Category: History

Basilica of Saint-Denis

If you watch rugby you will have heard of the Stade de France in Saint-Denis. It was built for the 1998 football World Cup. I went to Saint-Denis, three stops north of Gard du Nord on the RER, on Monday morning to see an older building.

Gwendwr Gardens

This is a pre World War II map showing part of West Kensington, north of Talgarth Road and west of North End Road.

On the Beach

You don’t have to have read Howards End to know its epitaph: “Only connect”. Only one other book has a similarly well known inscription; On the Beach.

Furnivall Gardens

On the north bank of the river, south of the A4, aka The Great West Road, lies Furnivall Gardens. You may think of it as being between The Rutland Arms and The Dove.

Osip Mandelshtam

When emails were at the cutting edge of technology a friend sent his son, at boarding school, the well known mnemonic Willy, Willy, Harry, Stee.

Vabamu

I hope I am not getting compassion fatigue. Shoes on the Danube, KGB cells and now suitcases, twenty-one of them in a piece called In Exile.

H is for Hawk

Unless you are David Attenborough you will find it convenient to see all the flora and fauna of Estonia without leaving Tallinn Old Town at the Museum of Natural History.

Broken Line

You may remember, I do, the ferry tragedy at Zeebruge in 1987 when Herald of Free Enterprise, a roll-on/roll-off car ferry, capsized killing 193 passengers.