Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, was an English writer and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeves; the immaculate and loquacious Psmith; Lord Emsworth and the Blandings Castle set; the Oldest Member, with stories about golf; and Mr Mulliner, with tall tales on subjects ranging from bibulous bishops to megalomaniac movie moguls.
Berengaria of Navarre was Queen of England as the wife of Richard I of England. She was the eldest daughter of Sancho VI of Navarre and Sancha of Castile. As is the case with many of the medieval English queens, little is known of her life.
Anne of Bohemia, also known as Anne of Luxembourg, was Queen of England as the first wife of King Richard II. A member of the House of Luxembourg, she was the eldest daughter of Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Bohemia, and Elizabeth of Pomerania. Her death at the age of 28 was believed to have been caused by plague.
In social psychology, propinquity is one of the main factors leading to interpersonal attraction.
Ethel Florence Lindesay Richardson, known by her pen name Henry Handel Richardson, was an Australian author.
Poets' Corner is the name traditionally given to a section of the south transept of Westminster Abbey in London, where many poets, playwrights, and writers are buried or commemorated.
True History of the Kelly Gang is a novel by Australian writer Peter Carey, based loosely on the history of the Kelly Gang. It was first published in Brisbane by the University of Queensland Press in 2000. It won the 2001 Booker Prize and the Commonwealth Writers Prize in the same year. Despite its title, the book is fiction and a variation on the Ned Kelly story.
The conspiracy thriller is a subgenre of thriller fiction. The protagonists of conspiracy thrillers are often journalists or amateur investigators who find themselves pulling on a small thread which unravels a vast conspiracy that ultimately goes "all the way to the top." The complexities of historical fact are recast as a morality play in which bad people cause bad events, and good people identify and defeat them. Conspiracies are often played out as "man-in-peril" stories, or yield quest narratives similar to those found in whodunits and detective stories.
Catherine Helen Spence was a Scottish-born Australian author, teacher, journalist, politician, leading suffragist, and Georgist. Spence was also a minister of religion and social worker, and supporter of electoral proportional representation. In 1897 she became Australia's first female political candidate after standing (unsuccessfully) for the Federal Convention held in Adelaide. Called the "Greatest Australian Woman" by Miles Franklin and by the age of 80 dubbed the "Grand Old Woman of Australia", Spence was commemorated on the Australian five-dollar note issued for the Centenary of Federation of Australia.
The Da Vinci Code is a 2006 mystery thriller film directed by Ron Howard, written by Akiva Goldsman, and based on Dan Brown's 2003 novel of the same name. The first in the Robert Langdon film series, the film stars Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Ian McKellen, Alfred Molina, Jürgen Prochnow, Jean Reno and Paul Bettany. In the film, Robert Langdon, a professor of religious symbology from Harvard University, is the prime suspect in the grisly and unusual murder of Louvre curator Jacques Saunière. On the body, the police find a disconcerting cipher and start an investigation. Langdon escapes with the assistance of police cryptologist Sophie Neveu, and they begin a quest for the legendary Holy Grail. A noted British Grail historian, Sir Leigh Teabing, tells them that the actual Holy Grail is explicitly encoded in Leonardo da Vinci's wall painting, The Last Supper. Also searching for the Grail is a secret cabal within Opus Dei, an actual prelature of the Holy See, who wish to keep the true Grail a secret to prevent the destruction of Christianity.
The following is a list of recurring or notable fictional locations featured in the stories of P. G. Wodehouse, in alphabetical order by place name.
The Da Vinci Code is a 2003 mystery thriller novel by Dan Brown. It is Brown's second novel to include the character Robert Langdon: the first was his 2000 novel Angels & Demons. The Da Vinci Code follows symbologist Robert Langdon and cryptologist Sophie Neveu after a murder in the Louvre Museum in Paris causes them to become involved in a battle between the Priory of Sion and Opus Dei over the possibility of Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene having had a child together.
Ki Longfellow was an American novelist, playwright, theatrical producer, theatre director and entrepreneur with dual citizenship in Britain. She is best known in the United States for her novel The Secret Magdalene (2005). This is the first of her works exploring the divine feminine. In England, she is likely best known as the widow of Vivian Stanshall, musician, lead singer of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, songwriter, author, radio broadcaster and wit.
Ray Evans was an Australian businessperson, political conservative, and campaigner against climate change mitigation efforts.
Susan Dorothea White is an Australian artist and author. She is a narrative artist and her work concerns the natural world and human situation, increasingly incorporating satire and irony to convey her concern for human rights and equality. She is the author of Draw Like da Vinci (2006).
Raikes Currie was Member of Parliament (MP) for Northampton from 1837 to 1857. He was a partner of the bank Curries & Co., which became part of Glyn, Mills & Co. in 1864, along with his father, Isaac Currie, in Cornhill, City of London, and had several interests in the newly developing colony of South Australia. He restored Minley Manor and made substantial improvements to the estate, work which was continued by his son and grandson.
George Edgar ‘Eddie’ Metcalf, Chinese name 王懷仁 Wáng Huáirén, was a British Protestant missionary serving in China with the China Inland Mission and credited with the first translation of the New Testament for the Eastern Lisu/Lipo minority.
John Harry Grainger was an Australian architect and civil engineer, who was also the father of musician Percy Grainger. He designed 14 bridges, notably Princes Bridge in Melbourne. As an architect, he designed half a dozen major public buildings, mainly in New Zealand, Perth, and Melbourne, notably the WA Supreme Court, while he was Principal Architect in the Architectural Division of the Public Works Department of Western Australia. He also designed some major commercial buildings in Melbourne such as Georges Store over his long career, between 1878 and 1915.
Rev. Lord John Thynne was an English aristocrat and Anglican cleric, who served for 45 years as Deputy Dean of Westminster.
Catherine Baker (1861–1953) was an Irish-born Australian teacher best known for championing the work of her friend Joseph Furphy, whose novel Such Is Life had received an indifferent reception upon its initial publication in 1909 but was later embraced by critics and the public. Miles Franklin incorporated Baker's recollections into the essay "Who Was Joseph Furphy?", which won the S. H. Prior Memorial Prize in 1939. Baker was appointed an OBE in 1937 for her efforts in promoting Furphy's work and to broader Australian literature. She was an influential part of the Australian literary scene, supporting, writing to and encouraging writers such as Ada Cambridge, Victor Kennedy, Edith Coleman, the poet Marie E. J. Pitt, journalist Alice Henry and the poet John Shaw Neilson. She was made a life member of the Henry Lawson Society, and honored with a bronze plaque by the society in 1936. Shortly before her death in 1953 she was made vice-president of the Australian Council for Civil Liberties.
