My agapanthus, the sole survivor on my west-facing balcony, captured at daybreak. #climatecrisis

Godwin & Curran at Glendalough, 7-8 Aug. 1800: 'We arrived at the Seven Churches about 5 o'clock, where we found neither Inn, nor alehouse, but a camp, the officers of which generously spying our distress, & hearing the name of counsellor Curran, supplied us...with dinner, tea, supper & beds.'

#OTD 1834: death of English poet and polymath Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the quince which William Godwin longed to engraft upon his apple-tree, 'melting & combining several of your modes of feeling ... into the substance of my mind' (Godwin to Coleridge, 5 September 1800; Letters, ii. 169).

Father's Day again. It will always be your day, Dad (pictured here as Sheriff of the Borough of Berwick-upon-Tweed in the early 1990s, following his year as Mayor, 1987-8).

#OTD 1794: publication of #WilliamGodwin’s most celebrated novel, Caleb Williams, in which the servant Caleb denounces his murderous employer, Falkland, & both are morally destroyed by fake news, dirty tricks, & all the truth-twisting deceptions by which authoritarian governments maintain power.

For late bloomers everywhere: Mary Delany (1700-1788) began her celebrated 'paper mosaicks' at the age of 72. Pictured: Myosotis Scorpiodes (Forget-me-not).

Corrections to 2nd proof of The Letters of William Godwin, Volume IV (618 pages before indexing), now completed and awaiting collection by OUP van man. Have been working on them since 16 January... Thanks to all those watching and waiting. #TheLongestJourney global.oup.com/academic/pro...

#OTD 7 April 1836: death of #WilliamGodwin, author of Political Justice, Caleb Williams, & many other works speaking truth to power; head of one of Britain's leading literary families; writer of 1500 astonishing letters – Vol. IV: 1816-1828 due out from OUP this year. global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Wishing you a #HappyEaster with 'Loveliest of Trees', from A.E. Housman's A Shropshire Lad (1896). Each time I read this poem, I hear the voice of the late, great Jon Stallworthy (1935-2014) reciting it from memory. #EasterDay

'The Bright Field', by R. S. Thomas, first published in his Laboratories of the Spirit (1975). #WorldPoetryDay

#OTD 14 Feb. 1793: philosophical anarchist William Godwin published his celebrated love letter to the world, Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, in which he envisaged a society based on justice, equality, tolerance, benevolence, & mutual moral accountability. #Valentine’sDay #LoveThyNeighbour

'There'll never be peace till Jamie comes hame', by Robert Burns (b. 25 Jan. 1759), based on what he described as 'a beautiful Jacobite Air', was sent by him to the Edinburgh lawyer Alexander Cunningham on 11 March 1791, & published, set to music, in James Johnson's Scots Musical Museum (1792). 1/2

Happy New Year! Best foot forward into 2026. Image: Henri Cartier-Bresson, 1932.

Thomas Hardy’s great end of year lyric poem, 'The Darkling Thrush', first published in The Graphic on 29 Dec. 1900, and then in The Times on 1 Jan. 1901 – though a deleted ‘1899’ on the manuscript suggests he may have written it earlier.

A good day for A Wild Goose Chase: Andrew McNeillie’s new collection of poems wiffling in for a landing.

Thomas Hardy's 'The Oxen', composed in wartime and first published in The Times, 24 Dec. 1915.

Remembering my father, Albert Edward Clemit, who died #OTD 23 December 2012, with snatches from the obituary I wrote for the #Berwickshire News. Thinking of others who, like me, winter out Christmas every year.

Caleb Williams (1794), William Godwin's timely exposé of fake news, dirty tricks, and all the truth-twisting deceptions by which authoritarian governments maintain power, is now trending on Bluesky. (Image from 19c. reprint)

#OTD 1 December 1817: publication of #WilliamGodwin’s Mandeville: A Tale of the Seventeenth Century, the only novel by him to be published in Edinburgh, & the subject of over 55 letters in Volume 4 of my OUP Letters of William Godwin, now at press.

Small Business Saturday: a book ticket for M. J. Godwin & Co., the children’s publishing and bookselling business run by radical polymath William Godwin and his second wife, Mary Jane Godwin, from 1805 to 1825. Read all about it in my piece for the Idler: pamelaclemit.wordpress.com/2019/10/08/n...

Volume IV of the OUP edition of William Godwin’s letters, now at press, includes an extensive description of his 1816 visit to Abbotsford, together with four letters to Sir Walter Scott (d. OTD 1832), all written in 1824, the same year that Edwin Landseer painted this portrait of Scott at home.

#OTD 8 July 1822: Godwin’s son-in-law Percy Bysshe Shelley drowns in the Gulf of La Spezia, leaving many of his poems unpublished and his papers in disarray. What happened next? Read all about it in my piece for @thetls.bsky.social www.the-tls.com/literature/p...

Father's Day again. My father in 1992. It will always be your day, Dad.

#OTD 26 May 1794: publication of the radical polymath William Godwin's most celebrated novel, Things As They Are; or, the Adventures of Caleb Williams, a tale of flight & pursuit, & a searing analysis of all the truth-twisting deceptions by which authoritarian governments maintain power.

Anarchy in the UK: OUP hoists its standard for radical polymath #WilliamGodwin, author of Political Justice, 1793, & Caleb Williams, 1794; & (in timespan of this volume) Mandeville: A Tale of the Seventeenth Century, Of Population, History of the Commonwealth of England; & many more works. At press.

Another year, another birthday. The English artist, letter-writer, and bluestocking Mary Delany (1700-1788) began creating her ‘Paper Mosaiks’ at the age of 71.

#OTD 7 Apr. 1836: death of the radical polymath #WilliamGodwin, author of Political Justice, 1793, Caleb Williams, 1794, & many other works; husband of #MaryWollstonecraft, the early advocate of women’s rights; father of #MaryShelley, author of The Last Man. He lives on in his writings—& in theirs.

#OTD 29 March 1797: marriage of William Godwin, author of An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793), and Mary Wollstonecraft, author of Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), at St Pancras Old Church, Somers Town. The rest is history.

#OTD 3 March 1756: birth of radical polymath #WilliamGodwin, author of Political Justice (1793), a founding work of philosophical anarchism, Caleb Williams (1794), the first detective novel, & many other works – & letter writer extraordinaire.

What did the radical polymath #WilliamGodwin do on #Valentine’sDay, 1793? He published his love letter to humanity, An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, in which he denounced government corruption & envisaged a new society based on justice, equality, tolerance, & mutual moral accountability. 1/2