Phil Benson
The Itinerary of John Leland in or About the Years 1535-1543
John Leland's 'Itinerary' was the product of several journeys around England and Wales undertaken between 1538 and 1543. The manuscript is m…
Things Seen in Florence
One of the largest and wealthiest cities of medieval Europe, the home of Dante and Giotto has long been a magnet for lovers of art, architec…
The Story of Peterloo
On 16th August 1819 around 60,000 people gathered at St. Peter’s Fields, Manchester, to rally for parliamentary reform. Shortly after the me…
The Blue Review, Number 3
The Blue Review was a short lived monthly journal published in London between May and July 1913. The successor to Rhythm, The Blue Review wa…
Two Cumberland Ballads
Two narrative ballads, based on local lore, by the Cumberland poet John Stagg. In 'The Hermit of Rockcliffe', a young fugitive takes refuge …
Every Man His Own Art Critic
This collection includes two texts written to accompany two blockbuster art exhibitions: Every man his own art critic at the Manchester Exhi…
Geraldine Jewsbury in Jerrold's Shilling Magazine, 1846-47
'The most striking feature in the present day, far more than that of railways even, is the utter chaos into which all previously received pr…
War Impressions: Being a Record in Colour
A personal account of the second Boer War by Australian expatriate artist Mortimer Menpes. Menpes travelled to South Africa as a corresponde…
Six lectures on literature
C. H. Herford was Professor of English Literature at the Victoria University of Manchester in era when public lectures were published in pam…
The Later Life
Set in the stifling world of turn of the century Dutch aristocracy, the second volume of the 'Books of the Small Souls' quartet, begins wher…
Manchester Poetry
Manchester's first published anthology of locally-written poetry was compiled by editor James Wheeler to show that Manchester, 'the most mec…
The Lady Macbeth of the Mzinsk District
In Mzinsk, a remote Russian town, adultery is Katerina's relief from boredom. Before long she has developed a passion for he lover, Sergei, …
Prose Romances from the Oxford and Cambridge Magazine (1856)
William Morris initiated the genre of high fantasy in a number of short novels written toward the end of his life. But he had already experi…
Extracts from a Diary Kept by the Rev. R. Burrows during Heke's War in the North, in 1845
An eye-witness account of the so-called Flagstaff War, fought between Maori warriors, led by Hone Heke, and British troops between March 184…
An Excursion to the Lakes in Westmoreland and Cumberland, August 1773
In the summer of 1773, lawyer and antiquarian William Hutchinson set out from his home in County Durham on a tour of the English Lake Distri…
Dr. Adriaan
The fourth and final book in Louis Couperus' Books of the Small Souls quartet. Ten years have passed since the conclusion of The Twilight of…
Lancashire Characters and Places
An eclectic collection of essays on late 19th-century Lancashire culture and life, including essays on the poets John Critchley Prince and E…
The Evergreen, A Northern Seasonal. Spring 1895
The Evergreen was a short lived seasonal magazine, edited by William Sharp (Fiona Macleod) and published by Patrick Geddes, which proposed a…
Little Johannes
In this allegory of childhood and youth, a series of increasingly sinister mentors - Windekind, Wistik, Pluizer and Dr. Cypher - guide the a…
The Twilight of the Souls
The third book in Louis Couperus' Books of the Small Souls quartet. The Twilight of the Souls begins some months after the conclusion of The…