The good, the bad and the ugly in books, exhibitions, cinema, TV, dance, music, podcasts and theatre.
The glamorous art world of Manhattan is a natural subject for novelists and film-makers, but with the honourable exception of William Boyd’s Stars and Bars, written before the great art boom of recent times got going, few of the novels or movies have quite got it right. The glamorous art world of Manhattan is a
Derek Hill (1916–2000), writes Bruce Arnold, was an English representational landscape and portrait painter of ‘haunting and evocative creative spirituality that is perhaps indefinable’. Derek Hill (1916–2000), writes Bruce Arnold, was an English representational landscape and portrait painter of ‘haunting and evocative creative spirituality that is perhaps indefinable’. But the biographer was undeterred. As an
In September 1954, Albert Speer decided to walk from Berlin to Heidelberg, a distance of 620 kilometres. As Hitler’s architect still had more than a decade of a prison sentence in Spandau to serve, this might have been seen as problematic. But not so. Speer mapped out a circular course of 270 metres in the
Why do so many aspiring writers think it best to begin with the short story and graduate to the novel? It’s madness. The short story is infinitely harder to write well. Some novelists succeed at both — William Trevor and John McGahern are the names that spring to mind — but Chekhov never wrote a
Halfway through his new book about Shakespeare’s sonnets, Don Paterson quotes W.H. Auden. Auden was one of Shakespeare’s great commentators and he firmly warned against reading the sonnets as simple statements. ‘It is also nonsensical,’ Auden wrote, ‘to waste time trying to identify characters. It is an idiot’s job, pointless and uninteresting.’ Halfway through his
Marcus Berkmann on the few genuinely funny books aimed at this year’s Christmas market It’s a worrying sign, but I suspect that Christmas may not be as amusing as it used to be. For most of my life, vast numbers of so-called ‘funny’ books have been published at around this time of year, aimed squarely
What do Evelyn Waugh, Peter Cook and Chris Morris have in common? I would have said ‘irreverence’ and left it at that; but the social scientist Peter Wilkin has written a book on the subject, The Strange Case of Tory Anarchism. What do Evelyn Waugh, Peter Cook and Chris Morris have in common? I would
Hitler’s experiences in the Great War have long been shrouded in mystery and controversy, not least because there is relatively little material from that time written by himself. Hitler’s experiences in the Great War have long been shrouded in mystery and controversy, not least because there is relatively little material from that time written by
Here is the latest Book End column from this week’s issue of the Spectator: Much of Stephen King’s recent work has been relatively lighthearted, but in Full Dark, No Stars he returns with gusto to his dark side and explores the perils of getting what you ask for. The first and longest of these four
The panel of judges for next year’s Booker Prize has been announced. It will be chaired by former chief-Spook Dame Stella Rimington. Rimington’s largely candid biography Open Secret gives a very privileged insight into the momentous events of the later 20th Century; and, apparently, her thrillers are a superior treat for a beach holiday too.
I never find the time to read poetry these days; and to enjoy and remember it, you have to read a lot. One of the many pleasures of sitting opposite the Spectator’s literary editors is being given recommended reading, built on more than 50 years of professional experience between them. Yesterday, Clare Asquith recommended I
Hunter S Thompson’s dispatches from Vietnam have entered legend. Murray Sayle is less well known, but he too was in Vietnam as the war degenerated into bloody catastrophe, and he described it with award-winning panache for Harold Evans’ Sunday Times. Sayle, who died recently aged 84, was an inveterate adventurer and mild Quixotic. Born in
Emma Donoghue’s excellent novel Room was rightly shortlisted for the Man Booker prize and the first four (three really) inept words that came to mind after reading it were: ‘really good, really creepy’. It makes me cringe now to think that I didn’t have anything more intelligent to say; but I was emotionally exhausted and,
‘I only see radiators these days’, announces one of the characters in this novel — ‘You know, people who give out heat and warmth.’ A radiator is a pretty good description of India Knight’s Comfort and Joy (Fig Tree/ Penguin, £14.99), too: a book so kindly and funny and affectionate that you could probably warm
While Tony Blair emerged from his memoirs as a chameleon of many colours, there is only one George W. Bush in Decision Points. The book reads like the man speaks. If it has been ghosted — and Bush gives thanks to a multitude of helpers — it has been done with consummate skill to preserve
In these straitened times it looks as if a great many more hours of most people’s days will have to be spent waiting in queues. In these straitened times it looks as if a great many more hours of most people’s days will have to be spent waiting in queues. The perfect companion for such
A memorable image by André Kertész shows a steam train passing over a high viaduct behind a row of peeling French houses next to a demolition site while a man in a suit and hat with his back to the train walks across the foreground, a mysterious painting-shaped item wrapped in newspaper under one arm.
David Cameron probably didn’t need reminding while he was in China what fools intelligent people can be when they visit authoritarian regimes. David Cameron probably didn’t need reminding while he was in China what fools intelligent people can be when they visit authoritarian regimes. ‘Useful idiots’, as Lenin didn’t say, they make allowances for dishonesty,
As befits a magazine with an erudite and international readership, I shall begin this review with a short salutation in the Western Greenland Eskimo language: ‘Ata, sûlorsimavutit!’ The phrase, as some of you — although I fear reprehensibly few — will know means: ‘Well, now you have again relieved yourself in your trousers.’ One can,
Ciudad Juárez, Mexico’s second largest border city, is clogged with rubbish, fouled with car exhaust and, increasingly, flooded with narcotics. Ciudad Juárez, Mexico’s second largest border city, is clogged with rubbish, fouled with car exhaust and, increasingly, flooded with narcotics. Mexican drug cartels are now so deeply ingrained in the city’s political and social fabric
To most people Christopher Plummer means Captain von Trapp in The Sound of Music. Plummer would not be in the least ashamed by this. A year or so ago he found himself forced to watch the film at a children’s Easter party: The more I watched, the more I realised what a terrific movie it
After having for so long been treated with such disdain by the French literary establishment, Michel Houellebecq has at last been embraced by it. Last week La carte et le territoire, his fifth novel, was awarded the Prix Goncourt, a distinction any of his previous novels might just as well have merited. Perhaps it has
Philip Hensher The English novel I liked best this year was Martin Amis’s The Pregnant Widow (Cape, £18.99) — humane, rueful and wonderfully resourceful in its wit. Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom (Fourth Estate, £20) was simply a marvel of technique, observation and sympathy. At the other end of the artistic spectrum, Lydia Davis’s Collected Stories (Hamish
Here is the latest Book End column from this week’s issue of the Spectator: ‘I only see radiators these days’, announces one of the characters in this novel — ‘You know, people who give out heat and warmth.’ A radiator is a pretty good description of India Knight’s Comfort and Joy, too: a book so
Why, one wonders, would a first-time novelist having been born in London, and having spent most of his adult life living in South Wales, set his narrative in mid-century America? For so is J.P. Smythe (surely one of the finest Victorian names to grace any young writer today), billed on the flyleaf of his debut
In July 1995, entrepreneur Jeff Bezos opened a new kind of bookstore. Inspired by recent leaps in modern technology, Amazon.com opened its doors to a different kind of consumer, set to the discordant soundtrack of the 56k modem. The concept followed the familiar principle of the mail-order catalogue, an accessible list of titles and cover
Sir Christopher Meyer, the former British Ambassador to the United States, has reviewed George Bush’s biography for the latest issue of The Spectator. We’ve pasted his entire review below, for readers of our Book Blog. Taking the long view, Christopher Meyer, The Spectator, 20 November 2010 While Tony Blair emerged from his memoirs as a
It is more than 30 years since Mark Amory declared biography dead, when he published his edition of Evelyn Waugh’s letters. Despite the best efforts of Victoria Glendinning (notably on Trollope) and Claire Tomalin (on Pepys and many others) there has been no grand critical resurrection since, until this year and the announcement of the
This year marks the 25th anniversary of Margaret Atwood’s landmark science fiction novel, The Handmaid’s Tale. Set in the Republic of Gilead, it imagines an alternative America of the near future where pollution has sterilized most of the female population. A class struggle arises for the ownership and dominion over women who remain fertile. The