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Cold Comfort Farm
''Cold Comfort Farm'' is a comic novel by English author Stella Gibbons, published in 1932. It parodies the romanticised, sometimes doom-laden accounts of rural life popular at the time, by writers such as Mary Webb. Plot summary Following the death of her parents, the book's heroine, Flora Poste, finds she is possessed "of every art and grace save that of earning her own living". She decides to take advantage of the fact that "no limits are set, either by society or one's own conscience, to the amount one may impose on one's relatives", and settles on visiting her distant relatives at the isolated Cold Comfort Farm in the fictional village of Howling in Sussex. The inhabitants of the farm – Aunt Ada Doom, the Starkadders, and their extended family and workers – feel obliged to take her in to atone for an unspecified wrong once done to her father. As is typical in a certain genre of romantic 19th-century and early 20th-century literature, each of the farm's inhabitants ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stella Gibbons
Stella Dorothea Gibbons (5 January 1902 – 19 December 1989) was an English writer, journalist, and poet. She established her reputation with her first novel, ''Cold Comfort Farm'' (1932) which has been reprinted many times. Although she was active as a writer for half a century, none of her later 22 novels or other literary works—which included a sequel to ''Cold Comfort Farm''—achieved the same critical or popular success. Much of her work was long out of print before a modest revival in the 21st century. The daughter of a London medical doctor, Gibbons had a turbulent and often unhappy childhood. After an indifferent school career she trained as a journalist, and worked as a reporter and features writer, mainly for the ''Evening Standard'' and '' The Lady''. Her first book, published in 1930, was a collection of poems which was well received, and through her life she considered herself primarily a poet rather than a novelist. After ''Cold Comfort Farm'', a satir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elizabeth Janeway
Elizabeth Janeway (née Hall) (October 7, 1913 – January 15, 2005) was an American author and critic. Biography Born Elizabeth Ames Hall in Brooklyn, New York, her naval architect father and homemaker mother fell on hard times during the Depression, leading her to end her Swarthmore College education and help support the family by creating bargain-basement sale slogans (she graduated from Barnard College just a few years later, in 1935). Intent on becoming an author, Janeway took the same creative writing class again and again to help hone her craft. While working on her first novel, ''The Walsh Girls'', she met and married Eliot Janeway, a much-quoted economist, who was to enjoy some influence with Presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson (he was known as "Calamity Janeway" for his pessimistic economic forecasts). Elizabeth described Eliot as "the most intelligent man I had ever met." The Janeways mingled with United States Supreme Court justices and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brian Blessed
Brian Blessed (; born 9 October 1936) is an English actor, presenter, writer and mountaineer. Blessed is known for portraying PC "Fancy" Smith in ''Z-Cars'', Augustus in the 1976 BBC television production of ''I, Claudius'', King Richard IV in the first series of ''Blackadder'', Prince Vultan in ''Flash Gordon'', Bustopher Jones and Old Deuteronomy in the 1981 original London production of '' Cats'' at the New London Theatre, Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter in ''Henry V'', Boss Nass in '' Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace'' and the voice of Clayton in Disney's ''Tarzan''. In 2016, Blessed was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to the arts and charity. Early life Blessed was born on 9 October 1936 at Montagu Hospital in Mexborough, Yorkshire, the son of William Blessed, a socialist coal miner at Hickleton Main Colliery (and himself the son of a coal miner) and cricketer for the Yorkshire second team, and Hilda (née Wall). Bless ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rosalie Crutchley
Rosalie Sylvia Crutchley (4 January 1920 – 28 July 1997) was a British actress. Trained at the Royal Academy of Music, Crutchley was perhaps best known for her television performances, but had a long and successful career in theatre and films, making her stage debut as early as 1932, and her screen debut in 1947. She had dark piercing eyes and often played foreign or rather sinister characters. She also played many classical roles, including Juliet in Shakespeare's ''Romeo and Juliet'', Hermione in ''The Winter's Tale'', and Goneril in ''King Lear''. Crutchley died at The Harley Street Hospital in London in 1997. Career Her screen debut was as a violinist who is murdered in '' Take My Life'' (1947). She played Madame Defarge twice in adaptations of ''A Tale of Two Cities'', in both the 1958 film, and in the 1965 television serialisation of the same story. She played Catherine Parr in the 1970 TV series, '' The Six Wives of Henry VIII'', and played the same character in it ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sarah Badel
Sarah M. Badel (born 30 March 1943) is a retired British stage and film actress. She is the daughter of actors Alan Badel and Yvonne Owen. Life and career Badel was born in London to actor, Alan Badel and actress, Yvonne Owen. She was educated in Poles Convent, Hertfordshire and trained for the stage at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art; she is now an Associate Member. Sarah Badel made her acting debut in January 1963 in the Bristol Old Vic company's production of ''Hamlet'', which was then touring India. Her first appearance in London theatre came in October 1964 in the part of Bella Hedley in ''Robert and Elizabeth'' at the Lyric Theatre. Badel made her Broadway theatre debut the following October playing Helen in '' The Right Honourable Gentleman'' at the Billy Rose Theatre. In 1966, she performed at the Chichester Festival Theatre in such roles as Miss Fanny in ''The Clandestine Marriage'' and Anya in ''The Cherry Orchard''. She returned to the Chichester Festival in 196 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fay Compton
Virginia Lilian Emmeline Compton-Mackenzie, (; 18 September 1894 – 12 December 1978), known professionally as Fay Compton, was an English actress. She appeared in several films, and made many broadcasts, but was best known for her stage performances. She was known for her versatility, and appeared in Shakespeare, drawing room comedy, pantomime, modern drama, and classics such as Ibsen and Chekhov. In addition to performing in Britain, Compton appeared several times in the US, and toured Australia and New Zealand in a variety of stage plays. Life and career Early years Compton was born in Fulham, London, the sixth and youngest child and fourth daughter of Edward Compton (1854–1918), actor and manager (whose real surname was Mackenzie), and his wife, the actress Virginia Frances Bateman (1853–1940) daughter of the actor Hezekiah Linthicum Bateman, of Baltimore, US. One of her brothers became well known as the author Compton Mackenzie. Trewin, J. C.br>"Compton, Fay (real ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alastair Sim
Alastair George Bell Sim, CBE (9 October 1900 – 19 August 1976) was a Scottish character actor who began his theatrical career at the age of thirty and quickly became established as a popular West End performer, remaining so until his death in 1976. Starting in 1935, he also appeared in more than fifty British films, including an iconic adaptation of Charles Dickens’ novella '' A Christmas Carol'', released in 1951 as ''Scrooge'' in Great Britain and as ''A Christmas Carol'' in the United States. Though an accomplished dramatic actor, he is often remembered for his comically sinister performances. After a series of false starts, including a spell as a jobbing labourer and another as a clerk in a local government office, Sim's love of and talent for poetry reading won him several prizes and led to his appointment as a lecturer in elocution at the University of Edinburgh in 1925. He also ran his own private elocution and drama school, from which, with the help of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Science Fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel universes, extraterrestrial life, sentient artificial intelligence, cybernetics, certain forms of immortality (like mind uploading), and the singularity. Science fiction predicted several existing inventions, such as the atomic bomb, robots, and borazon, whose names entirely match their fictional predecessors. In addition, science fiction might serve as an outlet to facilitate future scientific and technological innovations. Science fiction can trace its roots to ancient mythology. It is also related to fantasy, horror, and superhero fiction and contains many subgenres. Its exact definition has long been disputed among authors, critics, scholars, and readers. Science fiction, in literature, film, television, and other media, has beco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lambeth
Lambeth () is a district in South London, England, in the London Borough of Lambeth, historically in the County of Surrey. It is situated south of Charing Cross. The population of the London Borough of Lambeth was 303,086 in 2011. The area experienced some slight growth in the medieval period as part of the manor of Lambeth Palace. By the Victorian era the area had seen significant development as London expanded, with dense industrial, commercial and residential buildings located adjacent to one another. The changes brought by World War II altered much of the fabric of Lambeth. Subsequent development in the late 20th and early 21st centuries has seen an increase in the number of high-rise buildings. The area is home to the International Maritime Organization. Lambeth is home to one of the largest Lusophone, Portuguese-speaking communities in the UK, and is the second most commonly spoken language in Lambeth after English language, English. History Medieval The origins of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mayfair
Mayfair is an affluent area in the West End of London towards the eastern edge of Hyde Park, in the City of Westminster, between Oxford Street, Regent Street, Piccadilly and Park Lane. It is one of the most expensive districts in the world. The area was originally part of the manor of Eia and remained largely rural until the early 18th century. It became well known for the annual "May Fair" that took place from 1686 to 1764 in what is now Shepherd Market. Over the years, the fair grew increasingly downmarket and unpleasant, and it became a public nuisance. The Grosvenor family (who became Dukes of Westminster) acquired the land through marriage and began to develop it under the direction of Thomas Barlow. The work included Hanover Square, Berkeley Square and Grosvenor Square, which were surrounded by high-quality houses, and St George's Hanover Square Church. By the end of the 18th century, most of Mayfair was built on with upper-class housing; unlike some nearby areas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trap (carriage)
A trap, pony trap (sometimes pony and trap) or horse trap is a light, often sporty, two-wheeled or sometimes four-wheeled horse- or pony-drawn carriage, usually accommodating two to four persons in various seating arrangements, such as face-to-face or back-to-back. "Pony and trap" is also used as Cockney rhyming slang for "crap" meaning nonsense or rubbish, or defecation Defecation (or defaecation) follows digestion, and is a necessary process by which organisms eliminate a solid, semisolid, or liquid waste material known as feces from the digestive tract via the anus. The act has a variety of names ranging f .... References External links * Carriages {{Horse-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Branwell Brontë
Patrick Branwell Brontë (, commonly ; 26 June 1817 – 24 September 1848) was an English painter and writer. He was the only son of the Brontë family, and brother of the writers Charlotte, Emily, and Anne. Brontë was rigorously tutored at home by his father, and earned praise for his poetry and translations from the classics. However, he drifted between jobs, supporting himself by portrait-painting, and gave way to drug and alcohol addiction, apparently worsened by a failed relationship with a married woman. Brontë died at the age of 31, insisting on standing in his final moments. Youth Branwell Brontë was the fourth of six children and the only son of Patrick Brontë (1777–1861) and his wife, Maria Branwell Brontë (1783–1821). He was born in Thornton, near Bradford, West Riding of Yorkshire, and moved with his family to Haworth when his father was appointed to the perpetual curacy in 1821. While four of his five sisters were sent to Cowan Bridge boarding school, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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