The Book Trunk

This site is dedicated to my grandmother, who ran away from her Norwegian home in 1915 and arrived in England with nothing but a trunk full of books

Ducks on the Ice

Well, here we are, talking about the weather again! It’s only a few weeks since normal life was halted by floods. Now everything is disrupted by snow, which may be no great shakes to those of you living in colder climes, but is the main talking point here in the UK, where we never seem…

chrisharding53

January 19, 2013

ducks, frost, frozen, http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, ice, Snow, weather
Walking Boots and Pink Laces

I have walking boots! Proper walking boots! With pink laces! The Man of the House is very dismissive about those laces – I think he feels pink is far too frivolous for sensible footwear for a woman who wants to be taken seriously. But I don’t care. They are so beautiful and so comfortable that…

chrisharding53

January 12, 2013

http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, pedometer, Saturday Snapshot. keeping fit, walking boots
Grimm Thoughts on Fairy Tales

Further to my mention of fairy stories in yesterday’s post, did anyone else out there listen to Grimm Tales on Radio 4? Writer and mythologist Marina Warner, whose work I always admire, marked the bicentenary of the first publication of Grimm’s Fairy Tales with an exploration of the stories – their origins, how they were…

chrisharding53

January 9, 2013

BBC, Fairy Stories, Fairy Tales, Grimm Thoughts, http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, Radio, Radio 4
The Making of a Marchioness

I may have said this before, but I’m a sucker for fairy tales and happy endings, and Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Making of a Marchioness ticks all the right boxes – kind, gentle heroine in straitened circumstances marries her prince (or, in this case, a marquis), and survives danger (in his absence) to live happily…

chrisharding53

January 7, 2013

Frances Hodgson Burnett, http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, meloadrama
Mud, Moss and Martyrs

Happy New Year to you all! Earlier this week, on January 2, it was the Feast Day of The Thousand Holy Martyrs of Lichfield, who may – or may not – have been slain for their faith. St Amphibaus (whose existence is equally questionable) and his 999 followers were slaughtered (allegedly) on the orders of…

chrisharding53

January 5, 2013

Christian Martyrs, http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, Lichfield, nature reserve, Saturday Snapshot, walkway

Ducks on the Ice

Walking Boots and Pink Laces

Grimm Thoughts on Fairy Tales

The Making of a Marchioness

Mud, Moss and Martyrs