The rings of saturn
Encyclopedia
The Rings of Saturn (1995) is a novel by W. G. Sebald
and was published in English in 1998.
The second novel of W. G. Sebald
to be translated into English, The Rings of Saturn is the account of the narrator, also named W. G. Sebald, on a walking tour of Suffolk
. In addition to describing the places he sees and people he encounters (including translator Michael Hamburger
), Sebald also discusses various episodes of history and literature, including the introduction of silkworm cultivation to Europe and the writings of Thomas Browne
, which attach in some way to the larger text.
the author compares himself to Gregor Samsa, the protagonist in Kafka's The Metamorphosis
Obituary - of two scholars: Michael Parkinson, researching Charles Ramuz and Janine Daykins an expert on Gustav Flaubert, the latter likened to the angel in Dürer's Melancholia
Odyssey of Thomas Browne
's Skull - which for a time resided in the hospital museum but has now been returned to St Peter Mancoft Church
Anatomy lecture - Browne's possible attendance at Nicolaes Tulp
's anatomy lecture portrayed in Rembrandt's The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp (a reproduction of which appears in the book)
Quincunx - the quincunx
network which appears in Browne's work, The Garden of Cyrus
.
Fabled creatures - their appearance in works such as Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica
, Brehm's Tierleben
and Jorge Luis Borges
' Libro de los seres imaginarios
; specifically Baldanders
which appears in Grimmelhausen
's Simplicius Simplicissimus
Urn Burial - Browne's work, Urn Burial
via Somerleyton
Morton Peto's place - Somerleyton Hall
, was bought by Morton Peto in 1843 then demolished and rebuilt
The cities of Germany in flames - The head gardener at the Hall recounts his childhood when 67 airfields in East Anglia flew missions to bomb German cities, and two American Thunderbolt
s crashed in the lake at the Hall
The decline of Lowestoft - since the oil boom of the 1970s
The formal coastal resort - Lowestoft became fashionable in the latter half of the nineteenth century with many amenities built by Morton Peto
Frederick Farrar and the court of King James II - Frederick was born in Lowestoft in 1906 and recounts a charity ball held on the pier
in 1914. He likened his family holiday to James II in exile
The natural history of the herring
- once found in vast numbers in the North Sea
George Wyndham le Strange - an eccentric who owned a manor house in Henstead
behind Benacre Broad
A great herd of swine - seen near Covehithe
leads to consideration of Jesus' healing of the Gadarene
The reduplication of man & Orbis Tertius - a quote from "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
" by Jorge Luis Borges
about mirrors and copulation
and the death of the Earl of Sandwich
Nightfall - moving across the Earth as described in The Garden of Cyrus
Station Road in The Hague
- where the author walked 12 months previously
Mauritshuis
in The Hague which opened in 1644 and displays Jacob van Ruisdael's View of Haarlem with Bleaching Fields
Scheveningen, location of the Kurhaus
. The road to the Scheveningen was described by Diderot as a 'promenade without equal'
The Tomb of St Sebolt (the author's namesake) in Nuremburg
The Sailor's Reading Room in Southwold (pictured)
Pictures from the Great War - a book in the reading room which starts with a picture of the arrest of Gavrilo Princip
The concentration camp at Jasenovac
on the Sava run by the Croatia
n Ustaše
where 700,000 were killed
(who met Joseph Conrad
in the Congo
)
The Boy Teodor - Józef Teodor Konrad
's childhood: his father Apollo Korzeniowski
was a leading member of the Polish resistance against Russia
Exile in Volgda - His parents were arrested, tried, an exiled to Volgda
in Siberia in 1863
Nowofastów - where Konrad stayed with his uncle Tadeusz Bobrowski
Death and internment of Apollo Korzeniowski - His mother died in exile of tuberculosis
, his father returned from exile in 1867 but died the following year in Cracow
Sea- and love life - From 1875 Konrad worked on ships between Marseilles and the West Indies, when in Marseilles he fraternized with Spanish legitimists
there were rumours of an affair
A Winter Journey - Konrad spent time in Lowestoft
during 1878 and later gained British citizenship. In 1889 he sailed for Africa as captain of a Congo steamboat
The heart of darkness
- The despair he experienced in the Congo
(where five million died between 1890 and 1900 according to Sebald as a direct result of Belgian exploitation) inspired his novel
The panorama of Waterloo - the guilt of Belgium, and the ugly Lion Monument and associated visitor centre commemorating the Battle of Waterloo
near Brussels
Casement, the slave economy and the Irish question - Roger Casement
produced the Casement Report
on the horrors of the Congo but pressure from Leopold II of Belgium
meant he was ignored and moved to address the Irish question
Casement tried and executed for treason
- for seeking to recruit an Irish Brigade in Germany
- built 1875 for a narrow gauge railway linking Southwold
to Halesworth
The Chinese court train - never delivered to the Emperor of China it initially ran on the line
The Taiping Rebellion
and the opening of China - in the wake of the Opium Wars
Destruction of the garden of Yuan Ming Yuan by a joint force of British and French in 1860
The end of Emperor Hsien-Feng
The Dowager Empress Tz'u-hsi
The town beneath the sea - Dunwich
Poor Algernon - Algernon Charles Swinburne
who often walked between Southwold and Dunwich with his companion Theodore Watts-Dunton
Marsh Acres, Middleton
- home of translator Michael Hamburger
A Berlin childhood - Michael left in 1933
Dreams, elective affinities, correspondences - between the author and Michael's lives
and Mauritshuis
were originally endowed by sugar dynasties
Boulge
Park - near Woodbridge
where poet Edward FitzGerald
lived
Bredfield nursery - in nearby Bredfield House
where he spent much of his childhood
Edword Fitzgerald's literary ventures - most notably his translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
Last journey - FitzGeralds last journey, to Merton
in Norfolk
An Irish memory - Sebald recalls a visit to the Ashbury's near Clarahill in Ireland
On the history of the civil war - the Irish Civil War
The entrepreneurial spirit and the cult of the pheasant - exemplified by Cuthbert Quilter
who built Bawdsey Manor
Through the desert - past Rendlesham Forest
to Orford Castle
Secret weapons of destruction - on Orford Ness
including the rumours about Shingle Street
in a barn between Yoxford
and Harleston
Charlotte Ives and the Vicomte de Chateaubriand the story of their doomed love played out in Bungay
Memoirs from beyond the grave
- written by Chateaubriand who grew up in the Château de Combourg
in Brittany
In Ditchingham
churchyard - the grave of Charlotte Ives and her family
Ditchingham Park - and Dutch Elm Disease
The hurricane of 16th October 1987
The silkworm moth Bombyx mori
Origins and spread of sericulture
- From China to Greece and Italy then on to France where Olivier de Serres
argued for its introduction against Maximilien de Béthune, Duke of Sully
The Norwich silk-weavers - many arrived having fled France as a result of the Edict of Nantes
Sericulture in Germany
W. G. Sebald
W. G. Maximilian Sebald was a German writer and academic. At the time of his death at the age of 57, he was being cited by many literary critics as one of the greatest living authors and had been tipped as a possible future winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature...
and was published in English in 1998.
The second novel of W. G. Sebald
W. G. Sebald
W. G. Maximilian Sebald was a German writer and academic. At the time of his death at the age of 57, he was being cited by many literary critics as one of the greatest living authors and had been tipped as a possible future winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature...
to be translated into English, The Rings of Saturn is the account of the narrator, also named W. G. Sebald, on a walking tour of Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
. In addition to describing the places he sees and people he encounters (including translator Michael Hamburger
Michael Hamburger
Michael Hamburger OBE was a noted British translator, poet, critic, memoirist, and academic. He was known in particular for his translations of Friedrich Hölderlin, Paul Celan, Gottfried Benn and W. G. Sebald from German, and his work in literary criticism...
), Sebald also discusses various episodes of history and literature, including the introduction of silkworm cultivation to Europe and the writings of Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
Sir Thomas Browne was an English author of varied works which reveal his wide learning in diverse fields including medicine, religion, science and the esoteric....
, which attach in some way to the larger text.
Chapter I
In hospital - From bed in the Norfolk and Norwich HospitalNorfolk and Norwich Hospital
The Norfolk and Norwich Hospital [7] was founded in 1771 as a charitable institution for the care of "the poor and the sick" and was established by William Fellowes and Benjamin Gooch...
the author compares himself to Gregor Samsa, the protagonist in Kafka's The Metamorphosis
The Metamorphosis
The Metamorphosis is a novella by Franz Kafka, first published in 1915. It is often cited as one of the seminal works of short fiction of the 20th century and is widely studied in colleges and universities across the western world...
Obituary - of two scholars: Michael Parkinson, researching Charles Ramuz and Janine Daykins an expert on Gustav Flaubert, the latter likened to the angel in Dürer's Melancholia
Melencolia I
Melencolia I is a 1514 engraving by the German Renaissance master Albrecht Dürer. It is an allegorical composition which has been the subject of many interpretations...
Odyssey of Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
Sir Thomas Browne was an English author of varied works which reveal his wide learning in diverse fields including medicine, religion, science and the esoteric....
's Skull - which for a time resided in the hospital museum but has now been returned to St Peter Mancoft Church
St Peter Mancroft
St Peter Mancroft is a parish church in the Church of England, in the centre of Norwich, Norfolk. It is the largest church in Norwich and was built between 1430 and 1455. It stands on a slightly elevated position, next to the market place...
Anatomy lecture - Browne's possible attendance at Nicolaes Tulp
Nicolaes Tulp
Nicolaes Tulp was a Dutch surgeon and mayor of Amsterdam. Tulp was well known for his upstanding moral character.-Life:...
's anatomy lecture portrayed in Rembrandt's The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp (a reproduction of which appears in the book)
Quincunx - the quincunx
Quincunx
A quincunx is a geometric pattern consisting of five points arranged in a cross, that is five coplanar points, four of them forming a square or rectangle and a fifth at its center...
network which appears in Browne's work, The Garden of Cyrus
The Garden of Cyrus
The Garden of Cyrus or The Quincunciall Lozenge, or Network Plantations of the Ancients, naturally, artificially, mystically considered is a Discourse written by Sir Thomas Browne. It was first published in 1658, along with its diptych companion, Urn-Burial...
.
Fabled creatures - their appearance in works such as Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica
Pseudodoxia Epidemica
Pseudodoxia Epidemica or Enquries into very many received tenets and commonly presumed truths, also known simply as Pseudodoxia Epidemica or Vulgar Errors, is a work by Thomas Browne refuting the common errors and superstitions of his age. It first appeared in 1646 and went through five subsequent...
, Brehm's Tierleben
Brehms Tierleben
Brehms Tierleben is a reference book, first published in the 1860s,which made its author, Alfred Edmund Brehm ,known around the world.- Publishing history :...
and Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...
' Libro de los seres imaginarios
Book of Imaginary Beings
Jorge Luis Borges wrote and edited the Book of Imaginary Beings in 1957 as the original Spanish Manual de zoología fantástica, or Handbook of Fantastic Zoology, expanding it in 1967 and 1969 to the final El libro de los seres imaginarios...
; specifically Baldanders
Baldanders
Baldanders or The Soon-Another is a creature of Germanic literary myth that features protean properties.-Origin:Baldanders was first conceived by shoemaker and writer Hans Sachs after reading the description of Proteus in The Odyssey...
which appears in Grimmelhausen
Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen
Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen was a German author.-Biography:Grimmelshausen was born at Gelnhausen. At the age of ten he was kidnapped by Hessian soldiery, and in their midst tasted the adventures of military life in the Thirty Years' War...
's Simplicius Simplicissimus
Urn Burial - Browne's work, Urn Burial
Chapter II
The diesel train - caught from Norwich to LowestoftLowestoft
Lowestoft is a town in the English county of Suffolk. The town is on the North Sea coast and is the most easterly point of the United Kingdom. It is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and south-east of Norwich...
via Somerleyton
Somerleyton
Somerleyton is a village close to the River Waveney in the Waveney District of the English county of Suffolk. Somerleyton is located around north-west of Lowestoft and south-west of Great Yarmouth...
Morton Peto's place - Somerleyton Hall
Somerleyton Hall
Somerleyton Hall is a country house in the village of Somerleyton near Lowestoft, Suffolk, England. It has a notable garden.-History:In 1240, a manor house was built on the site of Somerleyton Hall by Sir Peter Fitzosbert whose daughter married into the Jernegan family. The male line of the...
, was bought by Morton Peto in 1843 then demolished and rebuilt
The cities of Germany in flames - The head gardener at the Hall recounts his childhood when 67 airfields in East Anglia flew missions to bomb German cities, and two American Thunderbolt
P-47 Thunderbolt
Republic Aviation's P-47 Thunderbolt, also known as the "Jug", was the largest, heaviest, and most expensive fighter aircraft in history to be powered by a single reciprocating engine. It was heavily armed with eight .50-caliber machine guns, four per wing. When fully loaded, the P-47 weighed up to...
s crashed in the lake at the Hall
The decline of Lowestoft - since the oil boom of the 1970s
The formal coastal resort - Lowestoft became fashionable in the latter half of the nineteenth century with many amenities built by Morton Peto
Frederick Farrar and the court of King James II - Frederick was born in Lowestoft in 1906 and recounts a charity ball held on the pier
Claremont Pier
The Claremont Pier is a traditional seaside pier in Lowestoft in the English county of Suffolk.-History:The pier was constructed in 1902/03 and used originally as a mooring for Belle steamers. It was designed by D. Fox and was originally 181.8 m in length and 10.9 m in width. In 1912, it was...
in 1914. He likened his family holiday to James II in exile
Chapter III
Fishermen on the beach - south of LowestoftThe natural history of the herring
Herring
Herring is an oily fish of the genus Clupea, found in the shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and the North Atlantic oceans, including the Baltic Sea. Three species of Clupea are recognized. The main taxa, the Atlantic herring and the Pacific herring may each be divided into subspecies...
- once found in vast numbers in the North Sea
North Sea
In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...
George Wyndham le Strange - an eccentric who owned a manor house in Henstead
Henstead
Henstead is near Kessingland and the A12 in Suffolk in England. It has a church called Church of St Mary which is a Grade I listed building.In 1771 the landscape artist, Thomas Hearne spent six weeks with the young George Beaumont in Henstead at the home of the latters tutor at Eton, Revd Charles...
behind Benacre Broad
Benacre Broad
Benacre Broad is an isolated body of water on the North Sea coast of the English county of Suffolk. It is located in the parish of Benacre, Suffolk about south of Lowestoft and north of Southwold. The village of Covehithe is just to the south, Kessingland to the north.The broad is part of Benacre...
A great herd of swine - seen near Covehithe
Covehithe
Covehithe, formerly North Hales, is a hamlet in a parish in Blything district, Suffolk, England. Lying on the coast around North-east of Southwold,also 8 miles South from the town of Lowestoft...
leads to consideration of Jesus' healing of the Gadarene
Exorcising the Gerasenes demonic
Exorcising the Gerasenes demonic is one of the miracles of Jesus attested in the Gospels. It is recorded in the three Synoptic Gospels, specifically in Mark 5:1-20, Matthew 8:28-34, and Luke 8:26-39...
The reduplication of man & Orbis Tertius - a quote from "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
"Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" is a short story by the 20th century Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. The story was first published in the Argentine journal Sur, May 1940. The "postscript" dated 1947 is intended to be anachronistic, set seven years in the future...
" by Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...
about mirrors and copulation
Chapter IV
The Battle of Sole Bay - which took place in 1672 off the coast near SouthwoldSouthwold
Southwold is a town on the North Sea coast, in the Waveney district of the English county of Suffolk. It is located on the North Sea coast at the mouth of the River Blyth within the Suffolk Coast and Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The town is around south of Lowestoft and north-east...
and the death of the Earl of Sandwich
Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich
Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich, KG was an English Infantry officer who later became a naval officer. He was the only surviving son of Sir Sidney Montagu, and was brought up at Hinchingbrooke House....
Nightfall - moving across the Earth as described in The Garden of Cyrus
The Garden of Cyrus
The Garden of Cyrus or The Quincunciall Lozenge, or Network Plantations of the Ancients, naturally, artificially, mystically considered is a Discourse written by Sir Thomas Browne. It was first published in 1658, along with its diptych companion, Urn-Burial...
Station Road in The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...
- where the author walked 12 months previously
Mauritshuis
Mauritshuis
The Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis is an art museum in The Hague, the Netherlands. Previously the residence of count John Maurice of Nassau, it now has a large art collection, including paintings by Dutch painters such as Johannes Vermeer, Rembrandt van Rijn, Jan Steen, Paulus Potter and Frans...
in The Hague which opened in 1644 and displays Jacob van Ruisdael's View of Haarlem with Bleaching Fields
Scheveningen, location of the Kurhaus
Kurhaus (Scheveningen)
The Kurhaus is a prominent building located in Scheveningen, The Hague in The Netherlands .- History :It was built between 1884 and 1885 by the German architects Johann Friedrich Henkenhaf and Friedrich Ebert . It consisted originally of a concert hall and a hotel with 120 rooms. Having suffered...
. The road to the Scheveningen was described by Diderot as a 'promenade without equal'
The Tomb of St Sebolt (the author's namesake) in Nuremburg
The Sailor's Reading Room in Southwold (pictured)
Pictures from the Great War - a book in the reading room which starts with a picture of the arrest of Gavrilo Princip
Gavrilo Princip
Gavrilo Princip was the Bosnian Serb who assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914...
The concentration camp at Jasenovac
Jasenovac concentration camp
Jasenovac concentration camp was the largest extermination camp in the Independent State of Croatia and occupied Yugoslavia during World War II...
on the Sava run by the Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
n Ustaše
Ustaše
The Ustaša - Croatian Revolutionary Movement was a Croatian fascist anti-Yugoslav separatist movement. The ideology of the movement was a blend of fascism, Nazism, and Croatian nationalism. The Ustaše supported the creation of a Greater Croatia that would span to the River Drina and to the border...
where 700,000 were killed
Chapter V
Conrad and Casement - A BBC documentary about Roger CasementRoger Casement
Roger David Casement —Sir Roger Casement CMG between 1911 and shortly before his execution for treason, when he was stripped of his British honours—was an Irish patriot, poet, revolutionary, and nationalist....
(who met Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
in the Congo
Congo Free State
The Congo Free State was a large area in Central Africa which was privately controlled by Leopold II, King of the Belgians. Its origins lay in Leopold's attracting scientific, and humanitarian backing for a non-governmental organization, the Association internationale africaine...
)
The Boy Teodor - Józef Teodor Konrad
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
's childhood: his father Apollo Korzeniowski
Apollo Korzeniowski
Apollo Korzeniowski was a Polish poet, playwright, clandestine political activist, and father of Polish-English novelist Joseph Conrad.-Life:...
was a leading member of the Polish resistance against Russia
Exile in Volgda - His parents were arrested, tried, an exiled to Volgda
Vologda
Vologda is a city and the administrative, cultural, and scientific center of Vologda Oblast, Russia, located on the Vologda River. The city is a major transport knot of the Northwest of Russia. Vologda is among the Russian cities possessing an especially valuable historical heritage...
in Siberia in 1863
Nowofastów - where Konrad stayed with his uncle Tadeusz Bobrowski
Tadeusz Bobrowski
Tadeusz Bobrowski was a Polish memoirist and social activist, best known outside Poland as the maternal uncle, guardian and mentor of Konrad Korzeniowski .-Early life:...
Death and internment of Apollo Korzeniowski - His mother died in exile of tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
, his father returned from exile in 1867 but died the following year in Cracow
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
Sea- and love life - From 1875 Konrad worked on ships between Marseilles and the West Indies, when in Marseilles he fraternized with Spanish legitimists
Carlism
Carlism is a traditionalist and legitimist political movement in Spain seeking the establishment of a separate line of the Bourbon family on the Spanish throne. This line descended from Infante Carlos, Count of Molina , and was founded due to dispute over the succession laws and widespread...
there were rumours of an affair
A Winter Journey - Konrad spent time in Lowestoft
Lowestoft
Lowestoft is a town in the English county of Suffolk. The town is on the North Sea coast and is the most easterly point of the United Kingdom. It is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and south-east of Norwich...
during 1878 and later gained British citizenship. In 1889 he sailed for Africa as captain of a Congo steamboat
The heart of darkness
The Heart of Darkness
The Heart of Darkness is the debut album from Hoodlum Priest. The album had little success, featuring the debut and only appearance of rapper Sevier, who left the band after Derek due to creative differences...
- The despair he experienced in the Congo
Congo Free State
The Congo Free State was a large area in Central Africa which was privately controlled by Leopold II, King of the Belgians. Its origins lay in Leopold's attracting scientific, and humanitarian backing for a non-governmental organization, the Association internationale africaine...
(where five million died between 1890 and 1900 according to Sebald as a direct result of Belgian exploitation) inspired his novel
The panorama of Waterloo - the guilt of Belgium, and the ugly Lion Monument and associated visitor centre commemorating the Battle of Waterloo
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
near Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
Casement, the slave economy and the Irish question - Roger Casement
Roger Casement
Roger David Casement —Sir Roger Casement CMG between 1911 and shortly before his execution for treason, when he was stripped of his British honours—was an Irish patriot, poet, revolutionary, and nationalist....
produced the Casement Report
Casement Report
The Casement Report was a 1904 document by British diplomat Roger Casement detailing abuses in the Congo Free State which was under the private ownership of King Leopold II of Belgium. This report was instrumental in Leopold finally reliquishing his private holdings in Africa...
on the horrors of the Congo but pressure from Leopold II of Belgium
Leopold II of Belgium
Leopold II was the second king of the Belgians. Born in Brussels the second son of Leopold I and Louise-Marie of Orléans, he succeeded his father to the throne on 17 December 1865 and remained king until his death.Leopold is chiefly remembered as the founder and sole owner of the Congo Free...
meant he was ignored and moved to address the Irish question
Irish question
The Irish Question was a phrase used mainly by members of the British ruling classes from the early 19th century until the 1920s. It was used to describe Irish nationalism and the calls for Irish independence....
Casement tried and executed for treason
Treason
In law, treason is the crime that covers some of the more extreme acts against one's sovereign or nation. Historically, treason also covered the murder of specific social superiors, such as the murder of a husband by his wife. Treason against the king was known as high treason and treason against a...
- for seeking to recruit an Irish Brigade in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
Chapter VI
The bridge over the BlythRiver Blyth, Suffolk
The River Blyth is a river in Suffolk, England, with a tidal estuary between Southwold and Walberswick.It can be crossed by pedestrians by a public footbridge called the Bailey Bridge about a mile upstream from the sea or by the Walberswick rowing boat ferry between 9am-5pm daily.The estuary mouth...
- built 1875 for a narrow gauge railway linking Southwold
Southwold
Southwold is a town on the North Sea coast, in the Waveney district of the English county of Suffolk. It is located on the North Sea coast at the mouth of the River Blyth within the Suffolk Coast and Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The town is around south of Lowestoft and north-east...
to Halesworth
Halesworth
Halesworth is a small market town in the northeastern corner of Suffolk, England. It is located south west of Lowestoft, and straddles the River Blyth, 9 miles upstream from Southwold. The town is served by Halesworth railway station on the Ipswich-Lowestoft East Suffolk Line...
The Chinese court train - never delivered to the Emperor of China it initially ran on the line
The Taiping Rebellion
Taiping Rebellion
The Taiping Rebellion was a widespread civil war in southern China from 1850 to 1864, led by heterodox Christian convert Hong Xiuquan, who, having received visions, maintained that he was the younger brother of Jesus Christ, against the ruling Manchu-led Qing Dynasty...
and the opening of China - in the wake of the Opium Wars
Opium Wars
The Opium Wars, also known as the Anglo-Chinese Wars, divided into the First Opium War from 1839 to 1842 and the Second Opium War from 1856 to 1860, were the climax of disputes over trade and diplomatic relations between China under the Qing Dynasty and the British Empire...
Destruction of the garden of Yuan Ming Yuan by a joint force of British and French in 1860
The end of Emperor Hsien-Feng
The Dowager Empress Tz'u-hsi
Empress Dowager Cixi
Empress Dowager Cixi1 , of the Manchu Yehenara clan, was a powerful and charismatic figure who became the de facto ruler of the Manchu Qing Dynasty in China for 47 years from 1861 to her death in 1908....
The town beneath the sea - Dunwich
Dunwich
Dunwich is a small town in Suffolk, England, within the Suffolk Coast and Heaths AONB.Dunwich was the capital of East Anglia 1500 years ago but the harbour and most of the town have since disappeared due to coastal erosion. Its decline began in 1286 when a sea surge hit the East Anglian coast, and...
Poor Algernon - Algernon Charles Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He invented the roundel form, wrote several novels, and contributed to the famous Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica...
who often walked between Southwold and Dunwich with his companion Theodore Watts-Dunton
Theodore Watts-Dunton
Theodore Watts-Dunton was an English critic and poet. He is often remembered as the friend and minder of Algernon Charles Swinburne, whom he rescued from alcoholism.-Birth and education:...
Chapter VII
Dunwich heath - a discussion on deforestationMarsh Acres, Middleton
Middleton, Suffolk
Middleton is a village in Suffolk, England. It is located approximately north-west of Leiston, north east of Saxmundham and from the Suffolk coast. The village is on the B1122 east of Yoxford and had a population of 359 at the 2001 census....
- home of translator Michael Hamburger
Michael Hamburger
Michael Hamburger OBE was a noted British translator, poet, critic, memoirist, and academic. He was known in particular for his translations of Friedrich Hölderlin, Paul Celan, Gottfried Benn and W. G. Sebald from German, and his work in literary criticism...
A Berlin childhood - Michael left in 1933
Dreams, elective affinities, correspondences - between the author and Michael's lives
Chapter VIII
A conversation about sugar - many museums such as the Tate GalleryTate Gallery
The Tate is an institution that houses the United Kingdom's national collection of British Art, and International Modern and Contemporary Art...
and Mauritshuis
Mauritshuis
The Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis is an art museum in The Hague, the Netherlands. Previously the residence of count John Maurice of Nassau, it now has a large art collection, including paintings by Dutch painters such as Johannes Vermeer, Rembrandt van Rijn, Jan Steen, Paulus Potter and Frans...
were originally endowed by sugar dynasties
Boulge
Boulge
Boulge is a hamlet and civil parish in the Suffolk Coastal district of Suffolk, England. It is about north of Woodbridge.Boulge church is the burial place of famous local poet/writer Edward Fitzgerald, whose most famous work was the translation The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.-External links:*...
Park - near Woodbridge
Woodbridge, Suffolk
Woodbridge is a town in Suffolk, East Anglia, England. It is in the East of England, not far from the coast. It lies along the River Deben, with a population of about 7,480. The town is served by Woodbridge railway station on the Ipswich-Lowestoft East Suffolk Line. Woodbridge is twinned with...
where poet Edward FitzGerald
Edward FitzGerald (poet)
Edward FitzGerald was an English writer, best known as the poet of the first and most famous English translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The spelling of his name as both FitzGerald and Fitzgerald is seen...
lived
Bredfield nursery - in nearby Bredfield House
Bredfield House
Bredfield House was situated in the village of Bredfield, around 2 miles north of Woodbridge, Suffolk, England...
where he spent much of his childhood
Edword Fitzgerald's literary ventures - most notably his translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
Last journey - FitzGeralds last journey, to Merton
Merton, Norfolk
Merton is a civil parish in the English county of Norfolk.It covers an area of and had a population of 113 in 50 households as of the 2001 census. For the purposes of local government, it falls within the district of Breckland...
in Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
An Irish memory - Sebald recalls a visit to the Ashbury's near Clarahill in Ireland
On the history of the civil war - the Irish Civil War
Irish Civil War
The Irish Civil War was a conflict that accompanied the establishment of the Irish Free State as an entity independent from the United Kingdom within the British Empire....
The entrepreneurial spirit and the cult of the pheasant - exemplified by Cuthbert Quilter
Sir William Quilter, 1st Baronet
Sir William Cuthbert Quilter, 1st Baronet was an English stock broker, art collector and Liberal/Liberal Unionist politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1885 to 1906....
who built Bawdsey Manor
Bawdsey Manor
Bawdsey Manor stands at a prominent position at the mouth of the River Deben close to the village of Bawdsey in Suffolk, England, about 118 km northeast of London....
Through the desert - past Rendlesham Forest
Rendlesham Forest
Rendlesham Forest is a 1500-hectare mixed woodland in Suffolk owned by the Forestry Commission with recreation facilities for walkers, cyclists and campers. Catering to enthusiasts of the 1980 Rendlesham Forest incident, there is a special UFO trail....
to Orford Castle
Orford Castle
Orford Castle is a castle in the village of Orford, Suffolk, England, located 12 miles northeast of Ipswich, with views over the Orford Ness. It was built between 1165 and 1173 by Henry II of England to consolidate royal power in the region. The well-preserved keep, described by historian R...
Secret weapons of destruction - on Orford Ness
Orford Ness
Orford Ness is a cuspate foreland shingle spit on the Suffolk coast in Great Britain, linked to the mainland at Aldeburgh and stretching along the coast to Orford and down to North Wier Point, opposite Shingle Street. It is divided from the mainland by the River Alde, and was formed by longshore...
including the rumours about Shingle Street
Shingle Street
Shingle Street is a small coastal hamlet in Suffolk, England, at the mouth of Orford Ness, situated between Orford and Bawdsey. This part of the coast is also known as Hollesley Bay and there is the HM Young Offender Institution, Hollesley Bay Colony nearby....
Chapter IX
The Temple of Jerusalem - A model being built by a retired farmerin a barn between Yoxford
Yoxford
Yoxford is a village in the east of Suffolk, England close to the Heritage Coast, Minsmere Reserve , Aldeburgh and Southwold.-Location and features:...
and Harleston
Harleston
Harleston may refer to:*Harleston, Devon*Harleston, Norfolk*Harleston, Suffolk...
Charlotte Ives and the Vicomte de Chateaubriand the story of their doomed love played out in Bungay
Bungay
Bungay is a town in Suffolk, East Anglia, England.Bungay may also refer to:* Bungay railway station* Frank Bungay , former professional footballer* Stephen Bungay , British management consultant, historian and author...
Memoirs from beyond the grave
Mémoires d'Outre-Tombe
Mémoires d'Outre-Tombe - literally "Memoirs from Beyond the Grave" - is an autobiography in 42 volumes by François-René de Chateaubriand, published posthumously in 1848...
- written by Chateaubriand who grew up in the Château de Combourg
Château de Combourg
The Château de Combourg is a castle in the commune of Combourg in the Ille-et-Vilaine département, in Brittany, France.The castle stands on a small hill next to Lac Tranquille in the town....
in Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
In Ditchingham
Ditchingham
Ditchingham is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. It is located across the River Waveney from Bungay, Suffolk near to The Broads National Park.- Overview :...
churchyard - the grave of Charlotte Ives and her family
Ditchingham Park - and Dutch Elm Disease
Dutch elm disease
Dutch elm disease is a disease caused by a member of the sac fungi category, affecting elm trees which is spread by the elm bark beetle. Although believed to be originally native to Asia, the disease has been accidentally introduced into America and Europe, where it has devastated native...
The hurricane of 16th October 1987
Great Storm of 1987
The Great Storm of 1987 occurred on the night of 15/16 October 1987, when an unusually strong weather system caused winds to hit much of southern England and northern France...
Chapter X
Thomas Browne's Musæum ClausumMusaeum Clausum
Musaeum Clausum , also known as Bibliotheca abscondita, is a tract written by Sir Thomas Browne first published posthumously in 1684. The book contains short descriptions of supposed, rumoured or lost books pictures and objects...
The silkworm moth Bombyx mori
Bombyx mori
The silkworm is the larva or caterpillar of the domesticated silkmoth, Bombyx mori . It is an economically important insect, being a primary producer of silk...
Origins and spread of sericulture
Sericulture
Sericulture, or silk farming, is the rearing of silkworms for the production of raw silk.Although there are several commercial species of silkworms, Bombyx mori is the most widely used and intensively studied. According to Confucian texts, the discovery of silk production by B...
- From China to Greece and Italy then on to France where Olivier de Serres
Olivier de Serres
Olivier de Serres was a French author and soil scientist whose Théâtre d'Agriculture was the text book of French agriculture in the 17th century..Serres was born at Villeneuve-de-Berg, Ardèche...
argued for its introduction against Maximilien de Béthune, Duke of Sully
The Norwich silk-weavers - many arrived having fled France as a result of the Edict of Nantes
Edict of Nantes
The Edict of Nantes, issued on 13 April 1598, by Henry IV of France, granted the Calvinist Protestants of France substantial rights in a nation still considered essentially Catholic. In the Edict, Henry aimed primarily to promote civil unity...
Sericulture in Germany