'Your papers, please' must never be heard in America
A novelist, a duchess and a tabloid newspaper have ignited an explosive debate in Britain: Is it all right to criticize a pregnant Kate?
The Metropolitan Opera may have pretty much turned opening night over to the glamorous Anna Netrebko, but New Year's Eve belongs to a very different diva _ Joyce DiDonato.
Near the end of his comprehensive look at one of Britain's great acting clans, Donald Spoto quotes its most famous -- or notorious -- member, Vanessa Redgrave, speaking with characteristic plainness: "Interviewers continue to ask about the Redgrave dynasty. 'But we are not a dynasty,' Vanessa replies quietly. 'We are a family.'"
British writer Hilary Mantel won the prestigious Booker literary prize for a second time Tuesday with her blood-soaked Tudor saga "Bring Up the Bodies," which the head of the judging panel said had "rewritten the book" on historical fiction.
British writer Hilary Mantel won the prestigious Booker literary prize for a second time Tuesday with her blood-soaked Tudor saga "Bring Up the Bodies," which the head of the judging panel said had "rewritten the book" on historical fiction.
British writer Hilary Mantel won the prestigious Booker literary prize for a second time Tuesday with her blood-soaked Tudor saga "Bring Up the Bodies," which the head of the judging panel said had "rewritten the book" on historical fiction.
Judges are choosing the winner of Britain's most prestigious literary trophy from a shortlist that includes novels set in the court of King Henry VIII and the opium dens of Mumbai.
St. Thomas More, rather improbably, was one of the culture heroes of the 1960s when Robert Bolt's "A Man for All Seasons" won, equally improbably, the Academy Award as best picture in 1966. In those days, lots of people on the right as well as the left rather fancied themselves as being, like More, conscientious martyrs to overweening government power - even if More's loyalty to papal authority would otherwise have been suspect, at least from the progressive point of view.
U.S. publication of the sequel to Hilary Mantel's Booker Prize-winning best-seller "Wolf Hall" has been moved from November to May.
British director Charles Jarrott, whose career of nearly 50 years in film and television included the acclaimed British royalty dramas "Anne of the Thousand Days" and "Mary, Queen of Scots," has died, a spokeswoman said Saturday. He was 83.
Elizabeth I, who ruled Great Britain from 1558 to 1603, continues to fascinate. Never a constitutional monarch, she had very real power, which she employed with relish. The daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, she inherited much of her father's guile without his conspicuous cruelty. But she faced formidable challenges: Religious divisions and political rivals at home and powerful enemies abroad. How did the queen deal with these challenges and transform her puny, debt-ridden kingdom into a major power?
Elizabeth I, who ruled Great Britain from 1558 to 1603, continues to fascinate. Never a constitutional monarch, she had very real power, which she employed with relish. The daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, she inherited much of her father's guile without his conspicuous cruelty. But she faced formidable challenges: Religious divisions and political rivals at home and powerful enemies abroad. How did the queen deal with these challenges and transform her puny, debt-ridden kingdom into a major power?
