Before we left Tim rushed into Blackwells and returned with a lovely book of Botticelli reproductions to replace the one I told him I has regretted ever since giving it to the POWs in the war! A beautiful present to remember the trip by! Got away before 10 and managed the trip home rather better with the aid of boiled sweets bought in Abingdon. Saw my first swallow while eating corned beef sandwiches in the car park of a pub beyond Alton. Lovely to see a countryside with no storm damage, until just beyond Petersfield one runs back into the distraction and desolation of storm damage. But even among the storm damage the countryside frothing with blackthorn and wild cherry.
© Anthony Lawton 2012
Cooking Prodigy Luke Hayes-Alexander schooled on Rosemary Sutcliff | Sutcliff Discovery of the Day
His parents, watching their son grow increasingly miserable in public school, enrolled him (Luke Hayes-Alexander, now of Luke’s Gastronomy in Toronto, Canada) at Sempar, a small private school that provided a classical education. At the school, the boy encountered for the first time a passion for learning that matched his own. He studied Beowulf and Rosemary Sutcliff’s novels about Roman Britain; his class acted out the parts in Julius Caesar. Computers were available but rarely turned on. Each week, students were escorted to the local public library to borrow as many books as they could carry.
Now all ready for off to Oxford in the morning … (Diary, 19/4/88)
April 19th Tuesday. Sheila went off this morning and Joan arrived this afternoon. Now all ready for off to Oxford in the morning.
© Anthony Lawton 2012
Rosemary Sutcliff early book research in University of Southern Mississippi de Grummond Collection
Before my mother stopped her (to keep all her papers in one place), Rosemary Sutcliff happily responded ad hoc to speculative letters asking for research notes and other papers connected with her historical novels and children’s books. So this collection at the University of Southern Mississippi includes notes in her trademark red notebooks. Interestingly the reference refers not only to The Lantern Bearers, but to notes for books called The Red Dragon and The Amber Dolphin, as well as notes on several other topics. There never were published books with those titles. The collection also contains a manuscript and two typescripts for the radio play The New Laird. The programme was taped on April 4, 1966, and broadcast from Edinburgh on May 17, 1966 as part of the Stories from Scottish History series. (I note that the library has not bothered with making accurate and up-to-date their brief paragraphs on her life … )
Source: USM de Grummond Collection- Rosemary Sutcliff papers
Rosemary Sutcliff’s The Eagle of the Ninth was one of Falco author Lindsey Davis’s top 10 Roman books
Lindsey Davis writes detective novels set in classical Rome, featuring the world of maverick private eye and poet Falco. On the publication in 2009 of the nineteenth of what became a bestselling series of novels known for their meticulous historical detail, she chose Rosemary Sutcliff’s The Eagle of the Ninth as one of her top ten Roman books.
‘Somewhere about the year 117AD, the Ninth Legion, which was stationed at Eboracum, where York now stands, marched north to deal with a rising among the Caledonian tribes, and was never heard of again.’ Hooked? If not, there’s no hope for you. A wonderful novel, for children of all ages.
via Lindsey Davis’s top 10 Roman books | Books | guardian.co.uk
ROSEMARY SUTCLIFF (1920-92) 