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"Aline G. Hornaday" wrote: > The Oxford Companion to the Year has just arrived from Amazon.com (30% > discount) - it's by listmember Bonnie Blackburn & Leofranc Holford-Stevens. > This book must be unique: it not only gives each day with the Roman > equivalent, appropriate quotation, holidays & holy days, anniversaries, but > also wonderfully chosen commentaries which are a delight to read. Then, a > section on Calendars & Chronology that answers all the questions I had, and > a lot that I hadn't been smart enough to ask. I look forward to many happy > hours with Bonnie Blackburn and her collaborator! - Aline Hornaday Now who, I wonder, if anyone, still reads old William Hone? I am one, and find no shame in it. From his early offerings in his _Apocryphal New Testament_, to his _Ancient Mysteries Described_ (both from about 1820), to his seminal series of trials on press freedom, I still find him an intriguing author (George Cruikshank's illustrations help). The _Oxford Companion to the Year_ follows in a great tradition, stretching back at least two centuries, so let us please not forget our forefathers! Those old 'Conversation/Everyday' books, and whatever else they were called at the time, were very often provided by people we now might regard as dilettantes/amateurs des livres (e.g. Brunet?! who claimed to be nothing else?). But Hone helped bring down Ellingborough (think I spelt that right?), quite apologetically (Ellingborough didn't realise quite what he was getting into from a quiet-spoken antiquarian), which Hone never intended. Hone also provided us with all sorts of knowledge which we now, in our current sophistication, regard as more the precincts of 'mere' local historians - we know what the big picture is, and we have already got the answers: or have we? I'll join in the thanks to Blackburn and Holford-Stevens. Just seen it. Looks dead nice. Unique? No. Part of a tradition? Yes. But a nice addition to that tradition. Thank you, the pair! Looks damned good to me! 'Ah kent yer faither!' (meant in the nicest way possible!) Angus Liverpudliensis, Arabia Felix %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%