There is indeed life after politics, as Margaret Thatcher's transport minister demonstrates with his series Great British Railway Journeys. As even a Guardian writer concedes, Portillo is 'a weirdly compelling host' whose passion for trains and history cannot help but take viewers along for the ride

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The adaptation of 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy' into a 1979 BBC series left le Carré with a good opinion of what long episodic versions of his work could be. 'The Night Manager', starring Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Laurie, more than confirms the author's faith was not misplaced

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Distinguished Transported   Daniel Connor. Seven years for sheep stealing. One of largest landowners in central Perth.   Jørgen Jørgensen. Eccentric Danish adventurer, declared himself ruler of Iceland, later became a spy in Britain.   John Davies. Founded The Mercury newspaper.   William Henry Groom. Politician, member of inaugural Australian Parliament.   Laurence Hynes Halloran. […]

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Gruel   Oliver asked for more. Politely. (He still got belted.) Popular literature was culprit for mongrel association, to starvation and poverty, but gruel has papers. Maize mush was the primary food of Mayans and Aztecs; a staple of ancient Greeks and Roman plebeians. Gruel allowed women to stop breast-feeding after only two years, halving […]

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The in-depth, long-play serials of episodic television bring us back to those now practically obsolete, brick-like Victorian novels—the kind you could get lost in for weeks. True, there are minor quibbles about the series' rendering of history, but overall it is an enthralling delight

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C C A D A   Tambourine of the cicada. Ululation of the cicada. White noise of the cicada.   Emerging out of cricket jangle, a crescendo of chattering, surround-sound clattering, mating call, war cry, territorial stake, community sing, the sonic arc steeply decrescendos back into frog cry and kookaburra hoo-hah. Between arias, erratic vocalists […]

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The Great Male-versus-Female Guitar Contest of 1933 Little Lizzy Douglas (they called her the kid), was born in Louisiana, in a farmer’s shed. She didn’t like farming, she didn’t like her name, so she grabbed a guitar and hopped on a train. Little Lizzie Douglas stepped on board— but when she stepped off, Memphis Minnie […]

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Sense of Out-of-Place Barbecue. Unincorporated community in North Carolina. Bastardstown. Townland in Wexford, Ireland (Irish name: Baile Bhastaird). Batman. City, in Turkey, threatened to sue Warner Bros for use of name. Bitch Mountain. Summit in Essex County, New York. Boring, Oregon. Sister city to Dull, Scotland, and Bland, NSW. Boquete. Small town in Panama. (Boquete […]

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  Colonel John Paul II Who made Colonel Sanders (of the chicken) colonel? Goateed, string-tied, linen-suited, paternal, honorary title: Kentucky Colonel— a two hundred year rollcall, in the journals, of the Honorable Order of Kentucky Colonels. Charles Stewart Todd was the first, when his celebrated Kentucky Militia dispersed, after victory in the War of 1812. […]

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One of the biggest surprises I recall, when moving to Australia in 1979 from the States, was my discovery that the classic piece of patriotic Americana that I had been singing since a child, “America (My Country ’tis of Thee)”, was also known, in Australia, as “God Save the Queen”—same melody, but with different words. […]

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