The Copybook

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

1375

Photo from NASA, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Music of the Spheres Clay Lane

Sir William Herschel not only discovered Uranus and infrared radiation, but composed two dozen symphonies as well.

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1376

© Martyn Gorman, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream Clay Lane

Hermia and her lover Lysander elope from Athens, only to become tangled with squabbling fairies in the woods.

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1377

Photo from the Imperial War Museums, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Gift of the Gab Clay Lane

There was one form of power that self-taught engineering genius George Stephenson never harnessed.

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1378

From Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Siren ‘Greatness’

In encouraging women into music, Alice Mary Smith thought promises of ‘greatness’ counterproductive.

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1379

© Nigel Brown, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

The Jacobite Rebellions Clay Lane

Loyal subjects of King James II continued to fight his corner after he, and any real hope of success, had gone.

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1380

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

Fit and Proper Persons Adam Smith

No one is more dangerous than the man who thinks that it is his destiny to direct things for the common good.

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