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the experience of reading in Britain, from 1450 to 1945...

Reading Experience Database UK Historical image of readers
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Record Number: 29858


Reading Experience:

Evidence:

'I will stay in this farmhouse while the gas course lasts [...] and get the old peasant in the evenings to recite more "[Fables of] La Fontaine" to me, in the Béthune dialect, and walk out to see the neighbouring inns and shrines, and read -- Bless me, Kapp [a fellow officer and satirical artist, recently sent away to the Press Bureau] has gone away with my "John Clare"! He has the book yet for all I know [...].

Century:

1900-1945

Date:

Between May 1916 and Jun 1916

Country:

France

Time

n/a

Place:

city: Hinges, near Béthune
county: Nord
other location: farmhouse

Type of Experience
(Reader):
 

silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

Type of Experience
(Listener):
 

solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown


Reader / Listener / Reading Group:

Reader:

Edmund Blunden

Age:

Adult (18-100+)

Gender:

Male

Date of Birth:

1 Nov 1896

Socio-Economic Group:

Professional / academic / merchant / farmer

Occupation:

Army Officer and Poet

Religion:

Christian (Anglican)

Country of Origin:

England

Country of Experience:

France

Listeners present if any:
e.g family, servants, friends

n/a


Additional Comments:

n/a



Text Being Read:

Author:

unknown unknown

Title:

unknown

Genre:

Unknown

Form of Text:

Print: Book

Publication Details

unknown

Provenance

unknown


Source Information:

Record ID:

29858

Source:

Print

Author:

Edmund Blunden

Editor:

n/a

Title:

Undertones of War

Place of Publication:

Harmondsworth (Penguin Modern Classics edn.)

Date of Publication:

1982 (1928, 1937)

Vol:

n/a

Page:

40

Additional Comments:

n/a

Citation:

Edmund Blunden, Undertones of War (Harmondsworth (Penguin Modern Classics edn.), 1982 (1928, 1937)), p. 40, http://can-red-lec.library.dal.ca/Arts/RED/record_details.php?id=29858, accessed: 28 March 2024


Additional Comments:

It is not known what Blunden read on this occasion but it can be assumed that it was not John Clare's poems, which he may have read periodically up until that point in time.

   
   
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