Books
The psychiatrist obsessed with ‘reprogramming’ minds
William Sargant’s controversial treatments of troubled young women in the 1960s included prolonged induced comas, ECT and, in extreme cases, lobotomies
Urban gothic: I Want to Go Home, But I’m Already There, by Roisin Lanigan, reviewed
A rented London flat starts to exude hostility and malevolence – or could our impressionable heroine just be imagining it?
Petty, malicious and tremendous fun – the Facebook office drama
Sarah Wynn-Williams’s gleeful dissections of former colleagues’ foibles were met with furious denials and the threat of legal action – guaranteeing maximum publicity for her book
William Blake still weaves his mystic spell
Philip Hoare considers the ageless, hypnotic appeal of the painter, poet, visionary and ‘one-man utopia’
The sin of TDS
You almost have to admire the nerve, the gall, the sheer chutzpah. Here we have a book about the mental…
The Pinochet affair: the pursuit of a Chilean dictator
A fast and compelling account of what happened when the retired general came to London in the late 1990s for an operation, by a lawyer closely involved in the case
The Da Vinci world of known unknowns
Was Leonardo really vegetarian, agnostic and a fashion icon? In this searingly brilliant new ‘anti-biography’ we learn there isn’t much we can say about him with any certainty at all
Doctor, Doctor: the genesis of a national folk hero
A foray into the BBC television series Doctor Who in which the author reaches heavily into the biographies of its lead actors with illuminating results
Satire and settled scores: Universality by Natasha Brown reviewed
Skewering journalistic pretension to authority is the main business of a novel that contrives to be both viciously accurate and weirdly off the mark
Tony Benn, bogeyman to some, beacon of hope and light to many
A collection of speeches and articles reminds us that ‘the most dangerous man in Britain’ was thoughtful, kind, entertaining and one of the most appealing politicians of the postwar period – writes a Conservative MP
Murder she imagined: The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami reviewed
The Moroccan-born American writer’s fifth novel is set in a US where algorithmic policing has halved gun deaths and despite the loss of liberty the majority are happy with the bargain
The last of the great salonnières
At her house in Westminster, Lady Pamela Berry, deb and it girl and then wife of Daily Telegraph proprietor Lord Hartwell, gathered parliamentarians, writers, aristocrats and wits
Poor little rich girl: the extraordinary life of Yoko Ono
Her background was one of privilege and she married one of the most famous men of our time but the Japanese artist suffered her fair share of grief and misfortune
Heroes of the Norwegian resistance
Among many fascinating characters is Gunnar Waaler, a double agent who passed on intelligence to the British while posing as an enthusiastic member of Quisling’s police force
Deep mysteries: Twist, by Colum McCann, reviewed
An enigmatic captain tasked with repairing undersea communication cables disappears, and it’s up to his shipmate to discover why
Why, at 75, does Graydon Carter still feel the need to impress?
The humblebrag and name-dropping read more like a Craig Brown pastiche than the reminiscences of one of America’s most celebrated magazine editors
A meditation on the beauty of carbon
In fact carbon proves just a peg for a series of essays on the oneness of life, with references to ‘ancient teachings’ , ‘other ways of knowing’ and Hindu and Buddhist cosmologies
A novel in disguise: Theory & Practice, by Michelle de Kretser, reviewed
De Kretser’s witty, innovative take on the immigrant’s predicament tries ingeniously to persuade us that we are not reading fiction but documentary truth
Bringing modernism to the masses in 20th-century Britain
Owen Hatherley examines the contribution of refugees from central Europe to the film industry, publishing and public art, especially architecture and town planning
Escape into fantasy: Stories of Ireland, by Brian Friel, reviewed
Friel’s tightly knit rural communities like to cling to illusions, whether it’s belief in sunken gold in the bay or in the continual prosperity of impoverished gentry
The story of Noah’s flood will never go out of fashion
Most cultures have a universal flood myth, and the idea of a cataclysmic climate event brought on by human wickedness is always bound to resonate
Across the universe – John and Paul are in each other’s songs forever
The Lennon-McCartney collaboration was one of genius from the start – and even in later years their songs continued to speak to one another, says Ian Leslie
How Anne Frank’s photograph became as recognisable as the Mona Lisa
To date, the diary, pieced together from Anne’s notebooks, has sold more than 30 million copies worldwide, with her story further explored in plays, films and novels
Fight or flight?: 33 Place Brugmann, by Alice Austen, reviewed
Residents of a sedate apartment block in Brussels react in very different ways to the Nazi invasion of Belgium in 1940
Why are we routinely buying disgusting bread in Britain?
Tasteless, adulterated, mass-produced pap bears no resemblance to an independent baker’s slow-fermented loaves, full of flavour, texture and nutrients
