Hello. I’m writing this from a hospital ward in England where I am tentatively recovering from Ulcerative Colitis, an autoimmune disease which went undiagnosed and untreated for five months due to a systemic healthcare failure since my consultant appointments were consistently cancelled and rescheduled by the hospital, despite my worsening condition. After nearing dying two weeks ago from… Read on
In memory of Blackie Margaret Hale, c.1999-August 17, 2021. Those who have followed me over the years know who Blackie was, and I would like to talk about her on this sad day. Earlier today, my family and I decided to have our beloved cat put to sleep due to her irreversible health problems. She was approximately 22… Read on
This week marks the end of my family’s two-year stay in Clungunford, Shropshire, England. This weekend, we’ll be back in London, having moved out of Balham back in 2011. After a somewhat nail-bitingly stressful removal over the weekend, I have a bit of time to reflect on what was a momentous couple of years, with the launch of… Read on
Last year on The Seventeenth Century Lady, we had a guest post by literary historian Dr Sara Read, entitled Menstruation & Female Bleeding in Seventeenth-Century England. To this day, this is one of the most popular guest posts in this site’s history, with over 17,000 reads. I’m delighted to welcome Sara back today, conversing with me about historical… Read on
Two Sundays ago (my how time flies!), I attended the 8am Easter Sunday service at the iconic Basilica di San Marco by the Piazza San Marco, Venezia, Italy. In this, the first of a series of articles from my recent trip to Venice, I would like to briefly cover a fraction of the history of this building and… Read on
I made the following Someecards over the course of the past two years, and here are the ones I think are the funniest of the lot. Feel free to use them, but please indicate that they were made by me, Andrea Zuvich, or The Seventeenth Century Lady. Thanks! Enjoy!
I’m sad that I even need to write on this topic, but I feel I must. Ask any of my closest friends, and they will tell you I am a very patient, ‘long-suffering’ person, so if I am compelled to speak out about something it is only because I’ve been pushed too far. As a person who spends… Read on
Wow, it’s already the last day of the August Blog Challenge. This has been such an interesting month of blogging, and I think you know me better than before. Things I am grateful for now: My family. I’ve always been grateful for them. They really rock. My “fans” – apparently, I can say this now! Really, these people… Read on
Leonardo DiCaprio. I remember how incensed I was as a then eleven-year-old, in 1996, when Romeo + Juliet came out and Romeo took drugs. As a Shakespeare fan, I was really angry. Despite my understandable disappointment with Baz Luhrman’s direction for one of my favourite characters, I soon fell under Leo’s spell (as most girls my age did… Read on
“Sugar please!” Uh oh. It’s all coming back to me now… Today’s Challenge topic is to tell you all about something funny. I thought it was funny, you might not, but I still laugh when I think of it. It was summer, perhaps June, maybe July of 2001 when I went to the United Kingdom for the first… Read on
Continuing on with the August Challenge set up by Natalie, today’s topic is ” Selfie! Share a favourite photo of yourself or take a new one” Without sounding horrendously arrogant, my favourite photo of myself is the one above, which was taken at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, because: 1. I don’t look like my usual bespectacled,… Read on
1. Books! 2. My family 3. Random acts of kindness 4. Roses 5. People reading in the library instead of playing video games. 6. Men offering me their seats on the train/bus (i.e. chivalry). 7. Music (mostly works made before the 20th century). 8. Art (anything before 1905 – I loathe modern art with a passion). 9. Daydreaming about… Read on
Today’s August Blog Challenge is to describe a recent dream. Well, since I can’t mention the most recent one – too private, *ahem* – so, I will instead tell you about a reoccurring dream I’ve had since I was a little girl… I’m suddenly in a clearing in a forest, surrounded by lush green trees and there are… Read on
Today’s challenge is: “Learn about something you know nothing about and share five facts”. The first thing that popped into my head was Astrophysics, something I’d heard about during my Physics lectures in high school, but never really got into, mainly because I’m incapable of understanding mathematics. This was a shame, considering most of my science and maths teachers… Read on
Today’s post topic was “Spend $5 (or equivalent) – buy something and share but stay within the budget!” I bought a used copy of Kathleen Winsor’s “Forever Amber” which I have never read before. So, it was 1p plus £2.76, so I am within the range. I know I should have read this one already, especially as it… Read on
Continuing with the August Blog-A-Day Challenge, today’s post is all about when I was twenty-one, which mostly fell upon 2007. It was a bittersweet year, one which made me question so much. I questioned my views on relationships, and even my love of history was put in jeopardy. I was in my first year at university, the third… Read on
Orange Blossom – Orange Blossom has become the most important flower scent for me. I lived in Florida from age ten to twenty-three and my backyard in Rockledge had two large orange trees and one grapefruit tree. Every year, the orange blossom would appear with its gorgeous white flowers and the unmistakeable sweet fragrance. I used to sit reading… Read on
1) Get a home of our own. My husband – once one of the top ActionScript Flash developers in the UK – technically lost his job after Steve Jobs decided to stop supporting Flash on Apple products. The recession hit us hard. We had to sell our flat in London and now are renting from the family up… Read on
I’m a bit late coming onto the August Blog A Day Challenge, but I’ve been wanting to join in. So, here’s my first contribution about the three things I’ve achieved. 1) Becoming a historian. Ever since I was about nine, and was handed my first David Starkey book, about Henry VIII’s Six Wives, I knew I wanted to… Read on
I am an unabashed romantic. That being said, I do not require the majority of the books I read to end happily ever after. In fact, all of my favourite romances from history and literature have been tragic. I grew up reading Arthurian legends, Thomas Hardy, Shakespeare’s tragedies, and more. I must be frank with you, I have… Read on
My husband and I have a lot of friends who do historical re-enactments and we went along to a 1940s-themed party in Shoreditch, London. It would have been more fun had people behaved less like debauched people from the noughties and more like people in the 1940s (i.e. My research and interviews with people who lived in the… Read on