Michael Ledger-Lomas

2 weeks ago | lrb.co.uk | Michael Ledger-Lomas

Dante Gabriel Rossetti​ could always cheer himself up by belittling William Morris. At the top of a letter to Jane Morris in 1868, he scribbled a crest for ‘The Bard and Petty Tradesman’ in which Morris, plucking a lyre beneath a laurel tree, is back-to-back with his double, who is leaning over his shop counter. Sending up Morris as a hypocrite, intoning odes when he wasn’t flogging knick-knacks, was part of Rossetti’s campaign to seduce Jane.

1 month ago | engelsbergideas.com | Michael Ledger-Lomas

Mounting trade deficits have convinced the president of the United States that ‘we have too long acted as Uncle Sugar and now we’ve got to be Uncle Sam’. The ten per cent surcharge he plans to impose on imports of manufactured goods from across the world will devastate Canada, because most of its exports go to the United States and its prosperity is particularly dependent on its cross-border automobile industry.

1 month ago | historytoday.com | Michael Ledger-Lomas

The morning after Edward VII was crowned King of Great Britain and Emperor of India in Westminster Abbey, Canon Welldon treated the colonial troops who had attended the ceremony to a valedictory sermon. An Old Etonian and a former headmaster of Harrow who had until recently been bishop of Calcutta, Welldon was the embodiment of upper-class and imperial purpose.

1 month ago | unherd.com | Michael Ledger-Lomas

CanadaDonald Trumpkemi badenochPierre PoilievrePoliticsrestofworldRobert Jenrick Pierre Poilievre, the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, used to be the future, once. In October 2023, he posted a YouTube video of his interview in an orchard in British Columbia with the unworldly editor of a local newspaper.

1 month ago | jacobin.com | Michael Ledger-Lomas

Even if you love South East London, it is difficult to like the Old Kent Road. Its air is thick with particulates and disappointment. Lorries rumble down a highway lined with big box stores and neglected social housing. But there is one sight to lift the spirits: a thousand-foot mural wrapping two sides of a local government building, which celebrates the road’s history.