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1841: Russian Romantic poet and novelist Mikhail...

Writer or writing item

1841

Russian Romantic poet and novelist Mikhail Yurevich Lermontov completed The Demon before his death in a duel in July of this year.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 5th ed., Oxford University Press, 1985.

December 1855: The London General Omnibus Company was e...

Building and people item

December 1855

The London General Omnibus Company was established.
Day, John R. The Story of the London Bus: London and Its Buses from the Horse Bus to the Present Day. London Transport Executive, 1973.
15

1885: Actress Helen Faucit (who had become Lady...

Writer or writing item

1885

Actress Helen Faucit (who had become Lady Martin when her husband was knighted in 1880) published On Some of Shakespeare 's Female Characters, a collection of essays that first appeared in Blackwood's.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.

Late 1945: André Deutsch established the publishing...

Writer or writing item

Late 1945

André Deutsch established the publishing firm Allan Wingate in Great Cumberland Street, London.
Rose, Jonathan, and Patricia J. Anderson, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 112. Gale Research, 1991.
95, 342
Mumby, Frank Arthur, and Ian Norrie. Mumby’s Publishing and Bookselling in the Twentieth Century. 6th ed., Bell and Hyman, 1982.
89-90

By April 1757: William Chambers (later Sir William) published...

Building and people item

By April 1757

William Chambers (later Sir William) published Designs of Chinese Buildings, Furniture, Dresses, Machines, and Utensils, a shaping influence on the coming style of Chinoiserie.
Fleeman, John David, and James McLaverty. A Bibliography of the Works of Samuel Johnson. Clarendon Press, 2000, 2 vols.
1: 714-15

24 May 2019: Thousands of children in more than a hundred...

Building and people item

24 May 2019

Thousands of children in more than a hundred nations around the world missed school to march in the streets demanding action from their respective governments to tackle the crisis of climate change.
Taylor, Matthew. “Schoolchildren go on strike across world over climate crisis”. theguardian.com, 24 May 2019.

4 June 2006: The Sunday Times provoked fears among British...

Writer or writing item

4 June 2006

The Sunday Times provoked fears among British authors that agents' fees would become liable to tax: it reported a test case brought against Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan (television presenters of the Richard and Judy Book Club

June 2014: Xiaolu Guo, a self-exiled Chinese novelist...

Women writers item

June 2014

Xiaolu Guo , a self-exiled Chinese novelist and film-writer (now a British citizen, who writes in two languages, English and Mandarin, and was one of Granta magazine's Best of Young British Novelists in 2013), published...

1849: Following on the great famine, Poor Law Boards...

National or international item

1849

Following on the great famine, Poor Law Boards of Guardians in Ireland began to subsidize emigration for those on their rolls.
Fitzpatrick, David. Irish Emigration 1801-1921. Economic and Social History Society of Ireland, 1984.
18

1833-1834: Another uprising occurred in Italy against...

National or international item

1833-1834

Another uprising occurred in Italy against the ruling Austrian power; it failed.
Hobsbawm, Eric John. The Age of Revolution 1789-1848. Vintage, 1996.
129

Joan Whitrow

JW , a Quaker and later an Independent pamphleteer in the post-Restoration period of reaction, is remarkable both for the family politics and religious feeling of her account of the deaths of two of her...

Later 1879: In a year when the Irish harvest failed almost...

National or international item

Later 1879

In a year when the Irish harvest failed almost entirely, the Irish National Land League was formed in Dublin, with Charles Stewart Parnell as president.
Morton, Grenfell. Home Rule and the Irish Question. Longman, 1980.
22

10 April 1893: George Gissing published his novel The Odd...

Writer or writing item

10 April 1893

George Gissing published his novel The Odd Women, featuring a sexual liaison without marriage, and a number of educated middle-class women training for jobs by which they aim to support themselves.
Solo: Search Oxford University Libraries Online. 18 July 2011, http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?vid=OXVU1&fromLogin=true&reset_config=true.
Cox, Michael, editor. The Oxford Chronology of English Literature. Oxford University Press, 2002, 2 vols.

1817: The Juvenile Review, a periodical giving...

Writer or writing item

1817

The Juvenile Review, a periodical giving serious attention to pedagogical writing and books for children, began publication in London.
Butts, Dennis. Mistress of our Tears, A Literary and Bibliographical Study of Barbara Hofland. Scolar Press, 1992.
43

1539: Juan de Zumárraga, Bishop of Mexico, destroyer...

Writer or writing item

1539

Juan de Zumárraga , Bishop of Mexico, destroyer of thousands of native manuscripts (documents of the Aztec, Maya, and Olmec civilizations), set up in Mexico City the first printing press in the Americas.
Manguel, Alberto. “Cities Built on Books”. The London Library Magazine, No. 30, 1 Dec. 2015–28 Feb. 2016, pp. 22-5.
23

9 December 1936: BBC television broadcast its first cookery...

Building and people item

9 December 1936

BBC television broadcast its first cookery demonstration: Moira Meighn presented meals cookable in fifteen minutes on a single burner.
Briggs, Asa. The BBC: The First Fifty Years. Oxford University Press, 1985.
373

1932: Alexander Korda formed London Film Productions...

Building and people item

1932

Alexander Korda formed London Film Productions and the Denham Studios .
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
376

Elizabeth Sewell

ES was well-known during the mid nineteenth century as a novelist, travel writer, historian, author of devotional and educational works, and children's writer. Her novels challenged the idea that romance leading to marriage was the...
Elizabeth Sewell Black and white oval photograph of Elizabeth Sewell, seated at a desk, wearing a dark high-necked dress with a white collar, and a white cap. Her signature is reproduced below.

June 1911: Ellen Terry lectured on the topic of Shakespeare's...

Building and people item

June 1911

Ellen Terry lectured on the topic of Shakespeare 's Triumphant Women, under the auspices of the Pioneer Players .
Cockin, Katharine. “Cicely Hamilton’s Warriors: dramatic reinventions of militancy in the British women’s suffrage movement”. Women’s History Review, Vol.
14
, No. 3/4, pp. 527-42.
534

August-October 1944: Representatives of the UK, the United States,...

National or international item

August-October 1944

Representatives of the UK, the United States, China, and the Soviet Union met at the estate of Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, DC, to map the outlines of the proposed United Nations .
“History of the United Nations”. The United Nations.

1922: Elisabeth Kuyper, a Dutch composer and conductor,...

Building and people item

1922

Elisabeth Kuyper , a Dutch composer and conductor, founded the London Women's Symphony Orchestra .
Sadie, Julie Anne, and Rhian Samuel, editors. The New Grove Dictionary of Women Composers. Macmillan, 1994.
257

25 July 1658: Sir William Davenant's masque The Cruelty...

Building and people item

25 July 1658

Sir William Davenant 's masque The Cruelty of the Spaniards in Peru, Exprest by instrumentall and vocall musick, and by the art of perspective in scenes, etc., was published; it had been performed...

8 October 1970: Alexander Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel...

Writer or writing item

8 October 1970

Alexander Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize.
Borne Back Daily. 2001, http://borneback.com/ .
8 October 2013

October 1890: The Normal School of Science was renamed...

National or international item

October 1890

The Normal School of Science was renamed the Royal College of Science .
Gascoigne, Robert Mortimer. A Chronology of the History of Science, 1450-1900. Garland, 1987.
400, 408
Haydn, Joseph. Haydn’s Dictionary of Dates and Universal Information. Editor Vincent, Benjamin, 23rd ed., Ward, Lock, 1904.

9 July 1798: George Canning, writing in the Anti-Jacobin,...

Women writers item

9 July 1798

George Canning , writing in the Anti-Jacobin, lambasted sensibility as a literary mode stemming from France, from Rousseau , and from diseased fancy, effeminacy, and self-obsession.
Norton, Rictor. Mistress of Udolpho: The Life of Ann Radcliffe. Leicester University Press, 1999.
170