Books
Are you sitting properly?
Funnily enough, after my editor sent me these three books to read, my guts started playing up. Suddenly, food seemed…
All the men and women merely players
How many books are there about Shakespeare? A study published in the 1970s claimed a figure of 11,000, and today…
Not a patch on our own Dear Mary
As Dear Mary so wittily demonstrates, our need for advice is perennial. But fashions change. Mary would probably take issue…
A narcissistic bore — portrait of the artist today
Two ambitious volumes of interviews with artists have just been published. They are similar, but different. The first is by…
No sex, please, in the Detection Club
‘The crime novel,’ said Bertolt Brecht, ‘like the world itself, is ruled by the English.’ He was thinking of the…
Not-so-evil genius
It is almost inconceivable that there could be a more densely detailed book about Napoleon than this — 800 crowded…
Punk in a funk
Look up Tracey Thorn’s live performances with Everything But The Girl or Massive Attack on You Tube and you’ll find…
Raiders of the lost Ark
Years ago, in an ill-conceived attempt to break into natural history radio, I borrowed a nearly dead car from a…
The more deceived
Louis the Decorator and his chums in the antiques trade use the word ‘airport’ adjectivally and disparagingly. It signifies industrially…
Hope against hope
At the eye of apartheid South Africa’s storm of insanities was a mania for categorisation. Everything belonged in its place,…
Sharpen your pencil
‘I had had a fantasy for years about owning a dairy farm,’ says Mary Norris, as she considers her career…
Lacan Appeals to the Patient
Since you remain reluctant, let us imagine that one’s selfhood is a work of art — a maquette in clay,…
Behind the beat
Tony Barrell can’t play the drums, but he’s in awe of those who can. ‘A band without a drummer is…
A choice of first novels
As all writers know to their cost, first novels are never really first novels. They make their appearance after countless…
The Best View in England
that’s what she said. Of course, I begin to find fault: a shrub partly obscures the view, there’s a glint…
Books and arts
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Crank Case
Paul Heywood-Smith QC has written a weak case for Palestine. A much stronger book was there to be written, but…
Lacan Appeals to the Patient
Since you remain reluctant, let us imagine that one’s selfhood is a work of art — a maquette in clay,…
The Best View in England
that’s what she said. Of course, I begin to find fault: a shrub partly obscures the view, there’s a glint…
Lacan Appeals to the Patient
Since you remain reluctant, let us imagine that one’s selfhood is a work of art — a maquette in clay,…
The Best View in England
that’s what she said. Of course, I begin to find fault: a shrub partly obscures the view, there’s a glint…
Blown to blazes
Philip Hensher on a little-known episode of first world war history when a munitions factory in Kent exploded in April 1916, claiming over 100 lives
The devil’s devoted disciple
It is ironic that this weighty biography of Hitler’s evil genius of a propaganda minister is published on the day…
No man is an island
Bit of Kant, bit of Kierkegaard, bit of motorcycle maintenance. That’s one take on The World Beyond Your Head, Matthew…
What a Day
The blue sky is Sunni. The white clouds are Shia. The sun is happy. The shops are crowded. The planet…
