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| Actors/Actresses
and Directors |
One
of cinema's greatest directors, the American Stanley
Kubrick, died at his home Childwickbury
Manor near the village of Harpenden in 1999. In his career he
made comparatively few films but many are considered classics, including
Paths of Glory, Spartacus and 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Kubrick had lived in England since the early 1960s and at Childwickbury
since 1979. He is buried on the estate.
The great nations have always acted like gangsters,
and the small nations like prostitutes.
(The Guardian, 1963)
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| Artists
and Architects |
The
sculptor Henry Moore was buried at
Perry Green in 1986.
Henry
Moore
|
| Famous
People |
Nicholas
Breakspear was born in Abbots Langley
in 1100. He was the only Englishman ever to become Pope when he was
elected as Adrian IV
in 1154. He died in office in 1159 at Anagni near Rome.
Richard
Neville, the Earl
of Warwick, known due to his power and influence as "the
Kingmaker" was killed during the Battle
of Barnet in 1471. Neville exploited his vast inherited
wealth and land to hold the balance of power between the warring Houses
of Lancaster and York during the Wars
of the Roses. He often changed sides and was influential enough
to enable both the Yorkist Edward
IV and the Lancastrian Henry
VI become king. It was Edward IV's army that defeated Neville
at Barnet and after Neville's death Edward was reinstated to the throne
he had lost only the previous year.
Earl
of Warwick
Richard
Cromwell, son of Oliver Cromwell, died in Cheshunt in 1712.
In 1658 he had succeeded his father as Lord Protector but his rule
was short and he was forced to abdicate less than a year later. After
the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660 he went into exile living
in France and Switzerland before finally returning to England in 1680,
where he lived until his death under another name.
Richard
Cromwell
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| Nobel
Prize Winners |
|
Literature |
The
Irish-born winner of the Nobel
Prize for Literature in 1925 George
Bernard Shaw died in 1950 at his home Shaw's
Corner
in Ayot St Lawrence where he had lived
since 1906. His ashes were scattered in the garden.
George
Bernard Shaw
George
Bernard Shaw
Martyrdom... the only way in which a
man can become famous without ability.
The Devil's Disciple (1901)
A government which robs Peter to pay
Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.
Everybody's Political What's What? (1944)
Newspapers are unable, seemingly,
to discriminate between a bicycle accident and the collapse
of civilisation.
(Quote)
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|
| Royal
Consorts and Heirs |
|
House of Plantagenet |
Isabella of France,
the former queen of Edward
II, died in 1358 and her death has been given as either
in the county at Hertford
Castle where she may have lived for the last year of her
life or at Castle Rising Castle in Norfolk
where she had been imprisoned by her son Edward
III since 1330. She was buried at Greyfriar's church at
Newgate in London.
Isabella
of France
Edward
II
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|
| Writers
and Poets |
For
George Bernard Shaw see Nobel
Prize Winners
The
poet William
Cowper was born in Great Berkhamstead in 1731.
William
Cowper
No voice divine the storm allayed
No light propitious shone;
When snatched from all effectual aid,
We perished, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea,
And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.
The Castaway (1799)
Graham
Greene was born as Henry Graham Greene in 1904 at Berkhamsted.
He died in 1991 in Vevey in Switzerland.
Graham
Greene
Graham
Greene
There is always one moment in childhood when
the door opens and lets the future in.
The Power and the Glory (1940)
The
poet Cecil
Day-Lewis (father of the actor Daniel Day-Lewis) died in Hadley
Wood in 1972. He had been Poet
Laureate
since 1968 when he succeeded John Masefield who had died the year
before. He was in turn succeeded by Sir John Betjeman. He is buried
at Stinsford in Dorset.
Cecil
Day-Lewis
Cecil
Day-Lewis
The
poet laureates
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|
Hatfield
House
Hatfield
House in 1824