Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish author who is best known for writing the 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula. During his lifetime, he was better known as the personal assistant of actor Sir Henry Irving and business manager of the West End's Lyceum Theatre, which Irving owned.
The Hound of the Baskervilles is the third of the four crime novels by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serialised in The Strand Magazine from August 1901 to April 1902, it is set largely in Dartmoor, Devon, in England's West Country and follows Holmes and Watson investigating the legend of a fearsome, diabolical hound of supernatural origin. This was the first appearance of Holmes since his apparent death in "The Final Problem", and the success of The Hound of the Baskervilles led to the character's eventual revival.
Northanger Abbey is a coming-of-age novel and a satire of Gothic novels written by the English author Jane Austen. Although the title page is dated 1818 and was published posthumously in 1817 with Persuasion, Northanger Abbey was completed in 1803, making it the first of Austen's novels to be completed in full. From a fondness of Gothic novels and an active imagination distorting her worldview, the story follows Catherine Morland, the naïve young protagonist, as she develops to better understand herself and the world around her.
Henry James was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the son of Henry James Sr. and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James.
Travels with My Aunt (1969) is a novel written by English author Graham Greene.
Sir Peter Reginald Frederick Hall CBE was an English theatre, opera and film director. His obituary in The Times declared him "the most important figure in British theatre for half a century" and on his death, a Royal National Theatre statement declared that Hall's "influence on the artistic life of Britain in the 20th century was unparalleled". In 2018, the Laurence Olivier Awards, recognising achievements in London theatre, changed the award for Best Director to the Sir Peter Hall Award for Best Director.
Riddley Walker is a science fiction novel by American writer Russell Hoban, first published in 1980. It won the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best science fiction novel in 1982, as well as an Australian Science Fiction Achievement Award in 1983. It was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1981.
Harry Stewart Fleetwood Andrews, CBE was an English actor known for his film portrayals of tough military officers. His performance as Regimental Sergeant Major Wilson in The Hill (1965) alongside Sean Connery earned Andrews the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actor and a nomination for the 1966 BAFTA Award for Best British Actor. The first of his more than 80 film appearances was in The Red Beret in 1953.
Sir Ronald Harwood was a South African-born British author, playwright, and screenwriter, best known for his plays for the British stage as well as the screenplays for The Dresser and The Pianist, for which he won the 2003 Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. He was nominated for the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007).
Anna Maxwell Martin, sometimes credited as Anna Maxwell-Martin, is a British actress. She won two British Academy Television Awards, for her portrayals of Esther Summerson in the BBC adaptation of Bleak House (2005) and N in the Channel 4 adaptation of Poppy Shakespeare (2008). She is also known for her roles as DCS Patricia Carmichael in BBC One crime drama Line of Duty (2019–2021) and Kelly Major in Code 404 (2020–present). From 2016-2022, Martin starred in the BBC comedy Motherland, for which she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Female Comedy Performance.
The Theatre Royal in Bath, England, was built in 1805. A Grade II* listed building, it has been described by the Theatres Trust as "One of the most important surviving examples of Georgian theatre architecture". It has a capacity for an audience of around 900.
Thea Sharrock is an English theatre and film director. In 2001, at age 24, she became the artistic director of London's Southwark Playhouse and the youngest artistic director in British theatre.
The Bondwoman's Narrative is a novel by Hannah Crafts whose plot revolves around an escape from slavery in North Carolina. The manuscript was not authenticated and properly published until 2002. Scholars believe that the novel was written between 1853 and 1861. It is one of the first novels by an African-American woman, another is the novel Our Nig by Harriet Wilson, published in 1859, while an autobiography from the same time period is Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs, published in 1861.
Wolf Hall is a 2009 historical novel by English author Hilary Mantel, published by Fourth Estate, named after the Seymour family's seat of Wolfhall, or Wulfhall, in Wiltshire. Set in the period from 1500 to 1535, Wolf Hall is a sympathetic fictionalised biography documenting the rapid rise to power of Thomas Cromwell in the court of Henry VIII through to the death of Sir Thomas More. The novel won both the Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. In 2012, The Observer named it as one of "The 10 best historical novels".
Anna (Annie) Louisa Walker was an English and Canadian teacher and author. She wrote five novels and two collections of poetry and edited an autobiography. Her poem "The Night Cometh" provides the text of the popular hymn "Work, for the night is coming".
Samuel Jackson Pratt was a prolific English poet, dramatist and novelist, writing under the pseudonym of "Courtney Melmoth" as well as under his own name. He authored around 40 publications between 1770 and 1810, some of which are still published today, and is probably best remembered as the author of Emma Corbett: or the Miseries of Civil War, (1780) and the poem Sympathy (1788). Although his reputation was tainted by scandal during his lifetime, he is today recognised as an early campaigner for animal welfare and the first English writer to treat the American Revolution as a legitimate subject for literature.
The Ocean at the End of the Lane is a 2013 novel by British author Neil Gaiman. The work was first published on 18 June 2013 through William Morrow and Company and follows an unnamed man who returns to his hometown for a funeral and remembers events that began forty years earlier. The illustrated edition of the work was published on 5 November 2019, featuring the artwork of Australian fine artist Elise Hurst.
The Melting Pot is a lost 1915 silent film drama based on the novel and 1909 Broadway play by Israel Zangwill. The film starred stage actor Walker Whiteside reprising his role from the Broadway play.
The Play That Goes Wrong is a play by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields of Mischief Theatre Company. The story follows a performance of a murder mystery, where the ill-fated theatre company encounters numerous mishaps.
The Wheel of Fortune: A Comedy is a comedy in five acts written by playwright Richard Cumberland and first presented at the Drury Lane Theatre in London on 28 February 1795, with a prologue and an epilogue. The original cast included John Philip Kemble as Penruddock, Robert Palmer as David Daw, Thomas King as Tempest, George Bland as Jenkins, John Whitfield as Woodville, John Palmer as Sydenham, Charles Kemble as Henry Woodville, Richard Suett as Weazel, Francis Godolphin Waldron as Woodville's Servant, Walter Maddocks as Penruddock's Servant, John Phillimore as Attendant, Jane Powell as Mrs. Woodville, Elizabeth Farren as Emily Tempest and Charlotte Tidswell as Maid.
