About Short Reads
Passing thoughts and more personal things about Nelson and his times. Be warned, some pieces I write may border on the silly.
‘Nelson was once Britannia’s god of war,
Don Juan: Canto the First, Lord Byron, 1818
And still should be so, but the tide is turn’d’
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England Expects
England expects. For years, I hated that phrase. Find out why.
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Losing Nelson by Barry Unsworth (1999)
There are plenty of Nelson biographies out there, but he doesn’t make as many appearances in fiction as you might think.
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The Divine Comedy Sing… Trafalgar
As with most Divine Comedy songs, you wonder why ‘Trafalgar’ isn’t better known. I’m not sure how it escaped me for so long.
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The One With Emma Hamilton
Lady Emma Hamilton, the great love of Horatio Nelson’s life, was born OTD in 1765. She began life a peasant, then married into high society, had an affair – and a lovechild – with the most famous sailor in the world, and somehow died a pauper. It’s a long and hair-raising story, which I intend…
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St George’s Day
I’ve never really understood what these ‘Saint’ days are all about. But, seeing as it is St George’s Day – in which we English purport to celebrate a Turkish soldier killing an imaginary dragon in Libya roughly two millennia ago – I thought I’d share an anecdote that is stonkingly patriotic even by Nelson’s high…
Nelson The Sailor 