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Michael Flanders
Michael Henry Flanders (1 March 1922 – 14 April 1975) was an English actor, broadcaster, writer and performer of comic songs. He is best known for his stage partnership with Donald Swann. As a young man Flanders seemed to be heading for a successful acting career. However, he contracted polio in 1943 while serving in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve and for the rest of his life was reliant on a wheelchair. He made a career as a prolific broadcaster on the radio and later on television. Moreover, he together with his old school friend, the composer Donald Swann, wrote successful songs in the late 1940s to the early and mid-1950s for revues in the West End of London. In 1956 they themselves performed some of these songs, along with new songs, in a two-man revue, '' At the Drop of a Hat''. This show, and its successor, '' At the Drop of Another Hat'', ran with occasional short breaks from 1956 to 1967 and played in theatres throughout the British Isles, the US, Australia and e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Western Europe, with a population of 14.9 million. London stands on the River Thames in southeast England, at the head of a tidal estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major settlement for nearly 2,000 years. Its ancient core and financial centre, the City of London, was founded by the Roman Empire, Romans as Londinium and has retained its medieval boundaries. The City of Westminster, to the west of the City of London, has been the centuries-long host of Government of the United Kingdom, the national government and Parliament of the United Kingdom, parliament. London grew rapidly 19th-century London, in the 19th century, becoming the world's List of largest cities throughout history, largest city at the time. Since the 19th cen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Westminster School
Westminster School is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school in Westminster, London, England, in the precincts of Westminster Abbey. It descends from a charity school founded by Westminster Benedictines before the Norman Conquest, as documented by the Croyland Chronicle and a charter of King Offa. Continuous existence is clear from the early 14th century. Westminster was one of nine schools examined by the 1861 Clarendon Commission and reformed by the Public Schools Act 1868. The school motto, ''Dat Deus Incrementum'', quotes 1 Corinthians 3:6: "I planted the seed... but God made it grow." The school owns playing fields and tennis courts in the centre of the Vincent Square, along which Westminster Under School is also situated. Its academic results place it among the top schools nationally; about half its students go to Oxbridge, giving it the highest national Oxbridge acceptance rate. In the 2023 A-level (United Kingdom), A-levels, the school saw 82.3% of its candidate ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 1880s to his death and beyond. He wrote more than sixty plays, including major works such as ''Man and Superman'' (1902), ''Pygmalion (play), Pygmalion'' (1913) and ''Saint Joan (play), Saint Joan'' (1923). With a range incorporating both contemporary satire and historical allegory, Shaw became the leading dramatist of his generation, and in 1925 was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Born in Dublin, in 1876 Shaw moved to London, where he struggled to establish himself as a writer and novelist, and embarked on a rigorous process of self-education. By the mid-1880s he had become a respected theatre and music critic. Following a political awakening, he joined the Gradualism (politics), gradualist Fabian Society and became its most prominent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Oxford Playhouse
The Oxford Playhouse is a theatre designed by Edward Maufe and F. G. M. Chancellor. It is situated in Beaumont Street, Oxford, opposite the Ashmolean Museum. History The Playhouse was founded as ''The Red Barn'' at 12 Woodstock Road (Oxford), Woodstock Road, North Oxford, in 1923 by J. B. Fagan. The early history of the theatre is documented by the theatre director, Norman Marshall (theatre director), Norman Marshall in his 1947 book, ''The Other Theatre''. Don Chapman also provided a comprehensive study of the theatre in the 2008 book, ''Oxford Playhouse: High and Low Drama in a University City''. The exterior design of the theatre building on the south side of Beaumont Street was by Sir Edward Maufe, with the interior design by F.G.M. Chancellor; the building was completed in 1938. It is faced with stone, in keeping with the early 19th century Regency architecture, Regency buildings in the street. Actors who have appeared on the stage at the Playhouse include Rowan Atkinson, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Cherwell (newspaper)
''Cherwell'' ( ) is a student newspaper published entirely by students of Oxford University. Founded in 1920 and named after a local river, ''Cherwell'' is a subsidiary of independent student publishing house Oxford Student Publications Ltd. Receiving no university funding, the newspaper is one of the oldest and largest student publications in the UK. The paper is published five times each term. History ''Cherwell'' was conceived by two Balliol College students, Cecil Binney and George Adolphus Edinger, on a ferry from Dover to Ostend during the summer vacation of 1920 while the students were travelling to Vienna to do relief work for the Save the Children charity. Edinger recalls the early newspaper having a radical voice: "We were feeling for a new Oxford …. We were anti-convention, anti-Pre War values, pro-feminist. We did not mind shocking and we often did." The publication was independent of the University of Oxford and it was entirely financed, staffed, and owne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
The Ascent Of F6
''The Ascent of F6: A Tragedy in Two Acts'', by W. H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood, was the second and most successful play in the Auden–Isherwood collaboration, first published in 1936. It was a major contribution to English poetic drama in the 1930s. It has been seen as a parable about will, leadership and the nature of power: matters of increasing concern in Europe as that decade progressed. Plot The play tells the story of Michael Ransom, a climber, who, against his better judgement, accepts the offer of the British press and government to sponsor an expedition to the peak of F6, a mountain on the border of a British colony and a colony of the fictional country of Ostnia. Ransom is destroyed by his haste to complete the expedition ahead of the Ostnian climbers. Background The play is dedicated to Auden's geologist brother John Bicknell Auden who had taken part in an expedition near the Karakoram mountain K2. The play is widely regarded as an allegory of Auden's own tem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Christopher Isherwood
Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood (26 August 1904 – 4 January 1986) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist. His best-known works include '' Goodbye to Berlin'' (1939), a semi-autobiographical novel which inspired the musical ''Cabaret'' (1966); ''A Single Man'' (1964), adapted into a film directed by Tom Ford in 2009; and '' Christopher and His Kind'' (1976), a memoir which "carried him into the heart of the Gay Liberation movement". Biography Family Isherwood was the elder son of Francis Edward Bradshaw Isherwood (1869–1915), known as Frank, a professional soldier in the York and Lancaster Regiment, and Kathleen Bradshaw Isherwood, née Machell Smith (1868–1960), the only daughter of a successful wine merchant. He was the grandson of John Henry Isherwood, squire of Marple Hall and Wyberslegh Hall, Cheshire, and he included among his ancestors the Puritan judge John Bradshaw, who signed the death warrant of King C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Henry IV (Pirandello)
''Henry IV'' ( ) is an Italian play ''(Enrico IV)'' by Luigi Pirandello written in 1921 and premiered to general acclaim at the Teatro Manzoni in Milan on 24 February 1922. A study on madness with comic and tragic elements, it is about a man who believes himself to be Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor. It has been adapted and translated into English by Tom Stoppard, among others. Rex Harrison starred in a British production which was translated by Stephen Rich, and went to Broadway in 1973. Plot overview An unnamed Italian aristocrat falls off his horse while playing the role of Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor during carnevale festivities, which take place annually before Lent. After he comes to, he believes himself to be Henry. For the next twenty years, his family, including his sister and now his nephew, Marchese Carlo Di Nolli, maintain an elaborate charade in a remote Umbrian villa, decorated to resemble Henry's imperial palace at Goslar and staffed with servants hired to play th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Luigi Pirandello
Luigi Pirandello (; ; 28 June 1867 – 10 December 1936) was an Italians, Italian dramatist, novelist, poet, and short story writer whose greatest contributions were his plays. He was awarded the 1934 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his bold and ingenious revival of dramatic and scenic art". Pirandello's works include novels, hundreds of short stories, and about 40 plays, some of which are written in Sicilian language, Sicilian. Pirandello's tragic farces are often seen as forerunners of the Theatre of the Absurd. Biography Early life Pirandello was born into an upper-class family in Girgenti (now Agrigento), Sicily, near the poor suburb of Porto Empedocle. His family's surname had originally been the Greek language, Greek "Pirangelos" (Greek language, Greek: ), which had been phonetically corrupted. Pirandello was of Greeks, Greek descent, as he noted himself in an interview to Kostas Ouranis in 1934. The area of his birth was called "Caos", from , Sicilian language, Sici ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Othello
''The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice'', often shortened to ''Othello'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare around 1603. Set in Venice and Cyprus, the play depicts the Moorish military commander Othello as he is manipulated by his ensign, Iago, into suspecting his wife Desdemona of infidelity. ''Othello'' is widely considered one of Shakespeare's greatest works and is usually classified among his major tragedies alongside ''Macbeth'', ''King Lear'', and ''Hamlet''. Unpublished in the author's life, the play survives in one quarto edition from 1622 and in the First Folio. ''Othello'' has been one of Shakespeare's most popular plays, both among playgoers and literary critics, since its first performance, spawning numerous stage, screen, and operatic adaptations. Among actors, the roles of Othello, Iago, Desdemona, and Emilia (Iago's wife) are regarded as highly demanding and desirable. Critical attention has focused on the nature of the play's tragedy, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Oxford University Dramatic Society
The Oxford University Dramatic Society (OUDS) is the principal funding body and provider of theatrical services to the many independent student productions put on by students in Oxford, England. Not all student productions at Oxford University are awarded funding from the society. However it is rare, for example, for any student production at the Oxford Playhouse not to receive substantial funding from the society. The society funds many types of shows, mostly at the Oxford Playhouse, Burton Taylor Theatre, and the individual college theatres such as the Michael Pilch Studio at Balliol College, Oxford, Balliol, Moser Theatre at Wadham College, Oxford, Wadham and the O'Reilly Theatre at Keble College, Oxford, Keble. All productions put on by Oxford University students can use the society's services, such as the website, the auditions portal, and advice from the committee, providing their production company is registered. The Society supports a competition for Freshers (''Cuppers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church (, the temple or house, ''wikt:aedes, ædes'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII, the college is uniquely a joint foundation of the university and the cathedral of the Oxford diocese, Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, Christ Church Cathedral, which also serves as the college chapel and whose Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, dean is ''ex officio'' the college head. As of 2022, the college had 661 students. Its grounds contain a number of architecturally significant buildings including Tom Tower (designed by Christopher Wren, Sir Christopher Wren), Tom Quad (the largest quadrangle in Oxford), and the Great Dining Hall, which was the seat of the Oxford Parliament (1644), parliament assembled by Charles I of England, King Charles I during the English Civil War. The buildings have inspired repli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
