Books
The frustrated life of John Singer Sargent
At Tate Britain this year, for the first time since 1926, nine of John Singer Sargent’s brilliantly painted and affectionately…
The afterlife of a painting: Molly & the Captain, by Anthony Quinn, reviewed
Novels about art are often strange, vain affairs. After all, writing about artists, especially fictional ones, can seem like a…
An Argentinian allegory: Our Share of Night, by Mariana Enriquez, reviewed
‘In Argentina,’ Mariana Enriquez writes in Our Share of Night, ‘they toss bodies at you.’ It is an arresting, chilling…
The history of the world in bloodshed and megalomania
It is hard to imagine why anyone should want to write one, but if there has to be a history…
‘The strangest of lives’: the plight of White Russians in Paris
Fleeing the revolution and forced to scrape a living as taxi drivers and seamstresses, the exiles were generally a melancholy crowd, united by mutual loathing
The music that inspired Bob Dylan
Greil Marcus chooses seven celebrated songs, ranging from the 1960s to the present, to explore the diverse sources of Dylan’s inspiration
Vatican II has always been seriously misunderstood
People no longer moan about most of the things that bothered them during my childhood. You don’t hear old folk…
All the art you’d pay not to own
‘To my mind,’ Renoir once wrote, ‘a picture should be something pleasant, cheerful and pretty. There are too many unpleasant…
The troubled life of Paul Newman
Paul Newman explains at the beginning how this book came about: ‘I want to leave some kind of record that…
Displacement and disturbance: Seven Empty Houses, by Samanta Schweblin, reviewed
Thrice nominated for the International Booker prize, the Argentine author Samanta Schweblin is part of a wave of Latin American…
The cruel legacy of the She-Wolf of France
Alison Weir’s study of five Plantagenet queens is dominated by Isabella, the wife of Edward II, whose vengefulness led to the Hundred Years’ War
Bogs, midges and blinding rain: the joys of trekking in the Highlands
Raynor Winn’s first book, The Salt Path, was a genuine phenomenon. Having been evicted from their farm after 20 years,…
What it means to be a black African in London
Since 2011, black Africans have been the dominant black group in the UK. Many of them are the descendants of…
Strange bedfellows: Charles Dickens and the popstar Prince
Nick Hornby yokes the two in an enjoyable jeu d’esprit – but, apart from troubled childhoods and prodigious energy, the thing they really share is Hornby’s admiration
No chocolate-box portrait: Bournville, by Jonathan Coe, reviewed
Queasy nostalgia gives way to mounting anger in a satirical novel about post-war Britain, seen through the eyes of a Birmingham family
Philosophers in the cradle: Marigold and Rose, by Louise Glück, reviewed
Infant twin girls, in the first year of their lives, muse on everything from the futility of existence to the purpose of memory
Books of the Year I — chosen by our regular reviewers
Our regular reviewers choose the books they have most enjoyed reading in 2022
Helpless human puppets: Liberation Day, by George Saunders, reviewed
George Saunders’s handbook published last year, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, gave masterclasses on seven short stories…
How to tether your camel and other useful tips
Here’s a treat for Christmas: a bona fide literary treasure for under a tenner. And a handsome little hardback, too,…
Heavenly beauty: Doppelmayr’s Atlas Coelestis
It seems something of a disservice to a work of this seriousness to say how beautiful it is, but that…
The horrors of lynching: The Trees, by Percival Everett, reviewed
Percival Everett’s 22nd novel The Trees was that rare thing on this year’s Booker shortlist: a genre novel. Only which…
What Zelensky has taken from his former TV career
Volodymyr Zelensky is one of the few leaders of modern times whose charisma, determination and sheer cojones can be said,…
Who needed who most? The complex bond between Vera Brittain and Winifred Holtby
Claudia FitzHerbert explores the complex bond between two remarkable writers in the interwar years
A cinematic offer we could not refuse
Francis Ford Coppola’s superb film The Godfather changed American cinema and, by extension, American culture. The film had it all:…
The rocky path to Christian dominance in Europe
Mutilated, strangled, suffocated or beaten to death: these are just some of the methods used to get rid of popes…
