Plenty of Nothing

Magna Carta

The text of Magna Carta was issued on this date in 1215, but Penguin didn't get the paperback rights until 800 years later.

Pale Blue Dot

The new Director of the Goddard Space Flight Center, Makenzie Lystrup, takes the oath of office with her hand on Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot. Source.

Pale Blue Dot in the library of the US Embassy in the Netherlands. Source.

Sour Grapes

William Caxton released his edition of Aesop's Fables on this date in 1484. I was going to buy one, but they wanted $1,500! Ach, it's not such a good translation anyway. Source.

Geneviève de Brabant

In Swann's Way Marcel Proust reminisces about a magic lantern he had in his bedroom as a child in the 1870s, with slides that told the story of Geneviève de Brabant. This set of slides may be the ones he's talking about.

Meisho Zue

Illustrated travel guides called meisho zue were popular in the Tokugawa period. This page shows the Garden of the Hojo at Ryoanji Temple. Source.

Icelandic Sagas in Icelandic

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Joanna Ellen Wood

Wood was born on this date in 1867, in Lesmahagow, Lanarkshire, North Britain. In 1894 she was praised as "one of Canada's three leading novelists". Her books are The untempered wind (1894), Judith Moore; or, Fashioning a Pipe (1898), A daughter of witches... (1900), Farden Ha' (1901), and Where Waters Beckon (1902). Lesmahagow, incidentally, was also the birthplace of Alexander Muir, who wrote "The Maple Leaf Forever." Source.

The Tudors in Popular Culture

1910        "I'm Henery the Eighth, I Am" (song)

1933        The Private Life of Henry VIII (film)

1936        Mary of Scotland (film)

1936        Tudor Rose (film)

1937        Gloriana (film)

1948        Anne of the Thousand Days (play)

1960        A Man For All Seasons (play)

1964        "I'm Henery the Eighth, I Am" (song)

1966        A Man For All Seasons (film)

1969        Anne of the Thousand Days (film)

1970        The Six Wives of Henry VIII (TV series)

1971        Elizabeth R (TV series)

1971        Mary, Queen of Scots (film)

1986        Lady Jane (film)

1998        Elizabeth (film)

2001        The Other Boleyn Girl (novel)

2007-10    The Tudors (TV series)

2007        Elizabeth: The Golden Age (film)

2008        The Other Boleyn Girl (film)

2009        Wolf Hall (novel)

2012        Bring Up the Bodies (novel)

2013-17    Reign (TV series)

2015        Wolf Hall (TV series)

2018        Mary Queen of Scots (film)

2020        The Mirror and the Light (novel)

Col·lecció Bernat Metge

It gets harder to argue that Catalan is not a major European language once you know about this 400-plus volume series of translations of Greek and Roman classics. Catalogue.

Madge Macbeth

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