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Monday
Introduction — Ben Jonson’s collection of short poems Underwoods was published in 1640, soon after he died. He tells us that it takes its title from a habit of classical poets, who liked to call their miscellanies ‘Woods’. If Jonson’s earlier poems were his woods, he said, then these little additions were shrubs on the woodland floor. The following lines are a reflection on the value of a life.
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15
Monday
Julius Benedict (1804-1885), Piano Concerto in E-Flat Major,
Op. 89: II. Andante. Played by Howard Shelley, with the
Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.
Sir Julius Benedict (1804-1885) was a Germen-born conductor and composer who studied with Hummel and Weber, and was acquainted with Beethoven. In 1825, he took a conductor’s post in Naples. In 1834 he moved to Paris, and the following year settled in London, where he became a conductor in theatres and concert halls, a prolific composer, and a tireless promoter of provincial musical festivals and popular concerts. He was knighted in 1871. The recording below is of the Andante from his Piano Concerto in E flat, of 1867.
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Monday
Introduction — In 1814, former US President Thomas Jefferson (who had served from 1801 to 1809) wrote a letter to Walter Jones (1776-1861), a lawyer whom Jefferson had appointed US attorney for the District of Columbia in 1802. In his letter, Jefferson reminisced about George Washington, supreme commander of the American revolutionary army and first President of the USA.
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17
Monday
Amen to That
by John Bright
Introduction — On January 13th, 1878, John Bright MP assured his constituents in Birmingham that reports of an imminent Russian invasion of Europe were utter delusion. Some in the Commons said that sending troops to aid Turkey in the Russo-Turkish War (now a year old) was in the ‘British interest’, but Bright reminded them how the Crimean War in 1853-56 had achieved nothing but a million dead young men.
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18
Sunday
Use the following words in sentences of at least
ten words in length. Make sure you use them as nouns.
IArena. IICost. IIIDecision. IVIntention. VMatter. VIQualm. VIIWalk.
Based on an exercise in Think and Speak (1929) by NL Clay.
19
24 May 2025
Suggest answers to these questions, in passages of at least 20 words.
1 If the earth isn’t flat, why does it look flat?
2 How can I tell whether a word is being used as a noun?
3 Why is it that the thing we are searching for is always in the last place we look?
Based on an exercise in Think and Speak (1929) by NL Clay, and Better English: Fifth Year (1930) by Harry Jewett Jeschke, Milton C. Potter and Harry O. Gillet.
20
24 May 2025
Deep Harmony
by J. William Jones
Introduction — J. William Jones was a Baptist minister and former chaplain to the Confederate Army in the US Civil War. While in Chattanooga, Tennessee, attending the Southern Baptist Convention held there on 8th-14th May, 1896, Jones was asked to give a speech at a state school, during a ceremony honouring the Union flag. These were his closing remarks, as given in Confederate Veteran magazine that August.
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21
23 May 2025
Describe half an hour in one of the following:
IA vet’s waiting room. IIA broken-down lift. IIIA bus.
What pictures come into your mind? Try to describe them.
From an exercise in Exercises 12-13 (1933) by NL Clay.
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23 May 2025
Introduction — Sir Guyon, the Knight of Temperance, has been commissioned to help an old man whose land is troubled by a wicked witch. The journey is fraught with dangers, and Sir Guyon has been cast into an endless swoon by Mammon, the money-god, for refusing to be his slave. As the knight slumbers, Spenser reflects on God’s care for the helpless.
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