A late Victorian writer of gothic horror and science fiction, something of a precursor to Lovecraft. A mystic who believes in a great unknown spiritual world behind or alongside the mundane, to penetrate which brings great delight and horror and death. Start with The Great God Pan. Subtly thrilling.
Arthur Machen at Wikipedia
A very good introduction to the history of the cards, their role in various occult societies, games, a Jungian interpretation of the Major Arcana, and methods of meditation and divination.
An homage to Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat, a comedy of Victorian manners, a time travel romp, a mystery and a romance.
Lady Schrapnell, a wealthy eccentric obsessed with rebuilding Coventry Cathedral, under the guise of an enormous donation to the Oxford History Department of the mid 21st century, co-opts the department’s entire staff of time traveling historians to go back in time to research the details of the construction of the Cathedral and its furnishings. On one such jaunt to the Victorian era an historian rescues from drowning Princess Arjumand, a little black and white cat, who plays a key role in a Temporal Crisis that our hero, a much put-upon and dreadfully time-lagged historian, must sort out.
There are several mysteries and several romances and a great many plot twists. And we actually meet Jerome K. Jerome boating down the Thames…
Utterly charming.
Sixth book of McCullough’s Masters of Rome series which covers the end of the republic from Marius to Antony, 110 BC to the Battle of Actium in 31 and Octavian’s assumption of the title Augustus in 27.
First class research, first class recreation of an alien culture.
A bleaker novel than the earlier ones in the series. Caesar is tired, and his assassination might just have come as a relief. Rome is tired, and the unending Civil Wars and succession of increasingly powerful Dictators is leading her to the Principate, the architect of which is introduced to us as a young man of 18, possessing some of Caesar’s superior abilities, but a different sort of man, cooler, far more ambitious: where McCullough presented Caesar as thwarted in his desire for his due within the normal parameters of a public career and recognition of his superior abilities, his actions directed towards political survival, she presents Octavian from the start as ambitious for great power and the rule of Rome and the world. Where Caesar awed and delighted us, Octavian chills.
Second book of McCullough’s Masters of Rome series which covers the end of the republic from Marius to Antony, 110 BC to the Battle of Actium in 31 and Octavian’s assumption of the title Augustus in 27.
McCullough has managed to paint the sociopathic Sulla with a sympathetic brush.
Third book of McCullough’s Masters of Rome series which covers the end of the republic from Marius to Antony, 110 BC to the Battle of Actium in 31 and Octavian’s assumption of the title Augustus in 27.
First class research, first class recreation of an alien culture.
Sulla in his old age, a physical wreck, as malignant as ever and now with power to achieve his ends. He is ambitious for himself, and eager for revenge: but he also has a deep sense of Roman traditions and his cruel reign does as much to set Rome back on her constitutional feet as it does to satisfy his personal needs. It is hard to paint a sociopath with a sympathetic brush, but McCullough has done it.
Fourth book of McCullough’s Masters of Rome series which covers the end of the republic from Marius to Antony, 110 BC to the Battle of Actium in 31 and Octavian’s assumption of the title Augustus in 27.
First class research, first class recreation of an alien culture.
McCullough’s Caesar is a super-man whose passions, intellect and temperament are quite unbelievable. She describes him as possessing terrific charm, and her character does possess that charm, so that you do believe in him, and sympathize with him, and cheer for him.
This volume tells of his rise through his first consulship (as well as his relationships with wives and mistresses.)