A.S. Byatt
The intellectual passions of J.R.R. Tolkien
There was something remorseless about Tolkien’s spiritual beliefs, as there was about his love of Old Norse and his obsession with privacy
Reading between the lines: the power of the unsaid
Kate McLoughlin explores the various silences in English literature – of rapture, intimacy, failure, avoidance and inarticulable grief
Scratching a living
John Gross’s The Rise and Fall of the Man of Letters: English Literary Life since 1800, a standard text for…
The best British short stories — from Daniel Defoe to Zadie Smith
In this handsome two-volume anthology, Philip Hensher convincingly establishes himself as a world authority on the short story, says Ian Sansom
