Gretel le Maître Ponders
Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities. She shares with you passages from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. Gretel invites you to accompany her as she navigates the world a day at a time; the podcast is unscripted, it’s ad-free. It was started to help cope with the imminent death of her mother, and has continued after the grief sadly started in February of 2024. It was a path of solace and remains a path of solace, peace and kindnes...
An Ancient Tradition; a Blackeyed Bagman; and Sagacious Swallows
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Chaucer’s Middle English Words and Phrases; and a Young American Tale 🇺🇸
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
A very good Friday to you. Thank you so very much for joining me as I share with you some delicious nuggets from Chaucer’s Middle English. An example, you say? Why of course! ‘Flokmele’ - in great numbers. As in ‘piecemeal’ meaning ‘piece by piece’. Flokmele: flock by flock. Delicious enough? No, you want more? Righto, one more….‘bisy dred’ - perpetual worry, as in ‘busy dread’.
We read a passage from C.A. Stephens’ ‘When Life Was Young’ set in young, bruised, beautiful America.
Lots of love, Gretel
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Anthony Trollope’s Barchester Towers and a dash of Pepys 📚
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
A Rotten Borough in The Pickwick Papers and Revolting Romancing in Barchester Towers
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Pickwick takes us to Eatanswill; and Saint Alphege is remembered
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
‘Ancient’ Scottish Poetry; Royal Hesse Life; and Benjamin Franklin’s Candour
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Welcome!
Thank you for joining me. An honour for me to have some company. I hope you enjoy today’s readings… 🙋♀️📚🫖
I have found out that sadly these extracts were revealed to be a hoax. Rather than delete the episode I think it better to leave it in place and for it to be (yet another 🥴😔) reminder of Gretel living and learning. Though is she really learning? Therein lies la problème 😅🤷♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. S...
Books for a Rainy Day: Pepys’ Diary, Chaucer’s Clerk’s Tale, Some History of Canada & Australia, et John Clare
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Day 6 in Cornwall: Purely Pickwick
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Good evening. This is a photograph of the Leather Bottle Inn in Cobham, Kent, one of Charles Dickens’ favourite public houses, and features in tonight’s episode. I don’t like what the managers have done inside though and is what is now too common: a canteen style layout of tables for easy serving and plenty of diners; rather than a multitude of different seating areas, which is essential to give a pub its true English traditional charm. However, at least all is kept safe and not destroyed, such as the magnificent fireplace, so per...
Day 5 in Cornwall: St Gennys Church, the Dog that Digs, and the Robin Romance
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Day 4 in Cornwall: Chaucer, Trollope, Jeopardy and Mercy
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Day 3 in Cornwall: A Skylark, Water Pipit and Linnets; and Sam Weller protects Mr Pickwick
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Day 2 in Cornwall: Barchester Towers, the Seaside Robin, and The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Day 1 in Cornwall: The Princess Diaries, an American Poet, and The Pickwick Papers
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Hello and welcome back to Cornwall 🥳
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information...
Alexander Pope and a Ropey Elephant compete with a Wittering Host 🐘
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Dear Friend or New Listener, thank you for joining me today as I wander the streets of Bridport, and talk for England before settling down to read the most thoughtful and eloquent Alexander Pope. He reminds me of William Shakespeare in his thoughts on mankind and his observations: that we are riddled with faults, most of them foolish; and frailties, most of them self-inflicted. If only we could be humble too, then these defects might be forgiven and even be charming, but, no! We dress them in the clothes of virtue and reason. Ti...
Signora Neroni is Irresistible; Mr Jingles is Irrepressible; and Mr Pepys is Irritated. Welcome to Book Night 📕
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Sherborne Abbey: We spend a few hours inside with Mr Wildmam
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Welcome! I’m so glad and honoured to have to hear in the Salon Le Maître where all is usually: peaceful, bright and curiosity-piquing; where sometimes things are: poor quality, yawnworthy and silly; but invariably: well-meaning, warm and respectful.
I wish you well this mid-October weekend, and hope you have a peaceful Sunday evening.
Tomorrow we will catch up with Barchester Towers, the Chronicle, and Samuel Pepys.
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities...
The Wren, J Clare and October, R Frost; Royal Reminiscences; and Mr Pickwick Chasing, in a Chaise
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Thanks to Wikipedia for the wren photographs 😊
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title infor...
A Quiet Hour in the Library 📚: Hunt’s History, Pepys’ Diary, Trollope’s Barchester, and Keats’ To Autumn 🍂
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Anglo-Saxon Chronicles Martyrdom of Archbishop Elfeah; Sunday Bells; and Mr Tupman outplayed in The Pickwick Papers
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Rory Bremner shows Gretel his Trump Impression; Dratted Drones; a London Boat Trip; Gretel’s London; a Retreat; and Unsurpassable Shelley
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Mary Bateson: The Story of the Nations • Monasteries and the Church in Medieval England
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Hello, a very good, if late Wednesday evening. Today’s episode is just one thing: a reading from the wonderful history book by Mary Bateson. However there are the usually interruptions and tangents. It’s obviously just for those interested in church and monastic history and/or those who like a bit of chattering. I find it all jolly fascinating.🤓
Sending you HUGE joy and love 🎈🙋♀️
Gretel x
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day...
Meadow Meander; Tuesday Bells; and Trollopean Ecclesiastical Medieval Manoeuvrings
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
A Whisper of Wellness, while Pepys prepares for War, Robin Hood Wrong-Foots, and Mr Tupman Woos
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
A Book at Bedtime: Marie of Hesse and Barchester Towers
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
John Clare’s Schoolboys; Ullathorne’s Quintain; and Muggleton’s Cricket 🏏
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
A Pinch of Bernard Shaw; a Sprinkle of Samuel Pepys; and a Dollop of Waffle
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Thank you, thank you, thank you for joining me and bearing with me. I couldn’t be more grateful for your support and comforted by your presence.
WHAT a relief to return home: I will never return to my mother’s house now and a door is closed. But memories come into their own, and for anyone in such a position, it is a part of life - a normal part of life. Gretel must put her best foot forward, feed the animals, care for her family, and let the past peac...
Benedict Biscop: a Detailed Death; A Life in Boxes; Battersea Leaves; and Milton
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 d...
A Catch-Up in Barchester Towers; and Gretel heads to London
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Support the show
Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
The Dedicated Listener meets a Brontë, a Chronicle, Caedmon, King Edwin, a Princess of Hesse & Mr Pickwick
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Dear Friend
So very much is going on, with my mother’s house about to be sold, relationship with siblings improving (thank GOODNESS), and Son off to university, not to mention Husband doing All-Sorts, that I needed an evening shut away with my books and you, dear listener, are the poor victim of all this.
BUT I think this stuff - all of it - is so interesting and mind-expanding that I would be over-the- moon if you do actually enjoy it or at least feel your li...
The Tuesday Bells 🔔; Shenanigans in Barchester; and blessed John Clare
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Hello and welcome! I share with you a photograph from my walk today, where we passed Sherborne New Castle, built by the wonderful Walter Raleigh.
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in...
Gretel gives impromptu Sermon; Childe Okeford Village; and more Pickwick
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
The Ancient Tale of Robin Hood; St Paul’s Church, Jarrow; The Crimean War; and Norman Churches
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
The Brontës, Samuel Pepys and Fuller’s Curious Church History
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Obadiah Slope’s Slippery Scheme; Windy Wittering; and Sir Robert Peel’s Undoing
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
A Book at Bedtime: a collection of readings including The Pickwick Papers and Barchester Towers
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Support the show
Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
A Walk in Cerne Abbas; Fuller’s Church History of Britain, of 1648; Tension mounts in Barchester Towers; and poems by Thomas Hardy
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
How to get rid of a horse, in The Pickwick Papers; and Charlotte Brontë’s Irish and Cornish ancestry.
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
Lucy, the Lundy Island Native, talks to Gretel
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This is a very special episode because it’s an interview - or more like a chat - with a one-in-a-million sort of person, whose family have lived on Lundy Island for generations. This is Lucy, a lady we met by chance and whose infectious joy and delight in life and the Island of Lundy blew me away.
I’m sorry to say that because we chatted in the Island pub it’s a little noisy. I’ve had a go at improving the sound - I hope you can hear all that she has to s...
A Nightingale & Orange Tree delight Pepys 🍊; a Saxon Love Letter; Beeny Cliff; and Trollope
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
This episode also includes a delightful reminiscence of Lundy Island by Hedley Thorne, more of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and a message from a new listener from Sydney, Australia.
I hope you are well. Thank you so much for joining me.
Love Gretel
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Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures t...
Purely Pickwick
Listener mail is warmly welcomed 🙋♀️
Support the show
Gretel le Maître likes to look for the beauty and curiosities in life, one day at a time. She shares with you snippets from books about history, art and literature and regularly takes you on adventures to new locations, to explore churches, cathedrals and architecture. We’ve reached over 90,000 downloads.
I suggest you don’t try to listen in order, unless you’re very committed. Dip in and out, choosing an episode based on the title information. Whether you are interested in history, literature...
