David Crane – författare

A groundbreaking work of Romantic biography; David Crane’s book is an astonishingly original examination of Byron, and a radical approach to biography.Crane focuses on the lifelong feud between Augusta – Byron’s half-sister with whom he had a passionate affair – and Annabella, his society wife. Recreating a meeting between the two, years after Byron's death – the Romantic ‘High Noon’ – he explores the emotional and sexual truth and the human vulnerability that lie at the heart of the Byron story.‘The Kindness of Sisters’ is not only rigorous in its scholarship, but also superbly compelling drama. Crane’s book combines passion, revenge and recrimination in 19th-century Britain with all the intensity of a Greek tragedy.

A sweeping political, social, military and cultural overview of the United Kingdom on the eve, and then the day, of the greatest battle fought by British arms.Midnight, Sunday, 17 June 1815. There was no town in England that had not sent its soldiers, hardly a household that was not holding its breath, not a family, as Byron put it, that would escape `havoc’s tender mercies’ at Waterloo, and yet at the same time life inevitably went on as normal.As Wellington’s rain-sodden army retreated for the final, decisive battle, men and women in England were still going to the theatre and science lectures, still working in the fields and the factories, still reading and writing books and sermons, still painting their pictures and sitting in front of Lord Elgin’s marbles as if almost five thousand did not already lie dead. After ten hours of savage fighting, Waterloo would be littered with the bodies of something like 47,000 dead and wounded. Meanwhile, as the day unfolded, a whole nation, countryside and town, artisan and aristocrat, was brought together by war.From Samuel Johnson Prize shortlisted author David Crane, Went the Day Well is a breathtaking portrait of Britain in those moments. Moving from England to the battle and back again this vivid, stunning freeze-frame of a country on the single most celebrated day in its modern history shows Crane’s full range in tracing the endless, overlapping connections between people’s lives. From private tragedies, disappointed political hopes, and public discontents to grandiloquent public celebrations and monuments, it answers Wellington’s call as he rallied his troops to `Think what England is thinking of us now’.

[Previously published as ‘Went The Day Well’]‘Of all the books marking the bicentenary Waterloo, this has to be the best’ Spectator‘A book to die for’ Evening StandardFrom Samuel Johnson Prize shortlisted author David Crane, this is a breathtaking portrait of the Britain that fought the battle of Waterloo.As Wellington’s rain-sodden army retreated towards an obscure valley called Waterloo, the men and women of Britain were still going to the theatre and science lectures, working in the fields and the factories, reading and writing books and sermons, painting their pictures and sitting in front of Lord Elgin’s marbles. David Crane’s stunning freeze-frame of Britain on this day of momentous change shifts hour by hour between Britain and Belgium. The Britain that fought Waterloo – its radicals and patriots, artisans and aristocrats, prisoners and poets – appears through the smoke of battle and the mythology of Waterloo in this magnificent and original tracing of the endless, overlapping connections between people’s lives.

David Crane has given us the definitive biography of one of Britain’s greatest heroes and explorers.`It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more…For God’s sake look after our people.’These were the final words written in Scott’s diary on 29 March 1912, as he lay dying in his tent with Birdie Bowers and Edward Wilson. Oates had taken himself into a blizzard a few days before, and the fifth member of the Polar party, Edgar Evans, had died some ten days previously, worn out by the cold and physical effort of the journey across Antarctica.Since then Scott has been the subject of many books – many hagiographical, others dismissive and scathing. Yet in all the pages that have been written about him, the personality behind the legend has been forgotten or distorted beyond all recognition.David Crane’s magisterial biography, based on years of close and detailed research with the original documents, redresses this completely. By reassessing Scott’s life and his substantial scientific achievements, Crane is able to provide a fresh and exciting perspective on both the Discovery expedition of 1901-4 and the Terra Nova expedition of 1910-12. The courage and tragedy of Scott’s last journey are only one part of the process, for the scientific enquiry that led up to it transformed the whole nature and ambition of Antarctic exploration.Scott’s own voice echoes through the pages. His descriptions of the monumental landscape of Antarctica in all its fatal and icy beauty are breathtaking; his honest, heartfelt letters and diaries give the reader an unforgettable account of the challenges he faced both in his personal life and as a superlative leader of men in possibly the harshest environment on the planet.Written with the full support of Scott’s surviving relatives, this definitive biography sets out to reconcile the very private struggles of the man with the very public life of extremes that he led.Note that it has not been possible to include the same picture content that appeared in the original print version.

Through the lives of three outstanding naval officers – each considered the most brilliant commander of his generation – David Crane offers a unique portrait of the Royal Navy at a time when it held unchallenged dominion over the world's oceans.Although all three died young, their careers covered virtually every war of significance in which the navy was involved during the nineteenth century. They fought against French and Americans, Russians, Turks, Egyptians, Indians and Chinese, in fleet engagements and naval bombardments, on the walls of Canton and the banks of the Mississippi, against Malay pirates and sepoy mutineers.As an eleven-year-old volunteer, Frank Hastings saw action at Trafalgar, and he went on to be revered as a hero of the Greek War of Independence. Yet, as the architect and captain of the first successful steam warship and the champion of gunnery and total war, he unwittingly prepared the way for much that would be bloodiest in the century ahead.Nobody who saw him in the trenches of the Crimea would ever forget William Peel's air of inviolable self-mastery under fire, and it was the same in India, where he could ride through a landscape of decomposing corpses as if it were some mythological world conjured up to try his knightly resolve. What was it that enabled a man of his intelligence, temperament, piety and background to fight with such brilliance in defence of an Ottoman Empire that was repugnant to every tenet he held most strongly?If James Goodenough chased Glory as assiduously as Hastings and Peel had done, it was the Glory of the next world, and not this. Throughout his career he strove to reconcile the demands of his faith and his profession, but when he finally met his martyrdom at the hands of the 'savages' of the Pacific islands, a shocked nation was left to face up to the inconsistencies, hypocrisies and self-deceptions on which floated its vision of divine election.Combining thrilling scenes of battle with acute psychological insight, Men of War provides a remarkable picture of the nature of courage, command and warfare.Note that it has not been possible to include the same picture content that appeared in the original print version.

A groundbreaking work of Romantic biography; David Crane’s book is an astonishingly original examination of Byron, and a radical approach to biography.Crane focuses on the lifelong feud between Augusta – Byron’s half-sister with whom he had a passionate affair – and Annabella, his society wife. Recreating a meeting between the two, years after Byron's death – the Romantic `High Noon’ – he explores the emotional and sexual truth and the human vulnerability that lie at the heart of the Byron story.`The Kindness of Sisters’ is not only rigorous in its scholarship, but also superbly compelling drama. Crane’s book combines passion, revenge and recrimination in 19th-century Britain with all the intensity of a Greek tragedy.Note that it has not been possible to include the same picture content that appeared in the original print version.

`There is a mad chap come here – whose name is Trelawny… He comes on the friend of Shelley, great, glowing, and rich in romance… But tell me who is this odd fish? They talk of him here as a camelion who went mad on reading Lord Byron’s `Corsair’.’ JOSEPH SEVERNDavid Crane’s brilliant first book investigates the life and phenomenon of Edward John Trelawny – writer, adventurer, romantic and friend to Shelley and Byron. Very reminiscent of YoungHusband in its mix of biography, history and travel writing it is a sparkling debut.Trelawny was, unquestionably, one of the great Victorians. He made a career from his friendship with Byron and Shelley and with his tales of glory from the Greek War of Independence. His story is one of betrayal and greed, of deluded idealism and physical courage played out against one of the most ferocious wars even the Balkans has seen.There has been no general biography of Trelawny for nearly twenty years, no history of the philhellene role in the Greek War of Independence for even longer.

David Crane has given us a magisterial portrait of one of Britain’s greatest heroes and explorers, acclaimed as the ‘masterpiece’ on the subject. Reissued for the 100th anniversary of Scott’s doomed expedition.‘It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more…For God’s sake look after our people.’These were the final words written in Scott’s diary on 29 March 1912, as he lay dying of exhaustion, starvation and extreme cold, in his tent on his return journey from the South Pole. Since then he has been the subject of many books. Yet in all the pages that have been written about him, the personality behind the legend has been forgotten or distorted beyond all recognition.David Crane’s magisterial biography redresses this completely. By reassessing Scott’s life and his substantial scientific achievements, Crane is able to provide a fresh and exciting perspective on both the Discovery expedition of 1901-4 and the Terra Nova expedition of 1910-12. The courage and tragedy of Scott’s last journey are only one part of the process, for the scientific enquiry that led up to it transformed the whole nature and ambition of Antarctic exploration.Written with the full support of Scott’s surviving relatives, and with access to the voluminous diaries and records of key participants, this definitive biography sets out to reconcile the very private struggles of the man with the very public life of extremes that he led.

Shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson prize for non-fiction. The extraordinary and forgotten story of the building of the World War One cemeteries, due to the efforts of one remarkable man, Fabian Ware. In the wake of the First World War, Britain and her Empire faced the enormous question of how to bury the dead. Critically-acclaimed author David Crane describes how the horror of the slaughter motivated an ambulance commander named Fabian Ware to establish the Commonwealth war cemeteries.Behind these famous monuments – the Cenotaph, Tyne Cot, Menin Gate, Etaples amongst them – lies a deeply moving story; ‘Empires of the Dead’ chronicles a generation coming to terms with grief on a colossal scale.

Shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson prize for non-fiction; the extraordinary and forgotten story of the building of the World War One cemeteries, due to the efforts of one remarkable man, Fabian Ware.Before WWI, little provision was made for the burial of the war dead. Soldiers were often unceremoniously dumped in a mass grave; officers shipped home for burial.The great cemeteries of WWI came about as a result of the efforts of one inspired visionary. In 1914, Fabian Ware joined the Red Cross, working on the frontline in France. Horrified by the hasty burials, he recorded the identity and position of the graves. His work was officially recognised, with a Graves Registration Commission being set up. As reports of their work became public, the Commission was flooded with letters from grieving relatives around the world.Critically acclaimed author David Crane gives a profoundly moving account of the creation of the great citadels to the dead, which involved leading figures of the day, including Rudyard Kipling. It is the story of cynical politicking, as governments sought to justify the sacrifice, as well as the grief of nations, following the `war to end all wars’.

The First World War Diaries of Manchester Pals Captain Charlie May – written and kept in secret and published now for the first time. A born storyteller, Charlie May’s vivid eye for detail and warm good humour brings his experience in the trenches (and the experience of millions of ordinary men like him) to life for a 21st-century readership.Captain Charlie May was killed, aged 27, in the early morning of 1st July 1916, leading the men of ‘B Company’, 22nd Manchester Service Battalion (the Manchester Pals) into action on the first day of the Somme.This tolerant and immensely likeable man had been born in New Zealand and – against King’s regulations – he kept a diary in seven small, wallet-sized pocket books. A journalist before the war and a born storyteller, May’s diaries give a vivid picture of battalion life in and behind the trenches during the build-up to the greatest battle fought by a British army and are filled with the friendships and tensions, the home-sickness, frustrations, delays and endless postponements, the fog of ignorance, the combination of boredom and terror to which every man that has ever fought could testify.His diaries reflect on the progress of the war, tell jokes – good and bad, give details of horse-rides along the Somme valley, afternoons with a fishing rod, lunch in Amiens, a gastronomic celebration of Christmas 1915 and concerts in ‘Whiz Bang Hall’. He describes battles not just with the enemy, but with rats, crows and on the makeshift football pitch – all recorded with a freshness that brings these stories home as if for the first time.The diaries are also written as an extended and deeply-moving love letter to his wife Maude and baby daughter Pauline. ‘I do not want to die’, he wrote – ‘Not that I mind for myself. If it be that I am to go, I am ready. But the thought that I may never see you or our darling baby again turns my bowels to water.’Fresh, eloquent and warm, these diaries were kept secret from the censor and were delivered to his wife after his death by a fellow soldier in Charlie’s company. Edited by his great-nephew and published for the first time, these diaries give an unforgettable account of the war that took Charlie May’s life, and millions of others like him.

Poet, writer, veteran and cricket devotee, Alan Ross’s brilliant editorship of the London Magazine kept alive a literary tradition.Alan Ross played a role in Britain’s cultural life that no one else did or could, linking not just the worlds of writing, painting and sport but the literary London of Cyril Connolly, John Lehmann, Horizon and New Writings with that of all those contemporary novelists, dramatists, travel writers and poets who appeared or cut their teeth in the pages of the London Magazine which he owned and edited for forty years. If you had to find the one thing that characterised Ross’s life it was that it brought together worlds usually kept well apart.The richest biographies are those of lives which throw light on a whole period and that of Alan Ross is the perfect case in point.

This book is a systematic attempt to establish Sheridan as a major figure in the history of English comedy. Leading scholars address Sheridan's role not only as an outstanding playwright, but also as the manager of Drury Lane Theatre, and his subsequent career as a Member of Parliament. The essays examine the theatrical world in which Sheridan worked, discuss his major plays, and include a modern director's observations on the production of his work today. This is combined with an important re-evaluation of Sheridan's achievements as a master of rhetoric in the political arena, to provide a much needed contemporary assessment of this multifaceted man and his work.

The New Cambridge Shakespeare appeals to students worldwide for its up-to-date scholarship and emphasis on performance. The series features line-by-line commentaries and textual notes on the plays and poems. Introductions are regularly refreshed with accounts of new critical, stage and screen interpretations. In this second edition of Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor David Crane emphasises the liveliness of the play in stage terms. He also claims that this citizen comedy was an expression of Shakespeare's fundamental understanding of human life, conveyed centrally in the character of Falstaff. In the process he examines Shakespeare's free and vigorous use of different linguistic worlds. An account of the play's textual history concludes that at the time of its earliest performances Shakespeare's text was being adapted to specific theatrical needs, and as much in the possession of its players as of its author.

The New Cambridge Shakespeare appeals to students worldwide for its up-to-date scholarship and emphasis on performance. The series features line-by-line commentaries and textual notes on the plays and poems. Introductions are regularly refreshed with accounts of new critical, stage and screen interpretations. In this second edition of Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor David Crane emphasises the liveliness of the play in stage terms. He also claims that this citizen comedy was an expression of Shakespeare's fundamental understanding of human life, conveyed centrally in the character of Falstaff. In the process he examines Shakespeare's free and vigorous use of different linguistic worlds. An account of the play's textual history concludes that at the time of its earliest performances Shakespeare's text was being adapted to specific theatrical needs, and as much in the possession of its players as of its author.

This book is a systematic attempt to establish Sheridan as a major figure in the history of English comedy. Leading scholars address Sheridan's role not only as an outstanding playwright, but also as the manager of Drury Lane Theatre, and his subsequent career as a Member of Parliament. The essays examine the theatrical world in which Sheridan worked, discuss his major plays, and include a modern director's observations on the production of his work today. This is combined with an important re-evaluation of Sheridan's achievements as a master of rhetoric in the political arena, to provide a much needed contemporary assessment of this multifaceted man and his work.

Musical revue Words by David Crane, Seth Friedman and Marta Kauffman. Music by William Dreskin, Joel Philip Friedman, Seth Friedman, Alan Menken, Steven Schwartz and Michael Skloff. Characters: 3 male, 3 female Unit set. This is a wonderful collection of songs about people who place lonely hearts ads: lonely people looking for that certain someone. In other words: Personals is about Most of Us, about the unending search for love in the Post Me Decade. "Are you looking for that "special' night where everything is going to be peachy, and you are going to meet the swellest little show of your dreams?...Personals is a winner, destined to find, apart from anything else, its own special place on the singles scene, the date show for the young in heart, the Jacques Brel of the '80s."-- N.Y. Post.

The Critic was Sheridan's response to a very specific political and theatrical situation. In the summer of 1779, a Franco-Spanish invasion seemed imminent and patriotic fervour superseded party divisions and personal animosities. The Critic satirises the panic of the summer in the form of the comically misconceived tragedy 'The Spanish Armada' that is in rehearsal in the second and third acts, but The Critic ends with genuine patriotic feeling. This edition traces both the political and the theatrical objects of Sheridan's satire and discusses its reliance (and improvement) on earlier meta-theatrical burlesques like The Duke of Buckingham's Restoration romp The Rehearsal.

Although it was written shortly before or after Queen Elizabeth's death in 1603 and performed by the boy company at Blackfriars, this play foreshadows the light ladies and callous gallants of Restoration comedy. Passion is a scourge, love is humiliation, and friends might as well be enemies. Freevill discards his concubine Franceschina and, for a joke, sets his straight-laced friend Malheureux on to her, who falls for her and promises to carry out her revenge on Freevill by killing him. The play in the theatre, which is fully imagined in the introduction to this edition, impresses on the audience the spuriousness of rigid moral persuasions, especially when they are tried by fits of sexual passion.

Dryden's audiences in 1671, both aristocratic and middle-class, would have been quick to respond to the themes of disputed royal succession, Francophilia and loyalty among subjects in his most successful tragicomedy. In the tragic plot, written in verse, young Leonidas has to struggle to assert his place as the rightful heir to the throne of Sicily and to the hand of the usurper's daughter. In the comic plot, written in prose, two fashionable couples (much more at home in London drawing-rooms than at the Sicilian court) play at switching partners in the 'modern' style. The introduction of this edition argues that Dryden's own ambivalence about King Charles and his entourage, on whom he came to rely more on more for patronage, manifests itself in both plots; most of all perhaps in the excessively Francophile Melantha, whose affectation cannot quite hide her endearing joie-de-vivre.

The New Cambridge Shakespeare appeals to students worldwide for its up-to-date scholarship and emphasis on performance. The series features line-by-line commentaries and textual notes on the plays and poems. Introductions are regularly refreshed with accounts of new critical, stage and screen interpretations. In this second edition of Shakespeare''s Merry Wives of Windsor David Crane emphasises the liveliness of the play in stage terms. He also claims that this citizen comedy was an expression of Shakespeare''s fundamental understanding of human life, conveyed centrally in the character of Falstaff. In the process he examines Shakespeare''s free and vigorous use of different linguistic worlds. An account of the play''s textual history concludes that at the time of its earliest performances Shakespeare''s text was being adapted to specific theatrical needs, and as much in the possession of its players as of its author.

The New Cambridge Shakespeare appeals to students worldwide for its up-to-date scholarship and emphasis on performance. The series features line-by-line commentaries and textual notes on the plays and poems. Introductions are regularly refreshed with accounts of new critical, stage and screen interpretations. In this second edition of Shakespeare''s Merry Wives of Windsor David Crane emphasises the liveliness of the play in stage terms. He also claims that this citizen comedy was an expression of Shakespeare''s fundamental understanding of human life, conveyed centrally in the character of Falstaff. In the process he examines Shakespeare''s free and vigorous use of different linguistic worlds. An account of the play''s textual history concludes that at the time of its earliest performances Shakespeare''s text was being adapted to specific theatrical needs, and as much in the possession of its players as of its author.

Dryden''s audiences in 1671, both aristocratic and middle-class, wouldhave been quick to respond to the themes of disputed royal succession,Francophilia and loyalty among subjects in his most successfultragicomedy. In the tragic plot, written in verse, young Leonidas hasto struggle to assert his place as the rightful heir to the throne ofSicily and to the hand of the usurper''s daughter. In the comic plot,written in prose, two fashionable couples (much more at home in Londondrawing-rooms than at the Sicilian court) play at switching partners inthe ''modern'' style. The introduction of this edition argues thatDryden''s own ambivalence about King Charles and his entourage, on whomhe came to rely more on more for patronage, manifests itself in bothplots; most of all perhaps in the excessively Francophile Melantha,whose affectation cannot quite hide her endearing joie-de-vivre.

Dryden''s audiences in 1671, both aristocratic and middle-class, wouldhave been quick to respond to the themes of disputed royal succession,Francophilia and loyalty among subjects in his most successfultragicomedy. In the tragic plot, written in verse, young Leonidas hasto struggle to assert his place as the rightful heir to the throne ofSicily and to the hand of the usurper''s daughter. In the comic plot,written in prose, two fashionable couples (much more at home in Londondrawing-rooms than at the Sicilian court) play at switching partners inthe ''modern'' style. The introduction of this edition argues thatDryden''s own ambivalence about King Charles and his entourage, on whomhe came to rely more on more for patronage, manifests itself in bothplots; most of all perhaps in the excessively Francophile Melantha,whose affectation cannot quite hide her endearing joie-de-vivre.

Although it was written shortly before or after Queen Elizabeth''s deathin 1603 and performed by the boy company at Blackfriars, this playforeshadows the light ladies and callous gallants of Restorationcomedy. Passion is a scourge, love is humiliation, and friends might aswell be enemies. Freevill discards his concubine Franceschina and, fora joke, sets his straight-laced friend Malheureux on to her, who fallsfor her and promises to carry out her revenge on Freevill by killinghim. The play in the theatre, which is fully imagined in theintroduction to this edition, impresses on the audience thespuriousness of rigid moral persuasions, especially when they are triedby fits of sexual passion.

Although it was written shortly before or after Queen Elizabeth''s deathin 1603 and performed by the boy company at Blackfriars, this playforeshadows the light ladies and callous gallants of Restorationcomedy. Passion is a scourge, love is humiliation, and friends might aswell be enemies. Freevill discards his concubine Franceschina and, fora joke, sets his straight-laced friend Malheureux on to her, who fallsfor her and promises to carry out her revenge on Freevill by killinghim. The play in the theatre, which is fully imagined in theintroduction to this edition, impresses on the audience thespuriousness of rigid moral persuasions, especially when they are triedby fits of sexual passion.

The Critic was Sheridan''s response to a very specific political andtheatrical situation. In the summer of 1779, a Franco-Spanish invasionseemed imminent and patriotic fervour superseded party divisions andpersonal animosities. The Critic satirises the panic of the summer inthe form of the comically misconceived tragedy ''The Spanish Armada''that is in rehearsal in the second and third acts, but The Critic endswith genuine patriotic feeling. This edition traces both the politicaland the theatrical objects of Sheridan''s satire and discusses itsreliance (and improvement) on earlier meta-theatrical burlesques likeThe Duke of Buckingham''s Restoration romp The Rehearsal.