Reluctant servant of the Raj: Burma Sahib, by Paul Theroux, reviewed
Few personal details survive about Eric Blair’s life as a policeman in Burma, making his years in the East fertile ground for the novelist
Four dangerous visionary writers
Simon Ings examines the lives of Maxim Gorky, Maurice Barrès, Gabriele D’Annunzio and Ding Ling, whose propagandism helped shape – and misshape – the 20th century
A mother-daughter love story
In her latest memoir, Leslie Jamison describes her pregnancy, experience of childbirth and devotion to her baby, returning repeatedly to the dilemmas of a working mother
The firebrand preacher who put Martin Luther in the shade
Andrew Drummond traces the short, turbulent career of Thomas Müntzer, the rabble-rousing revolutionary behind the peasants’ uprising in 1520s Germany
Flaubert, snow, poverty, rhythm … the random musings of Anne Carson
It is thrillingly difficult to keep one’s balance in Carson’s topsy-turvy world as she meditates on a wide range of subjects in poetry, pictures and prose
After Queen Victoria, the flood
Alwyn Turner draws on popular culture to show how violent protest and unrest followed the old queen’s death, making nonsense of the fabled Edwardian ‘golden summer’
What do we mean when we say we are ‘giving up’?
Adam Phillips explores the various implications of the phrase, contrasting giving up smoking or alcohol with giving up hope – and being given up on
Lord Byron had many faults, but writing dull letters wasn’t one of them
Andrew Stauffer traces the poet’s tumultuous life through some of the most remarkable missives in the English language
Could AI ruin the election?
The artificial intelligence space is strange. Significantly overfunded, overhyped and overcovered — in part because AI can easily produce bad,…
It gets worse and worse for Rishi Sunak
Sixteen months ago Rishi Sunak was installed as Conservative leader and prime minister in the hope that he would be…
Hope for Russia has died with Navalny
It was brave. It was foolhardy. It was almost unbelievable. After his near-fatal poisoning by the Russian Federal Security Service,…
Could Harry become an American citizen?
If I was the producer of Good Morning America, I would feel disappointed by today’s appearance of Prince Harry on…
