In "The Cricket Field," James Pycroft offers a comprehensive exploration of the game of cricket, intertwining detailed descriptions of rules, gameplay, and personal experiences with sharp observations on the sport's cultural significance in Victorian England. Pycroft's literary style reflects a blend of instructional prose and anecdotal storytelling, echoing the era's fascination with sports as a reflection of societal values. Through his erudite yet accessible language, he conveys the int...

In "The Cricket Field," James Pycroft offers a comprehensive exploration of the sport of cricket, intertwining historical analysis and personal anecdotes to illuminate the game's evolving significance in 19th-century England. Pycroft's literary style combines a vibrant narrative with meticulous detail, making both the technical aspects of cricket and its cultural implications accessible to readers. With chapters oscillating between the technical intricacies of batting and bowling and broad...

The astonishing story of James Hardy Vaux, writer of Australia's first dictionary and first true-crime memoirIf you wear 'togs', tell a 'yarn', call someone 'sly', or refuse to 'snitch' on a friend then you are talking like a convict.These words, and hundreds of others, once left colonial magistrates baffled and police confused. So comprehensible to us today, the flash language of criminals and convicts had marine officer Watkin Tench complaining about the ...

Prisons and Prisoners In Victorian Britain provides an illustrated insight into the Victorian prison system and the experiences of those within it - on both sides of the bars. Featuring stories of crime and misdeeds, this fascinating book includes chapters on a typical day inside a Victorian prison - food, divine service, exercise and medical provision; the punishments inflicted on convicts - such as hard labour, flogging, the treadwheel and shot drill; and an ove...

Using contemporary accounts of W.G.'s greatest innings, many for the first time, Robert Low presents a radically new image of the sportsman who was recognised as the pre-eminent athlete of his day.From his emergence as a teenage prodigy to well past his fiftieth year W.G. dominated the game of cricket, taking 2,876 wickets and scoring 54,896 first-class runs in a career lasting an incredible 43 years, from 1865 to 1908. His beard and massive frame made him instantly recognisable wherever h...

Included are the imaginative reconstruction of the 1882 England and Australia test match to Cardus's descriptions of village cricket, accounts of the great players that Cardus watched play (from Donald Bradman and Harold Larwood to Wally Hammond) to examples of his 'Shastbury' writings.Chosen and introduced by Sir Rupert Hart-Davis, Cardus on Cricket features a range of writings from 'Cricket', 'Days in the Sun', 'The Summer Game', 'Good Days', 'Australian ...

The former Prime Minister examines the early history of one of the great loves of his life in a book that sheds new light on the summer game’s social origins.All his life John Major has loved cricket. In ‘More Than a Game’ he examines it from its origins up to the coming of the First World War. Along the way he considers the crucial role of the wealthy patrons who gambled huge sums on early matches; the truth behind the legends that have grown up around the famous Hambledon Club; c...

"A monthly magazine costing sixpence but worth a shilling."For 60 years The Strand Magazine showcased the best writers in England and America.The magazine did not just reflect the age, it shaped it.It was a popular publication for the best in fiction, featuring works by some of the greatest authors of the 19th and 20th centuries, including Rudyard Kipling, Leo Tolstoy, Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, as well as European writers such as Victor Hugo and Le...

The author of I, Claudius tells the tale of a notorious nineteenth-century poisoner: "A must for true-crime addicts" ( Kirkus Reviews).A self-confessed forger, cheat, thief, and petty criminal, William Palmer was also a surgeon and a racehorse owner during the Victorian era who doped horses, fixed races, philandered unapologetically, and generally behaved as an all-around rogue. But the crime for which he was condemned was altogether more serious:...

First published in 1917, this semi-autobiographical work tells the story of Gordon Caruthers' schooldays at the English public school, Fenhurst. From his confusion and isolation, through rebellious school escapades and relationships with fellow students, Alec Waugh reveals his own deep criticism of a system forcing pupils to conform to flawed ideals, and the inevitable consequences of thrusting thirteen year old children and eighteen year old adolescents together. The book caused a storm o...

Inspiring and irreverent by turns, Brian Levison's new anthology has drawn on rugby's wealth of excellent writing. Frank Keating, P. G. Wodehouse, Alec Waugh, A. A. Thomson, John Reason and Mick Imlah are among the distinguished names who have written movingly, amusingly and entertainingly about the game they loved.Great players such as Brian O'Driscoll, Willie John McBride, J. P. R. Williams, Chester Williams, Colin Meads, Gavin Hastings and Brian Moore give us a fascinating insid...

______________________A fascinating examination of cricket in the nineteenth century by 'the most entertaining historian alive' (Spectator)'Few historians have the power to make you feel you actually inhabit the times they are writing about. Kynaston does' Sunday Times, Books of the DecadeOn a hot morning in July 1898, the sporting world gathered at Lord's to celebrate the fiftieth birthday of WG Gr...