‘A satisfactory novel should be a self-evident sham,’ in an opinion Flann O’Brien (1911-1966) shared with one of his fictional characters, ‘to which the reader could regulate the degree of his credulity’. Furthermore, the inhabitants of novels should be allowed ‘a private life, self-determination and a decent standard of living’. The distinction between reality and
This book shows how successive cabinets have handled the deadliest secret of modern times, what to do about nuclear bombs, since the first ones went off in 1945. As the subject was so secret, not much has ever been allowed out into the public domain; but Hennessy’s scholarly skills have been such that he has
Richard Shannon has been writing about Gladstone on and off for almost 50 years. His first book, a study of Gladstone and the Bulgarian Agitation, was published in 1963. He is the author of a major biography of Gladstone in two exceptionally hefty volumes, which appeared to critical acclaim in 1982 and 1999. So why
Weimar lasted 14 years, the Third Reich only 12. Yet Weimar is always seen as a prelude to the Third Reich, which appears to have been created by Weimar’s failures. Actually, as Eric Weitz argues, the Weimar Republic (1919-1933) was not responsible for the Reich; it was a democratic, socially aware and progressive government, way
However loaded or coded, ‘Greek love’ is one of our more misleading cultural terms of convenience. It refers to an aspect of classical civilisation whose existence many people continue to find either embarrassing or reprehensible. Even now Hollywood chooses to present Achilles and Patroclus as best buddies US-Army style rather than as lovers unabashedly showing
The late Alan Coren once called a collection of articles Golfing for Cats, in order, he claimed, to maximise his sales by tapping in to two profitable markets at once. Michael Moorcock has lavishly adopted this stratagem. The cataloguing data for this book defines it as: ‘1. Detective and mystery stories. 2. Fantasy fiction.’ The
This book exposes newspapers to the same merciless, lethal and sometimes unfair scrutiny which the press itself has long shone on politicians, the royal family and numerous other targets. The results are devastating. Nick Davies has amassed an overwhelming weight of evidence that the British media lies, distorts facts and routinely breaks the law. It
This book is startling, original, enormously disturbing, horribly unscientific but compelling. Did you know that Dachau housed the world’s first and largest organic garden, established to produce various foods, including honey, for the German elite? Or that to find a ‘healthier cigarette’, 12 billion were manufactured using asbestos filters? Production stopped because the filters removed
Jane Rye on William Feaver’s biography of Lucien Freud Lucian Freud describes his paintings as largely autobiographical, which seems to imply some sort of readiness to expose his private life to the public gaze; but he does so on his own terms and is notoriously reluctant to let anyone else poke about in it. At the
Between 1975 and today, under the direction of Professor Wm. Roger Louis, the British Studies Seminars of the University of Texas has organized 60 seminars on the modern history of Britain and has published a selection of the lectures in five volumes of which this is the most recent. It includes personal reminiscence. Graham Greene,
I love books like this. A writer writing about what he knows and what he loves and things he has done, with absolutely no thought as to the marketability of the book when it comes out. This very slight lack of focus has already been reflected in a couple of reviews. What is it, fish
Alan Judd on Marc Sageman’s latest book Marc Sageman is deservedly one of the best-known academics working on terrorism. A clinical psychologist and former CIA officer, in 2004 he published Understanding Terror Networks, a book which enlarged the way the subject was seen. Hitherto, most researchers and governments had located the ‘root causes’ of terrorism
Matthew d’Ancona on Paul Morley’s latest book In 1980, the Manchester pop impresario, Tony Wilson, showed Paul Morley the dead body of Ian Curtis, the lead singer of Joy Division, who had hanged himself. Wilson hoped that Morley would one day write the definitive account of the band and Curtis’s martyrdom. He also knew that Morley’s
J. Robert Oppenheimer, ‘the father of the atomic bomb’, remembered that when he saw the first mushroom cloud rise in its terrifying beauty above the test site in New Mexico, a line from the Bhagavad-Gita came into his head: ‘Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.’ According to a colleague, however, what he
When Edgar Allan Poe bumped into a friend in New York in 1845, according to Peter Ackroyd’s brisk new life, the following exchange took place. ‘Wallace,’ said Poe, ‘I have just written the greatest poem that ever was written.’ ‘Have you?’ said Wallace. ‘That is a fine achievement.’ ‘Would you like to hear it?’ said
The bookshelves of any self-respecting library used to be weighed down with the monographs of the titans of 19th-century politics. The three volumes of John Morley’s masterly Life of Gladstone would jostle for space as each new volume of Moneypenny and Buckle’s six-volume Life of Benjamin Disrael was published. Yet one Victorian politician would have
Both these books are dominated by the American connection, over half of each being devoted to transatlantic collecting in the 20th century. James Stourton’s theme is post-war art collecting, and his US section is headed ‘America Triumphant’. He describes the 60 years when the USA dominated the international art market through sheer buying power but
At the centre of James Meek’s new novel — a fine successor to The People’s Act of Love — there is a brilliant scene in which Adam Kellas, a war correspondent, is watching two Taliban lorries driving along a ridge. In the no-man’s-land between is an ancient Soviet tank occupied by Astrid, an American correspondent
A. N. Wilson commemorates the life of the great journalist Hugh Massingberd The following is the address given at his funeral at Kensal Green Crematorium on 2 January We were all so lucky to bask in Hugh’s generous friendship. He included in this friendship his family, his children, Harriet and Luke, Gareth, the father of Hugh’s
Tugging the review copy of Granta 100 out of its jiffy bag, I decided to conduct a little experiment. I would write down the names of the writers whom I expected to find in it and award myself marks out of ten. Two minutes’ thought produced the following: Martin Amis, Julian Barnes, Ian McEwan, Salman