Is that a woman or a man?
“But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life...” in Middlemarch. So said George Eliot. Which rings even more true to me, since George was actually a 'Georgina', or Mary Ann Evans to be correct. That she had to hide behind a male pen name,
Shakespeare's Shakespeare?
I'm lucky to share my name with a lesser known author who contributed much to the standard English of today. When I mean standard, I'm not thinking of the rules of grammar, but the common everyday language of expressions: phrases and idioms as teachers often refer to them. Shakespeare is very well known, not only for his wit and perception, but also for a lot of lovely modern English language: puking, bawdy, The Mousetrap etc. (more on Agatha Christie - and of course Shakespe
The wisdom of Jane Austen
"I have not wanted syllables where actions have spoken so plainly" in Sense and Sensibility. Might seem a strange thing to write, given that this is (or soon will be) a website about writing and where, without syllables, nothing would be communicated. But I have always been a fan of Jane Austen. She is the author of the women's bible and is someone who acted in a way that she could for her time and social position. Given that we are celebrating 100 years of women getting the