The air glitters with hope as the snowy village of Merrywake celebrates the Christmas season after the tumult of the Napoleonic Wars. As the Viscount’s famous Twelfth Night Ball draws closer, many of the villagers have a story to tell – we meet a lovelorn vicar and kindly maid reunited after a misunderstanding, three sisters […]
Christmas reading 2023 – historical books to give or ask for
We asked 13 well-loved authors to each recommend a couple of historical books for Christmas 2023 to give, receive, or treat yourself with. There’s fiction and non-fiction, most published recently, with a few old favourites as well. We hope these suggestions help to inspire your Christmas reading. Tracy Borman Henry VIII: The Heart and the […]
Oliver Cromwell’s war on Christmas?
Probably the one thing that most people could tell you about Oliver Cromwell (other that that he had warts) was that he banned Christmas. It is a ‘fact’ that is often referenced today, with comparisons being made to modern restrictions on festivities due to Covid-19. Is it true though? Stuart Orme, curator of the Cromwell […]
“Put those Christmas lights out!” The Home Front during World War Two
Jean Fullerton’s novels draw on the history of her native East End of London. Her Ration Book series, set during the Second World War, vividly describes Christmas at a time when cupboards were, if not bare, not stocked with treats, either. She tells Historia what wartime Christmases were like. For centuries Christmas has been a […]
The Best Costume Dramas for Christmas
Katherine Clements picks the best costume drama to watch over the festive season. The Crown (Netflix, from 8th December) When The Crown first aired last year it was much hyped as the most expensive TV series ever made. I doubted whether a show about our current royals would live up to such grand claims. I was […]
From Disturbing to Disney: the Strange Tale of the Nutcracker
Catherine Hokin investigates the history of festive favourite, The Nutcracker ballet. A deeply creepy inventor ‘uncle’, a seven-headed mouse, a little girl who tears her arm open on broken glass and a curse which traps first a queen and then a boy inside the misshapen body of a giant nutcracker: what better story to entertain your […]
HWA’s Christmas Reads
We asked members of the Historical Writers’ Association which books were on their Christmas list, and which they were giving to others. The results include some sparkling fiction and non-fiction, from prize-winning novels to hidden gems. Manda Scott Every year something jumps out of the TBR pile and makes itself noticed so that I remember it […]