Tag: books

‘The Story of the Stone”: the artist and shaman come nearest to us in sharing an acknowledgement of the opaque density of our experience.  New short stories by James Kelman.

April 30, 2025

“The Story of the Stone: Tales, Entreaties & Incantations“: the artist and shaman come nearest to us in sharing an acknowledgement of the opaque density of our experience.  New short stories by James Kelman I have already referred to this set of stories in a past blog [see this link to read if you wish]. … More ‘The Story of the Stone”: the artist and shaman come nearest to us in sharing an acknowledgement of the opaque density of our experience.  New short stories by James Kelman.

‘… caught in improper possession of another person’s property’.  Abdulrazak Gurnah (2025) ‘Theft’ is a novel in a great tradition of ‘David Copperfield’ & ‘Great Expectations’.

April 26, 2025

‘… caught in improper possession of another person’s property’.[1] This blog examines the sensibility of the outsider’s desire to belong and have no belongings. Abdulrazak Gurnah (2025) ‘Theft‘ is a novel in a great tradition of ‘David Copperfield‘ & ‘Great Expectations’. Karim, whose growth to total self-possession makes him the main contender pretender to be … More ‘… caught in improper possession of another person’s property’.  Abdulrazak Gurnah (2025) ‘Theft’ is a novel in a great tradition of ‘David Copperfield’ & ‘Great Expectations’.

I decided never to rely on my very first impressions of what is likable or not. Why I persevered then with Rupert Everett’s short stories in ‘The American No’. This blog is mainly on his Oscar for A Last Season.

April 14, 2025

I decided never to rely on my very first impressions of what is likable or not. Why I persevered then with Rupert Everett’s (2025) short stories in The American No London, Abacus Books. This blog is mainly on his Oscar for A Last Season The American No is a new set of short stories by … More I decided never to rely on my very first impressions of what is likable or not. Why I persevered then with Rupert Everett’s short stories in ‘The American No’. This blog is mainly on his Oscar for A Last Season.

‘For the Mesopotamians, truth was not contained ….’: was their culture such a one that norms existed alongside happily alongside their contradiction, and repression was unnecessary. This blog reflects on a first reading of Selena Wisnom [2025] ‘The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of History’.

April 4, 2025

When Alexander Pope warned that ‘a little learning is a dangerous thing,’ he was warning that, since error lies everywhere, we need exposure to all the evidence that supports the one and only version of knowledge of the world that is the truth. The real danger is that there are so many statements that claim … More ‘For the Mesopotamians, truth was not contained ….’: was their culture such a one that norms existed alongside happily alongside their contradiction, and repression was unnecessary. This blog reflects on a first reading of Selena Wisnom [2025] ‘The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of History’.

Thomas Haller’s resurrection is his ‘lilac renaissance, his violet hour’.

April 3, 2025

Fritz Schein lives entirely in, and on as his means of living, ‘the art world’ of ‘spectacularity’ – a world of apparently random images and appearances that eschews the privacy of inner reflection by being in love with the still surface of mirrors. When the ‘great recluse’ Thomas Haller turns up at a show Schein knows … More Thomas Haller’s resurrection is his ‘lilac renaissance, his violet hour’.

When I do strange things, fortunately I laugh at myself. A case in point …

March 28, 2025

My current reading Being retired and in one’s seventh decade of age leaves the issue of time open and yet I seem forever to find certain nagging questions pressing on my mind as if they mattered top anyone – even myself. Here is a case in point. i have resolved to do a blog a … More When I do strange things, fortunately I laugh at myself. A case in point …

‘There is always too much and too little said in any story of desire’. A blog that won’t be written on a book that just needs to be read and reflected upon.

March 26, 2025

‘There is always too much and too little said in any story of desire’. [1] Simon Goldhill is an exquisite historian as well as scholar of Greek drama, as his book on the Benson family deeply illustrates (see my blog on this at this link). As works they they therefore satisfy without commentary – for … More ‘There is always too much and too little said in any story of desire’. A blog that won’t be written on a book that just needs to be read and reflected upon.

A distant memory of a distant Peter Avery: “Between my vice and my religion, I find myself continually on my knees.” A ‘straightened’ memory of a queer Fellow.

March 25, 2025

A distant memory of a distant Peter Avery: “Between my vice and my religion, I find myself continually on my knees” A straightened memory of a queer Fellow. I have just read Simon Goldhill’s wonderful book published this year (2025) Queer Cambridge: An Alternative History and will, when I am able and have reflected a … More A distant memory of a distant Peter Avery: “Between my vice and my religion, I find myself continually on my knees.” A ‘straightened’ memory of a queer Fellow.

Tash Aw’s ‘The South’ focuses upon the lives of queer ‘angry young men’, and even boys grown as wild as El Niño.

March 23, 2025

Growth and hunger create awareness of ‘hollow spaces that never existed before’: Tash Aw’s The South focuses upon the lives of queer ‘angry young men’, and even boys grown as wild as El Niño. But are both responding to an extraordinary and new  ‘physical evolution stronger than’ any of us or merely to ‘the effect … More Tash Aw’s ‘The South’ focuses upon the lives of queer ‘angry young men’, and even boys grown as wild as El Niño.

Racism, Sexism, and British writing at the end of the colonial period and the knotty problem of point of view.

March 21, 2025

We sometimes think racism was inevitable in post-colonial Britain, but looking for evidence of it in writing is sometimes an issue that needs thought. I have a good, if incomplete collection of Robin Jenkins’ novels amongst my library which I once read avidly and all the time. I still prize above above many other novels … More Racism, Sexism, and British writing at the end of the colonial period and the knotty problem of point of view.

The queer confidence of a shy man: George Mackay Brown (GMB) and his late novel ‘Vinland’, where “boys love to range freely in the country of their imagination, and there they are captains and jarls”.

March 16, 2025

What is it to be confident? Usually mythologies are based around what ‘confidence’ should mean. The Viking sea captains and jarls of the Orkneyninga Saga are a strong subject for a literature in which boys dream of the men they might become but adolescence was a fraught and painful thing for George Mackay Brown (GMB), … More The queer confidence of a shy man: George Mackay Brown (GMB) and his late novel ‘Vinland’, where “boys love to range freely in the country of their imagination, and there they are captains and jarls”.