literary biography
Excess and incest were meat and drink to the Byrons
Excess, incest and marital misery were in the blood. Frances Wilson uncovers several generations of infamous Byrons
Wordsworth may have been partially eclipsed by his fellow Romantics, but his life was far from dull
Wordsworth’s reputation has been too long in decline, says Tom Williams. In the space of a decade he transformed English poetry, and his earlier works remain astonishing
‘Where every vice was permissible’: Graham Greene’s Cuba
Cuba meant a lot to Graham Greene. Behind his writing desk in his flat in Antibes he had a painting…
Lonely hearts and guilty minds: the world of Pamela Hansford Johnson
The revival of interest in mid-20th century novelists is one of the most positive and valuable developments of our time.…
Navigating a new world
In the 1890s, when British-owned ships carried 70 per cent of all seaborne trade, legislators worried about the proportion of…
Oliver Goldsmith: the most fascinating bore in literature
On 10 April 1772, the biographer James Boswell recorded in his diary that he had hugged himself with pleasure on…
