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Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.

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943

© alijava, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

The Six Labours of Theseus as told by E. M. Berens

Young Theseus sets out for Athens on foot to claim his kingdom, but the road is infested with giants, bandits and a savage sow.

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944

Imperial War Museums Collection, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

Equally Free by Sir Joshua Fitch

Sir Joshua Fitch urges Victorian society to let women make their own career choices – whatever they may be.

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945

© Humphrey Bolton, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.

Could Do Better by Sir Joshua Fitch

The Report of the Newcastle Commission confirmed that there were no Dotheboys Halls among Yorkshire’s private schools.

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946

© David wright, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.

Brimstone and Treacle by Charles Dickens

Mrs Squeers has lost the school spoon, and is uncomfortably frank about its importance.

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947

By James Gillray (1756-1815), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Fact-Lovers by Ralph Waldo Emerson

American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson saw the demand for hard evidence as a peculiarly English trait.

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948

© Stephen Richards, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.

Dead Man Walking by John Buchan

Richard Hannay was finding life in London a little slow until a self-confessed dead man walked into his rooms.

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© Nicholas Armitage / Clay Lane, 2025

May 20 NS

May 7 OS

The Bishop and the Chatterbox : One week into a Lenten retreat with the Bishop of Hexham, a boy’s miserable life is turned right around.
The Battle of Nechtansmere : King Ecgfrith of Northumbria dismissed repeated warnings about his imperial ambitions.
Thick and Thin : Express each of these ideas as a single word.
Break : Explain what each of these common expressions means, and give examples.
Blind Guide : William Wirt recalls an overpowering sermon from a blind man in a little wooden chapel.
It’s All in the Delivery : Aeschines paid tribute to the oratory of his greatest rival — whether he meant to or not.
The Road to Ruin : George Berkeley warned that industry, not financial speculation, was the guarantee of a nation’s wealth.
Signs of Command : Suggest publicly-displayed commands, and say how many of them are sentences.
My Native Notes : Scotsman James Boswell always spoke good English when in England, but he was careful to leave a little Scots in.
Hidden Message : Reveal the hidden message in a letter, and write a coded letter of your own.
The Great and the Good : Daniel Defoe wondered whether goodness was not preferable to greatness.
Statements, Questions and Commands : Choose a word from our list, and then use it in any one of the three basic types of sentence — if possible.
Sentegrams : These sentences, taken from English literature, have been jumbled up like an anagram; see if you can piece them back together.
Good Sense : Rewrite these sentences so that the word ‘unless’ is not used.
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