book reviews and features
Sally Adee: We Are Electric review - currents that run through us all![]()
All the things going on with me as I type this – fingers moving keys, eye and brain registering characters on my screen, thoughts that will (I hope) generate the next lot of characters – rely on... Read more... |
Extract: The Northern Silence - Journeys in Nordic Music and Culture by Andrew Mellor![]()
“Silence,” Andrew Mellor contends, “is more prominent in the northernmost reaches of Europe.” Yet it is more like a texture or an apprehension of vacancy than a state of true soundlessness:... Read more... |
'I let it emerge': an interview with Fiona Benson on the cusp of the TS Eliot Prize announcement![]()
Fiona Benson’s new collection of poems, Ephemeron (Jonathan Cape, 2022), tries to capture those things that are always moving out of grasp. It does this through four sections: the first... Read more... |
Jaan Kross: A Book of Falsehoods review - plague, power and deception in 16th century Tallinn![]()
When the first volume of Estonian master Jaan Kross’s peerless historical trilogy first appeared in an English... Read more... |
Best of 2022: Books![]()
From Kafka’s spry sketches to Derek Owusu’s novel-poem, and Jaan Kross’s Estonian Wolf Hall to Katherine Rundell’s spirited biography of John Donne, our reviewers take the time to share... Read more... |
10 Questions for writer and translator Saskia Vogel![]()
Johanne Lykke Holm’s spellbinding novel Strega recounts one teen’s journey into womanhood.... Read more... |
Bob Dylan: The Philosophy of Modern Song review - a book that contains multitudes![]()
Some years after Chronicles (2004) a book that broke moulds and delighted with its originality, and as with albums... Read more... |
Kelefa Sanneh: Major Labels review - diary of an omnivorous musicophile![]()
Major Labels: A History of Popular Music in Seven Genres is American critic Kelefa Sanneh’s ambitious survey of musical history. As such, it risks remaining only a... Read more... |
10 Questions for Bruce Lindsay, biographer of Ivor Cutler
Ivor Cutler: A Life Outside the Sitting Room by Bruce Lindsay, is the first full-length... Read more... |
Patrick Duff: The Singer review - agony and ecstasy of a rock'n'roll life![]()
As our favourite rock stars become elders, there has been a steady flow of autobiographies, some ghosted, some... Read more... |
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