Clay Lane

The Copy Book

A Library of History and Literature in English

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469

‘I Shall Keep This for Aunt Jane’

James Edward Austen-Leigh tells us what it was that made his aunt, the celebrated novelist Jane Austen, so remarkable.

470

Jibe and Joke

Sir Richard Steele takes up arms against the kind of wit who thinks you can be as nasty as you like provided you make people laugh.

471

Dunstan’s Deliverance

In 978, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dunstan, was being battered in a stormy meeting when he — along with England’s rich monastic heritage — had a miraculous escape.

472

The Martyrdom of King Edward

After the death of King Edgar, powerful court factions struggled for power by hiding behind his two sons, twelve-year-old Edward and his younger step-brother Ethelred.

473

Cuthbert’s Christmas

One Christmas Eve back in the twelfth century, a monk keeping midnight vigil in Lindisfarne priory watched spellbound as two great doors opened all by themselves.

474

Edgar and the Ship of Kings

Following a very grand coronation at Bath in 973, King Edgar travelled to Chester and showed his people that he had become a mighty lord indeed.