Monday 26 October 2009

Braveheart, Lorca & Churchill on Race

by Derry Nairn


The London Film Festival is on for a few more days. Last Thursday saw the now-annual silent movie show in Trafalgar Square. The ever excellent Ian Visits blog has a report and some great links to some films that were shown.

Times Online and Times Archive both report today on Spanish efforts to positively identify the body and grave of Federico Garcia Lorca, the poet believed to have been executed by Franco's troops during the Spanish Civil War.

Mel Gibson, in the same newspaper, admits to having played 'fast and loose with the historical truth' in his 1996 film Braveheart. Historians respond.

Spare $16 million? The historic Cagaloglu spa - 'a stone's throw from Hagia Sofia and the Blue Mosque' - in Istanbul could be yours. From the BBC.

The Observer's Elizabeth Day reviews the second volume of David Kynaston's chronicle of postwar Britain. Don't miss the entertaining quotes at the end!

Was Churchill a racist? Ian Jack, in the Guardian, puts last week's debate over the British National Party's BBC appearance in a historical context. (Note: Paul Lay has written about the BNP today, and Kathryn Hadley touched on the same topic a few weeks back - in this very spot!)

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