A View of the Harbor by Elizabeth Taylor
Elizabeth Taylor is a private writer and a slow teller. In a recent reissue of a 1947 novel, A...
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Author: Dennis Haritou
The Daemon Knows by Harold Bloom
When I was a teenager the F. O. Matthiessen edition of The Oxford Book of American Verse fell off...
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Germinal By Emile Zola
A.N. Wilson’s The Victorians, reviewed on this site, mentions four 19th century novels that deal...
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Against Interpretation by Susan Sontag
When we read we want to soften the blow. We read the lines but we don’t get the impact. So when...
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I Do and I Don’t by Jeanine Basinger
Recent events have led me to wonder when, and indeed if, same-sex marriage will be a theme taken...
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Skepticism and the Depth of Life by Saul Bellow
This is the last essay from the 60’s, sort of Bellow’s swan song to the era, in the recently...
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The Moon in the Gutter by David Goodis
“The Moon in the Gutter”, such a poetic image? But I was wrong. In the shacks, alleys, dumps and...
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The Writer as Moralist by Saul Bellow
Saul Bellow’s essay on this subject was written in 1963. When Bellow refers to the cultural trends...
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The Victorians by A.N. Wilson
We commonly approach the past with a selfie stick. We insert ourselves into it. We crash the party...
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The Earliest Stories Ever?
I got over my desire to be a completist a while back. I no longer have to see all the episodes of...
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Penelope Fitzgerald A Life by Hermione Lee
When Penelope Fitzgerald went up to Oxford, still not the commonest thing for a woman to do in the...
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Appreciating Photography with Susan Sontag
The most offensive use of photography I personally know takes place at the Museum of Modern Art in...
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Suspended Sentences by Patrick Modiano
Suspended Sentences by recent Nobel Prize winner Patrick Modiano is a collection of three novellas...
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Charles Dickens in Hard Times
He’s a gossip. He dishes it out on his characters. His authorial voice is very present. He doesn’t...
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Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh by John Lahr
Since 1992, John Lahr has been senior drama critic of The New Yorker. In 1994 he wrote a New...
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A Review with Teeth – Peter Medawar Reviews The Phenomenon of Man
I came across this scalding review of Pere Teilhard’s The Phenomenon of Man on the recommendation...
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James Baldwin, Everybody’s Protest Novel
How do you challenge a novel that mainstream judgement considers an icon? How do you say: “It’s...
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An Interview with Richard Flanagan
Richard Flanagan is the author of the The Narrow Road to the Deep North, recently released in the...
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Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
If you’re a fan of Indie bookstores then you already know who Emily St. John Mandel is. We have...
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The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan
The Narrow Road to the Deep North is the Winner of the 2014 Man Booker Prize. “Why at the...
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The String Diaries by Stephen Lloyd Jones
A monster story with something of a pity the monster touch, The String Diaries is set in several...
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Euphoria by Lily King
When our society seems to be reeling back from the enlightenment ideals of reason and tolerance,...
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The Stories of Jane Gardam
The Stories of Jane Gardam is an exceptional cloth release from Europa Editions. Exceptional...
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Funny Once by Antonya Nelson
I requested Funny Once from Bloomsbury. I had the feeling, that all bibliophiles have from time to...
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