The Joy of Six 1174

"Like a partner in an abusive relationship, the BBC is desperate to be loved by those who despise it and everything it stands for. So, even as this tired and disgraced Government, reeling from a series of catastrophic by-election defeats, is limping timidly towards its reckoning with an increasingly hostile electorate, the BBC’s Director-General felt it necessary to abase himself before its baying backbenchers." Patrick Howse on Tim Davie's self-basement before the 1922 Committee.

Johnny Rich says the government is wrecking its own reforms of technical education.

"Young Deer’s version of the Osage tragedies opened just four months after the January 1926 arrests of William King Hale, Ernest Burkhart and John Ramsey - played by Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio and Tay Mitchell, respectively, in Scorsese’s film - for the horrifying murders of several dozen or more Osage Indians over their oil headrights." Angela Aleiss rediscovers the Native American filmmaker James Young Deer, who first told the story of Killers of the Flower Moon.

Iain Sharpe, who was one of the most interesting Lib Dem voices in the golden age of blogging, has revived his blog Eaten by Missionaries after 11 years. Here he explains why he was away so long.

"One of the things that has always struck me about the Narnia novel is how wildly and recklessly they borrow from other narratives.  Lewis blends together Classical myth with English folklore, adds bits of The Secret Garden and the Gospels, gestures to Rudyard Kipling and Thomas Malory, and sends the reader off to wander through this dazzling landscape." Jem Bloomfield introduces his new book, which untangles the literary roots of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Katy Alston is interviewed about her new map of medieval Ludlow: "I tried to ensure that everything on the map had been researched. For example, I wanted to add boats on the river but didn’t because Ludlow didn’t have a decent boat trade route. It was blocked intermittently and very unreliable. Artists have added trows ( boats) in the past, but this was apparently just artistic licence."