Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
© Ian Greig, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
Jane Eyre returns to Thornfield Hall and Mr Rochester, and even the thought of Blanche Ingram cannot rob her of happiness.
Read
© Visions of Domino (Klim Levene), Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0 generic.
Though Arthur Clough had discovered that to be your own man was a long and toilsome path, it was not a path without hope.
© Markoz, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
Richard the Lionheart told Philip, the martial Bishop of Dreux, to decide whether he was a bishop or a knight.
© Joecoolandcharlie, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
When Richard I heard that the town of Verneuil in Normandy was under threat, he made a vow that few could be expected to take so literally.
© Sujayadhar, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
The British Empire’s hostile breakup with India should have taught everyone two things: money cannot buy love, and power does not command respect.
By Franz Seraph von Lenbach (1836-1904), via the National Portrait Gallery and Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
Two of the Victorian Age’s most distinguished historians locked horns over the question of whether historians should be nice.