Ben Kane, himself now an acclaimed author of Roman novels, has posted on his own website an homage to Rosemary Sutcliff which concludes:
I wasn’t made aware of quite how deep The Eagle of the Ninth had sent roots into my mind until, at the age of 31 and more than twenty years after I’d read the book, I first set my eyes on the incredible structure that is Hadrian’s Wall. Read More »
The writing of Rosemary Sutcliff is loved by Imogen Russell Williams, director of Have Your Cake Theatre – a fringe theatre company. Her areas of ‘anorak expertise’ (according to the Guardian website) include ‘children’s books, classical tragedy and Golden Age crime fiction’. No wonder that for her:
… the nonpareil of children’s historical fiction remains Rosemary Sutcliff, whose books about Bronze Age Britain (Warrior Scarlet; Sun Horse, Moon Horse) and Roman Britain, particularly The Eagle of the Ninth and The Lantern Bearers, were intensely memorable to me as a child and part of the reason I eventually chose to study classics at university. Read More »
MacDonald, a Scotsman and long-time fan of the novel (The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff), does the source material proud with a visually exquisite and painstakingly detailed portrait of his homeland’s chaotic history.
Along the way, he also spins an engrossing tale of unlikely brotherhood and survival amidst a wilderness of foes, real and imagined. Not all of The Eagle’s 114 minutes work perfectly, but in an era of overproduced special effects it is refreshing to see a film where the locations actually exist, those armies are really there, and death isn’t just a clever transition to the next scene.
A great visit to Silchester yesterday, organised for journalists covering The Eagle film … I saw for the first time the Silchester Eagle, in the museum in nearby Reading. It was smaller than I imagined. It was the artefact that, with the mystery of the disappearance of the ninth legion from military records, stimulated Rosemary Sutcliff to imagine her bestselling The Eagle of the Ninth historical novel. Read More »
Much is written about the ‘community’ and ‘interactivity’ of social networks and blogs, not all of it convincing. But my hope when I started working more vigorously last year on this blog was that, over time, there might evolve a sense of connectedness if not community around Rosemary Sutcliff‘s work and life. So thank you those of you who regularly comment here, or tweet me, or retweet something. And all manner of fascinating posts turn up on the ‘You Write’ tab. Thus today it was a delightful surprise to read a post from Stephen Walby:
We live in Rosemary’s old house in the lovely Sussex village of Walberton. Rosemary lived here until she died in 1992. She is very fondly remembered here, having been an active member of village life. Our next door neighbours daughter remembers coming to the house to help out and many other villagers have stories to tell, we have heard how Rosemary would welcome groups of children from the village school for talks. Read More »
ROSEMARY SUTCLIFF (1920-92) 