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Sheila Hancock takes pride in her irascibility
This book begins with Sheila Hancock wondering why she is being offered a damehood. I must say I slightly wondered…
Bisexuality was the Bloomsbury norm
It’s been a century since the heyday of the Bloomsbury group, and now Nino Strachey, a descendant of one of…
From teenage delinquent to man of letters: James Campbell’s remarkable career
The great age of the Scottish autodidact must have ended a century ago, but it had a prodigious impact while…
What do Beethoven, D.H. Lawrence and George Best have in common?
This is not a book about tennis. Roger Federer appears early on, trailed by the obligatory question ‘When will he…
Women behaving badly: Ghost Lover, by Lisa Taddeo, reviewed
Lisa Taddeo’s Three Women established her as a narrator of female desire in all its complexity. Her study of three…
Alive with innovation: British art between the world wars
When I mentioned the subject of this book to someone reasonably well-informed about 20th-century British art, the response was: ‘Isn’t…
The catastrophe that allowed mammals to reign supreme
Humans are so comfortable with their self-declared dominance over the rest of life, appointing themselves titular head of an entire…
A twist on the American classic: The Sidekick, by Benjamin Markovits, reviewed
On the cover of The Sidekick, just below a broken basketball hoop, a quote from Jonathan Lethem suggests Benjamin Markovits…
‘It was all a fairy tale’: Lina Heydrich’s description of the Holocaust
There have been many biographies of Reinhard Heydrich, the cold, cynical head of the SS in the Third Reich, but…
After Aberfan, clairvoyants had a field day
In the wake of catastrophe, however random or unpredictable, one of the first things people can be relied upon to…
Too close to home: Nonfiction, by Julie Myerson, reviewed
Julie Myerson has, somewhat confusingly, written a novel called Nonfiction. The confusion of course is the point, because this is…
Musings on harmony, melody and rhythm
Every Good Boy Does Fine – a banal phrase that also just happens to be the key to limitless wonder.…
A flawed utopia: The Men, by Sandra Newman, reviewed
The problem for feminism is men. Not, specifically, in the sense that men are the source of women’s problems, although…
Where does brave, stubborn Hungary stand today?
‘Deplorable,’ wrote the historian Denis Sinor in 1958 about the state of Hungarian historiography in English. ‘Not only are the…
A child’s eye view: Fight Night, by Miriam Toews, reviewed
Writing from a child’s point of view is a daredevil act that Miriam Toews raises the stakes on in her…
Brother against brother in the English civil war
‘The Wars of the Three Kingdoms’ is the best description of the devastating conflict that erupted in England, Ireland and…
The real Norfolk: Stewkey Blues, by D.J. Taylor, reviewed
D.J. Taylor is a Norfolk native who, un-usually, has stayed put. These stories, written during the pandemic, are all set…
Life’s great dilemma: Either/Or, by Elif Batuman, reviewed
In this delightful sequel to her semi-autobiographical novel The Idiot (2017), which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, Elif…
Whodunits shouldn’t be dismissed as a guilty pleasure
What a weird lot crime writers are. I don’t come to this conclusion lightly, since I’m a crime writer myself,…
Old rockers with a Peter Pan syndrome
What do the following individuals have in common: a political activist from Suffolk; a chartered psychologist from Oxfordshire, who enjoys…
Reflections on water in the Middle East
These Bodies of Water begins dramatically (as befits a book derived from Sabrina Mahfouz’s Royal Court show A History of…
Is Anna Wintour human?
Apparently Anna Wintour wants to be seen as human, and Amy Odell’s biography goes some way to helping her achieve…
The sad fate of Edna St Vincent Millay – America’s once celebrated poet
In June 1957, Robert Lowell attended a poetry reading by E.E. Cummings. Sitting dutifully and deferentially alongside him were Allen…
The danger of learning too much from Covid
When Ray Bradbury was asked if his dystopian vision in Fahrenheit 451 would become a reality, he replied: ‘I don’t…
The treatment of mental illness continues to be a scandal
There is much more desperation in this searching and enlightening history than there are remedies. Andrew Scull is a distinguished…
