Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
© Derek Bennett, Geograph. CC BY-SA 2.0.
John Galsworthy urges the English to love their language as they love their country.
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By Gilbert Stuart (1755–1828), via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.
A US Congressman tells the House why they mustn’t censor the press.
© Sandeep Nanu, Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 4.0.
John Wood shares the wonder of the Indian cobra’s hood, in science and in myth.
By Oda Krohg (1860-1935), via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.
Silas Marner has to harden his heart and teach little Eppie a lesson she will remember.
© Iain MacFadzean, Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 4.0.
Dostoevsky had to break it to Moscow’s students that ordinary Russians found their brand of politics patronising.
After Thomas Miles Richardson (1784-1848), via the British Museum. © The Trustees of the British Museum, shared under licence CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.
On his visits to Durham Gaol, prison reformer John Howard found conditions that were all too familiar.