No laughing matter: The Material, by Camille Bordas, reviewed
A graduate course at the University of Chicago teaches stand-up to a group of aspiring young comedians. But the more you analyse humour, the less funny it becomes
Love in idleness: The Four Corners of the Heart, by Françoise Sagan, reviewed
In an atmosphere of languid torpor on a French family estate, an unfortunate relationship develops between a son, a father and a mother-in-law
Is this the end of travel writing?
Viv Groskop shares Sara Wheeler’s fears that modern sensibilities are fatally threatening a centuries-old genre
The art of the short story: what we can learn from the Russians
Viv Groskop takes a masterclass in the art of the short story
Searching in vain for the ‘soul’ of modern Russia
It would be hard to have better travel-writer credentials than Sara Wheeler. Here the author of The Magnetic North and…
A hymn to self-loathing: Tibor Fischer’s How to Rule the World reviewed
Tibor Fischer has a track record with humour. His first novel, the Booker shortlisted Under the Frog, takes its title…
The Boston marathon bombers: Muslim radicals or ordinary American citizens?
As Masha Gessen herself admits — and as friends and journalist colleagues repeatedly told her — it was a strange…
The Great Gatsby meets Fifty Shades of Oligarch
It’s surprising there haven’t been more novels drawing on London’s fascination with Russian oligarchs. But how to write about them…
The Dear Leader’s passion for films — and the real-life horror movie it led to
Ahead of last year’s release of The Interview, the Seth Rogen film about two journalists instructed to assassinate Kim Jong-un,…
Transnistria: a breakaway republic of a breakaway republic
Transnistria is not an area well-served by travel literature or, really, literature of any kind. The insubstantial-seeming post-Soviet sandwich-filling between…
