Books
Jaipur Notebook
In 2004, ten days after I moved my family to a new life in India, I gave a reading at…
Ornithology
‘The Wood Thrush can sing a duet by itself, using Two separate voices,’ as opposed To the whip-bird, one cry,…
Books and Arts
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Reviewing reviews of reviews — where will it all end?
Sam Leith reviews the reviews of David Lodge — and wonders where it will all end
When No Man's Land is home
Countless writers and film-makers this year will be trying their hand at forcing us to wake up and smell the…
The Good Lord Bird, by James McBride - review
James McBride’s The Good Lord Bird is set in the mid 19th century, and is based on the real life…
From Nasser to Mubarak — Egypt's modern pharaohs and their phoney myths
Jonathan Rugman is foreign affairs correspondent for Channel 4 News.
Why are Scandinavians so happy when they should be so sad?
As I sit here in my Sarah Lund Fair Isle sweater, polishing my boxed sets of Borgen and nibbling on…
On Lambeth Bridge
I am halfway across a bridge and midway through my life, staring at the midday sun. How I love politics!…
Where the Whigs went
A book about one of the London clubs, published to mark its 250th anniversary, might be regarded as of extremely…
The two people who brought us The Grapes of Wrath
John Steinbeck (1902–1968), an ardent propagandist for the exploited underdogs of the Great Depression, had barely enough money for subsistence…
Write what you know — especially if it's the second world war
Adam Foulds’s latest novel is less successful than its predecessor. In 2009 he reached the Booker shortlist with The Quickening…
A cruel novel about an India-born, world-famous, possibly real-life author
It is six years since Hanif Kureishi’s last novel Something to Tell You, a kaleidoscopic meditation on life and death…
Hope for one of the most turbulent, traumatised regions in the world
John Keay’s excellent new book on the modern history of South Asia plunges the reader head first into some wildly…
Our founding father
Founding fathers of proud nations are venerated. From an early age, children learn about their achievements and sacrifices. A King…
On Lambeth Bridge
I am halfway across a bridge and midway through my life, staring at the midday sun. How I love politics!…
On Lambeth Bridge
I am halfway across a bridge and midway through my life, staring at the midday sun. How I love politics!…
Books and Arts
Got something to add? Join the discussion and comment below.
My family's better days
Simon Blow recalls the wealth, recklessness and beauty of his family’s better days
Butcher's Crossing is not at all like Stoner — but it's just as superbly written
John Williams’s brilliant 1965 novel, Stoner, was republished last year by Vintage to just, if surprisingly widespread, acclaim and went…
Is there a way to live without economic growth?
During Japan’s lost decade in the 1990s I found myself handing out rice balls to Tokyo’s homeless on the banks…
Breakdowns, suicide attempts — and four great novels
Among the clever young Australians who came over here in the 1960s to find themselves and make their mark, a…
'Where are the happy fictional spinsters?'
This book arose from an argument. Lifelong bookworm Samantha Ellis and her best friend had gone to Brontë country and…
Hugh Trevor-Roper, the man who hated uniformity
The arrival of a letter from Hugh Trevor-Roper initiated a whole series of pleasures. Pleasure began with the very look…
The 'semi-detached' member of Margaret Thatcher's cabinet
John Biffen was mentally ill. This is the outstanding revelation of Semi-Detached, a memoir which has been assembled from his…
