The journey of Adam and Eve
Trying to reconcile a belief in the literal truth of the Bible with the facts of the world as we…
The dice men
‘I have a slight bone to pick with you,’ I tell Ian Livingstone as he makes me a cup of…
How I write
How do they do it? Among writers, the earnest audience member at a literary festival who asks, ‘Do you write…
The first celebrity
It’s quite a scene to imagine. A maniacal self-publicist with absurd facial hair takes off in what’s thought to be…
Diary
Also in Sam Leith’s Diary: the best 18th-century novel since the 18th century and gossiping with David Miller
Diary
To Fortnum & Mason last week on the hottest evening of the year to present the Desmond Elliott Prize for…
In praise of neigh-sayers
Wallace Stevens gave us ‘Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird’. The German scholar Ulrich Raulff, in this meaty book…
The game of life
In the introduction to his new book Steven Johnson starts out by describing the ninth-century Book of Ingenious Devices and…
The game of life
In the introduction to his new book Steven Johnson starts out by describing the ninth-century Book of Ingenious Devices and…
A few good books
It is a truth universally acknowledged that whenever ITV or the BBC decides — the latter usually with charter renewal…
Smashing stuff
‘Joe lay in bed in his mother’s house. He thought about committing suicide. Such thinking was like a metronome for…
Cervantes the seer
William Egginton opens his book with a novelistic reimagining: here’s Miguel de Cervantes, a toothless old geezer of nearly 60,…
Diary
I’d like this to have been one of those Spectator diaries that gives the ordinary reader a glimpse into the…
Diary
I’d like this to have been one of those Spectator diaries that gives the ordinary reader a glimpse into the…
United Arab Emirates: Leaves in the desert
Who goes to the Sharjah International Book Fair? Sam Leith, for one
‘They pull a gun, you pull a hashtag’ – the ridiculous debate over what to call Isil
We should worry less about what to call Isis, and more about how to fight them
Theatre of politics
Sam Leith on the year 1606, when plague and panic were rife — and all the world really was a stage
1386 and all that
Sam Leith describes the frequently lonely, squalid and hapless life of the father of English poetry
When Hitler’s dream came true
In 1946, in the aftermath of a devastating war, the world seemed a very dark place indeed, says Sam Leith
High rises and dashed hopes
The only thing really swinging in early Sixties Britain, says Sam Leith, was the wrecking-ball
Translating Proust wasn’t all
Sam Leith is astonished by how much the multi-talented Charles Scott Moncrieff achieved in his short lifetime
The rhythm of life
Sam Leith finds much to like in a companion to musical films, and concludes that they matter very much – to the author anyway
The incredible journey
Sam Leith marvels at a lone horseman’s 10,000-mile ride, braving bandits, quicksands, vampire bats and revolution in search of ‘variety’
A guide to life
Adam Nicolson plunges into Homer’s epic poetry and finds it inexhaustible. Sam Leith feels a touch of envy
Biting back
Edward St Aubyn’s new novel is a jauntily malicious satire on literary prizes in general, the Man Booker Prize in…
