Tag Archives: Lancashire Witches

Best Books of 2012

20 Thursday Dec 2012

Posted by in Art and Photography, Books, Fiction, Marilyn Monroe, Non-Fiction, Witchcraft

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My ten favourite reads of 2012, including new fiction; books commemorating the 50th anniversary of Marilyn Monroe’s death, and the 400th anniversary of the Pendle witch trials; and some previously published books that I’ve just caught up with.

I had never read Kate Grenville’s work before, but Sarah Thornhill (and its predecessor, The Secret River) really evokes the stark beauty of the outback, contrasted with the tumult of the early settlers.  Continue reading →

The Curse of Pendle

28 Wednesday Nov 2012

Posted by in History, Radio, Witchcraft

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Installation on Pendle Hill: photo by Brett Dixon/BBC, 2012.

The Curse of Pendle is a 30-minute documentary, broadcast by BBC Radio 4 on November 23rd, commemorating the 400th anniversary of the Lancashire Witch Trials. It is presented by the novelist Jeanette Winterson, who grew up in Accrington, within view of Pendle Hill.

‘We all knew the stories of Chattox and Demdike – names you’d never forget,’ Winterson recalls. ‘Were they witches? Did they still haunt the hill? It scared us kids to death.’ Continue reading →

1612 Underture

27 Thursday Sep 2012

Posted by in Film, History, Music, Witchcraft

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The Eccentronic Research Council (ERC) is a collective founded by Sheffield musicians Adrian Flanagan and Dean Honer.

1612 Underture, their new concept album, also features the Bolton-born actress Maxine Peake. Continue reading →

The Pendle Witch Child

19 Friday Aug 2011

Posted by in History, Television, Witchcraft

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Simon Armitage – one of Britain’s leading poets – was born in West Yorkshire. Like many local children, he would have been raised on stories of the Pendle Witches in nearby Lancashire.

A grimly intoxicating blend of history, crime and folklore is richly evoked in Armitage’s new BBC Four documentary, The Pendle Witch Child. Next year marks the fourth centenary of the notorious 1612 trial, the largest of its kind in England at the time. Continue reading →

The Lancashire Witches

25 Monday Jan 2010

Posted by in Books, Fiction, History, Witchcraft

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Original artwork by John Gilbert

William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882) was a historical novelist and one of the most popular English authors of the later 19th century. Born in Manchester, he trained as a lawyer and practised in London, but his true ambitions were always literary. In his youth, Ainsworth read adventure stories and was an admirer of Dick Turpin, the highwayman whose exploits were the subject of popular legend. The tale of Turpin’s overnight ride from London to York on his steed, Black Bess, featured in Ainsworth’s first novel, Rookwood (1834.)

Among Ainsworth’s nearly forty novels, several were set in his native Lancashire, including his most famous work, The Lancashire Witches: A Romance of Pendle Forest (1848.) Continue reading →

The Lancashire Witch Conspiracy

27 Thursday Mar 2008

Posted by in Books, History, Witchcraft

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The Lancashire Witch Conspiracy is a remarkable new book by John A. Clayton, focusing on the Pendle Witch Trials of 1612. He has undertaken extensive research to achieve what seemed impossible, bringing valuable new evidence to light. It was the largest witch trial in England at that time, surpassed only by Matthew Hopkins’ reign of terror as the Witchfinder General nearly four decades later. Continue reading →