The Copybook

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

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1177

By Staecker, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Blessings of Nicholas Mogilevsky by Clay Lane

Passengers sharing Bishop Nicholas’s Moscow-bound flight found his blessings faintly silly — but that was when the engines were still running.

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1178

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

Dixie on Thames by Richard Cobden

Victorian MP Richard Cobden offered a startling analogy for the American Civil War.

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1179

© Graham Horn, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

The Reform Acts by Clay Lane

Nineteenth-century Britain had busy industrial cities and a prosperous middle class, but no MPs to represent them.

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1180

© Robert Graham, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.

The Battle of Brunanburh by Clay Lane

Athelstan confirmed himself as King of the English, and also reawakened a feeling that all Britain should be a united people.

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1181

© Leon Hawley, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 3.0.

St Chad and the Invisible Choir by Clay Lane

Chad, the seventh-century Bishop of Mercia, seemed to be making a lot of music for one man.

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1182

© shakko, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 3.0.

The Night-time Disciple by Clay Lane

Nicodemus did not allow intellectual doubts to get in the way of what he knew in his heart.

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© Nicholas Armitage / Clay Lane, 2025

May 9 NS

April 26 OS

A Gallant Attempt for the Crown : Only months after kidnapping the Duke of Ormond, Irish radical Thomas Blood was at it again, this time attempting to steal the Crown Jewels.
Russia’s Heroic Stand : In 1941, with much of the West subdued, Adolf Hitler bent the full force of his hatred on Moscow.
A Thousand Commas : Assess the punctuation of this sentence, according to the author’s own principles.
Batter My Heart : John Donne gives God a free hand to do whatever needs to be done.
Window Seat : Describe the view from one of the following vantage points.
Repeat Offender :
In Two Minds : Join these ideas together to a form a single sentence, in at least two different ways.
The First Traffic Lights : The busy crossroads outside the Houses of Parliament was the testing ground for a new technology.
Good Companions : Explain what these wise classical authors are telling us.
The Rule of the Road : Being a free citizen doesn’t mean that everyone else has to get out of your way.
Blind Courage : George Santayana reprimanded politicians and military men who thought war was good for the country’s soul.
Patience : Make a single sentence out of these three ideas.
The Angel Cried : A hymn sung in the weeks after Easter, imagining how Gabriel brought the news of Christ’s resurrection to Mary.
She was a Phantom of Delight : Mary Wordsworth wasn’t pretty or bookish, but she was kind and vital, and William loved her.
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