Tag Archives: history

Ibrahim Abdel Meguid’s Birds of Amber

Along with Great Cairo: Mother of the World, we received this book in a shipment of review copies from International Publishers Marketing. It’s an English translation from the original Arabic, although I should note that the translator (Farouk Abdel Wahab) … Continue reading

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Desmond Stewart’s Great Cairo: Mother of the World

Three of the most memorable literary journeys I’ve made in 2008-09 have brought me to the ancient and venerable city of Cairo, Egypt. In Naguib Mahfouz’s The Cairo Trilogy (English translation easily available in several editions, both as a single … Continue reading

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Bert Williams’ The Middle years, 1910-1918 and His Final Releases, 1919-1922

I know about Fanny Brice. Her portrayal of Brice in “Funny Girl” was the breakthrough that made Barbra Striesand a star. I know about W. C. Fields, and can recite many of his best-known lines in an approximation of his … Continue reading

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Various artists’ 1912: Waitin’ on the Levee and 1913: Come and See the Big Parade

The American company Archeophone has released several more chapters in its “Phonographic Yearbook” series, including these two from watershed years early in the previous century. As with all of its releases, Archeophone has included a wealth of historic background in … Continue reading

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O. J. Padel’s Arthur in Medieval Welsh Literature

Lisa Spangenberg penned this review. Since the earliest references to King Arthur occur in medieval Welsh poetry, it has been almost de rigeur to assert that Arthur, and hence the ancestry of Arthurian literature and myth, lies in Celtic tales … Continue reading

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Various artists’ 1920: Even Water’s Getting Weaker

If you’ve always had trouble finding a “greatest hits” recording for 1920, search no more.  The good folks at Archeophone have produced a typically excellent package in Even Water’s Getting Weaker, which they plan as the first in their “Phonographic … Continue reading

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Various artists’ The Pink Lambert

Archeophone Records, a Bloomington, Indiana, company that specializes in releasing CDs of old 78 rpm and cylinder recordings, may just do for  Vaudeville and Tin Pan Alley pop what Harry Smith’s anthology did for American folk music. The Pink Lambert: … Continue reading

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John Berger’s Into Their Labours

‘My people are the poor ones their country made of stones Their wealth is in persistance, in stories and in bones… – Oysterband, “One Green Hill” Between 1979, when he wrote Pig Earth, the first volume of what was to … Continue reading

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Ronald Reichertz’s The Making of the Alice Books: Lewis Carroll’s Uses of Earlier Children’s Literature

Thomas Wiloch wrote this review. What inspired Lewis Carroll to write his classic tales about that intrepid English girl, Alice? Contemporary readers may think his stories sprang full-blown from his brow in Zeus-like fashion. Others may focus their attention on … Continue reading

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