Paris Review Daily have just published the fifth in my Écuyères series about the circus and hippodrome horsewomen of nineteenth-century Paris. It’s about Céleste Mogador, who was so many things it was hard to cram it all into the essay, not least because she left so much of her own life writing behind. Please go …
Continue reading “Céleste Mogador: Lioness of the Hippodrome”
UPDATE: The viral photographs of Sélika set me hunting through archives and circuses from St Petersburg to Paris to uncover the lives of elusive women who were celebrated artistes, survivors, and scapegoats of the nineteenth century. I’m telling their stories now in Amazons of Paris. You can sign up here for more information and …
Continue reading “Everything I Don’t Know About Selika Lazevski”
I’ve been reading beautifully illustrated books about horses all my life and in the last twelve years I’ve trawled all sorts of academic articles and image libraries, so it’s always delightful to find an image I’ve never seen before. The Palazzo Pitti in Florence just opened an exhibit called Leopoldo de’ Medici: Prince of the …
Continue reading “Rapunzel Horses – the hot accessory of Early Modern Europe?”
If you’ve come here after reading the Washington Post piece on the revival of sidesaddle in America (now going a little viral on Jezebel.com), here’s a selection from the archives – a little bit of everything from balloonists to tragic heroines, scandalous females and zebras ridden sidesaddle. I also wrote in detail about women and …
Continue reading “Sidesaddle in a Hot Air Balloon (and other adventures)”
“You are doing a man’s work and so you’re dressed rather like a man, but remember just because you wear a smock and breeches you should take care to behave like a British girl who expects chivalry and respect from everyone she meets. … See to it that [a Land Army Girl] means … a …
The New York Times has a beautiful photo report from Kenya, where jockeys and trainers are fighting to keep horse racing alive. And Karen K introduced me to Jodhpurs and Sons, a tumblr dedicated to images of a certain kind of equestrian style.
This is an out-take from If Wishes Were Horses: A Memoir of Equine Obsession. I’ve just found an image of her in the National Portrait Gallery’s collection: click here and again on the picture to enlarge. Twenty-two year-old Mrs Alicia Thornton, the daughter of a Norwich watchmaker and wife of a Colonel Thornton, pitted her …
I enjoyed talking about the history of sidesaddle on Countryfile – it was my first experience of TV and everyone was incredibly friendly and easygoing. We did a few takes of different parts of the interview and it was hard to know whether to embellish what I’d said each time or to say the same …
Continue reading “A (Not So) Short History of Women Riding Astride”
Hello folks, I’m still here! I’ve been busy writing articles and launching the book so I left the DVD extras to do my blogging work for me. I’m easing back into the daily stuff now, and have a few posts lined up. I’ve almost finished reading Donna Landry’s Noble Brutes: How Eastern Horses Transformed English …
I had a wonderful, wonderful day in February with the Flying Foxes Side-saddle Display Team – aka The St Trinians of side-saddle – at Audley End for a forthcoming Telegraph piece (will run on the 24th March 2012). Here’s a behind the scenes slide show that gives you an idea of what a team effort …
