and puerile acts of blasphemy), was a somewhat different character… May it please … Read More…

Continuing our weekly serialisation of Jonathan Law’s The Whartons of Winchendon, the story of Thomas Wharton takes a turn for the darker and stranger… Although Tom Wharton spent his last years in the incongruous role of a much honoured elder statesman, he would be outlived by one last, semi-mysterious scandal – a … Read More…

Continuing our weekly serialisation of Jonathan Law’s The Whartons of Winchendon (published for Kindle by Dabbler Editions and available to buy from Amazon now), we learn more about Thomas Wharton: powerful political fixer, habitual liar, saviour of the nation and pox-ridden traitor… And so, rather implausibly, in the last weeks of 1688, Tom Wharton … Read More…

The Whartons of Winchendon is a new serialisation of Jonathan Law’s latest book, which is published for Kindle by Dabbler Editions and available to buy from Amazon now. In this third episode we meet Philip’s son Tom Wharton, who rose to political power but also became embroiled in religious and domestic scandal. Did … Read More…