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The Black-Out Book: 500 Family Games and Puzzles for Wartime Entertainment
Incorporates "Strictly Personal" and "A Zoo" by Muriel and Sydney Box.
- GenresGamesHistoryNonfiction
216 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
February 29, 2012
This is a book that can be read often and re-read just for the games to play with family on a cold winter's night, a super rainy day or take with you camping. Especially after you read all about the stars and how they show them in the sky. This book is a collection of things gathered that was used during the WWI and especially for WWII in London. With the air raids, there needed to be blackouts in the evening to protect the citizens. Take a look at a wonderful family book that everyone should own. You will be delighted you read it and will want to read it often as a reminder for different time period that should cross over to the present anytime.
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February 14, 2011This is a facsimile edition of “One-hundred-and-one black-out nights’ entertainment.” We have made good use of it while waiting for our meals at the Cherrybank Inn, doing the word and number games and reading off interesting (and often obsolete) facts. According to this book, the Gerrmans measure circles in 400 degrees, therefore a right angle is 100 degrees. The present tense of the verb “wrought” is “work.” It takes 19 pennies stacked on top of each other to equal the height of a single penny. I can just imagine the 10-year-old sitting in the Anderson, trying it out by candlelight.
There are also plenty of poems, quotations, puzzles, quizzes and magic tricks to keep you going during the long and sleepless nights of the Blitz. Or whatever might be causing you sleepless nights.
There’s a useful and interesting introduction explaining some of the background for the book. “Evelyn August” was the pen name of the married couple Sydney and Muriel Box. They worked together as playwrights, and enjoyed a good deal of success, but had to supplement their income when cinemas and theatres were shut down during wartime. Hence this book.
They also worked in the film industry. In 1940, together with Jay Gardner Lewis, Sydney formed a production company that made short government propaganda and training films -- one of these, The English Inn (1941), was Muriel’s directing debut.
The company was called “Verity Films.”
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Random mythbusting from the last page of The Black-out Book:
=Famous Last Words=
Lord Nelson: “Kismet, Hardy.” (No, Bobby, he didn’t say “Kiss me, Hardy.” That is just one of those superstitions that sometimes find their way into history books.)
There are also plenty of poems, quotations, puzzles, quizzes and magic tricks to keep you going during the long and sleepless nights of the Blitz. Or whatever might be causing you sleepless nights.
There’s a useful and interesting introduction explaining some of the background for the book. “Evelyn August” was the pen name of the married couple Sydney and Muriel Box. They worked together as playwrights, and enjoyed a good deal of success, but had to supplement their income when cinemas and theatres were shut down during wartime. Hence this book.
They also worked in the film industry. In 1940, together with Jay Gardner Lewis, Sydney formed a production company that made short government propaganda and training films -- one of these, The English Inn (1941), was Muriel’s directing debut.
The company was called “Verity Films.”
--------------------------
Random mythbusting from the last page of The Black-out Book:
=Famous Last Words=
Lord Nelson: “Kismet, Hardy.” (No, Bobby, he didn’t say “Kiss me, Hardy.” That is just one of those superstitions that sometimes find their way into history books.)
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews