Author Archives: Don Cram

Spider Woman’s Daughter by Anne Hillerman

Anne Hillerman has continued these Leaphorn & Chee mysteries after her father’s death. They are excellent, continuing the settings and characters made famous by her the Tony Hillerman Navajo police mysteries, perhaps even better since they include a feminine perspective. … Continue reading

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Surnames

The study of how names came to be is called onomastics. In Britain, surnames were rare until the arrival of William the Conqueror. Until the nineteenth century the Dutch still did not use surnames generally. This perturbed Napoleon who ordered … Continue reading

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Protest Too Much

“Methinks thou dost protest too much” is a fine example of iambic poetry, but it is not what Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet. “The lady doth protest too much, methinks,” iambic and pentameter, is what he wrote in Hamlet, Act III, … Continue reading

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