2026: there is a significant anniversary to think about. It is exactly 110 years since the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama was established. The archival records don’t specify the exact month the doors first opened in 1916, but I assume the formal first day of school was in the
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Update from the V&A Museum I have recently been following up on the status of the Irene Mawer memorial plaque, a bronze relief of her as Pierrot. This piece is a rare physical record of her mime career and I contacted the Victoria & Albert Museum to see if it was currently
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This is a photo of my Irene Mawer biography manuscript – being checked for errors by Sidney. We are in Spain in our camper van and I had the whole manuscript printed out at a local printer shop as I don’t have a printer in the van. It was well
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In a previous blog post I mentioned that I had digitally erased a pair of antlers that Miss Mawer was sporting on a hat. And I quickly put them back on when I realised I was messing with a historical archive. It did get me wondering, though, what the antlers
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This past week I have been extremely busy with the technical side of publishing a book. There is an awful lot more to it than I expected and at times it is overwhelming. My manuscript for the biography has been printed out on to paper since before the New Year, and my
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Foundations of the Good Old Panto The good old British panto settled into its role as a Christmas family tradition in the late 19th century — exactly the period when Irene Mawer was growing up (born 1893). I don’t know whether she was taken to pantomimes, but it seems likely.
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Here are two possibilities for the title and sub-title of Miss Mawer’s biography. What do you think? (Please ignore the photo, it is only a prototype mock-up of the cover.) IRENE MAWER: The Biography. A Female Experience of Mime, Movement and Voice in the 20th Century. Or
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The Barnstar is a community-driven award on Wikipedia, used to recognize editors who contribute meaningfully to Wikipedia content. It’s a way of saying “thank you” and celebrating collaborative effort of Wikipedia. Some years ago, I created a Wikipedia page for Miss Mawer. I worked hard on it and was very
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Recently, I was lucky enough to attend the Ruby Ginner Awards 2025, held by the Classical Greek Dance Association. While I was there, I mentioned that next year, 2026, will be the 110th anniversary of the founding of the Ginner-Mawer School. I was rather deflated when, on being asked
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My book about Irene Mawer has been written for some time. The book is finished. So why isn’t it published? The reason is complicatedly simple – copyright. I always knew that I would need to deal with copyright, but I had innocently assumed it would be straight forward, and mainly
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