Dante
Hell is other academics: Katabasis, by R.F. Kuang, reviewed
A postgraduate student of ‘Analytic Magick’ must rescue the soul of her thesis supervisor from campus hell or risk being stuck in academic limbo on Earth
The insoluble link between government and crime
Taxes and prohibition invariably lead to evasion, racketeering and corruption in an endless capitalist cycle, says Mark Galeotti
The meaning of ‘moot’? It’s debatable
In Florence there was a stone on which Dante sat in the evenings, pondering and talking to acquaintances. One asked…
Now imagine a white hole – a black hole’s time-reversed twin…
Just as you can enter a black hole without leaving it, you can exit a white hole without entering it – but first you must understand what black holes really are
The mutterings of the dead
Ten years ago Shehan Karunatilaka’s first novel, Chinaman, was published and I raved about it, as did many others. Set…
The coming of barbarism
There’s a scene in Martin Amis’s 1990s revenge comedy The Information in which a book reviewer, who’s crushed by his…
Sin and salvation
Where does the artist end and their work begin? Like 2015’s Woolf Works, Wayne McGregor’s new ballet swirls creator and…
Infernal censorship
How Dante fell foul of the Chinese Communist party
A podcast about the literary canon that actually deepens your knowledge (sort of)
While most of life’s pleasures can be shared, reading is lonely. It’s more than possible for six friends to enjoy…
Throned on her hundred isles
It took the madness of genius to build such a wonderful impossibility. Patrick Marnham reviews a delightful new literary guide to Venice
A mirror to the world
The best new books celebrating Shakespeare’s centenary are full of enthusiasm and insight — but none plucks out the heart of his mystery, says Daniel Swift
Topsy-turvy
When Tom Birkin, hero of J.L. Carr’s novel A Month in the Country, wakes from sleeping in the sun, it…
Double thinking, double lives
Jan Morris on the inconsistency and paradox that has characterised Italian thought over the centuries — and the desperate search for certainty
More Marx than Dante
Martin Gayford finds a few nice paintings amid the dead trees, old clothes and agitprop of the Venice Biennale
Villains of the gospels
Peter Stanford is a writer on religious and ethical matters. He was for four years editor of the Catholic Herald.…
Seeing Dante anew
Reading Dante is an experience of a lifetime. You never come to the end of it. But, like Dante himself,…
Homer in the theme park
A favourite game of mine is to imagine Virgil and Homer today, plying their trade among the supermarkets and office…
Walk on the wild side
After a walk in Richmond Park beset by rush-hour traffic, the Heathrow flight path and a strange swarm of flying…
Steeling the show
Visitors to Chatsworth House this spring might wonder if they have stumbled through the looking-glass. The estate’s rolling parkland has…
