Category: Literature

It’s very sad to hear that Michael Dibdin has died. He was a really fine author and I’ve absolutely loved his Aurelio Zen series of novels. More obituaries at the BBC and the Daily Telegraph. A final Zen novel, End Games, is due in July. [UPDATE] The Guardian’s own obit, and In Praise of… Aurelio…

And speaking of The Independent – it has a new promotion running on Saturdays called “Banned Books.” Each week you can buy one of “25 cutting-edge titles, censored classics and literary landmarks” for £3.49 with your Saturday Independent (at selected stores). They gave away the first in the series, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess,…

Sad to hear that veteran Polish journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski died last week. I first came across him when I started reading Granta many years ago. To be honest I was intrigued by a magazine that came in a paperback book format. But two writers from those early editions really stood out for me: James Fenton’s…

I was wandering around Borders the other day, just to see if they had any interesting books in the London branch that hadn’t been in the Norwich branch. Not that I need any more books. Anyway, they did have the hardback of Restless by William Boyd on sale at half price. Now I love William…

My parents have read a couple of books by someone who they said was quite good. I was curious to find out more, so I asked: Me: “Who’s the author?” Them: “We can’t remember.” Me: “What’s the name of one of the books he wrote?” Them: “We can’t remember.” Me: “Can you tell me anything…

I see that I’m not the only person who gets fascinated by The Guardian’s regular table of bestselling (or fastselling) books across the year. Grumpy Old Bookman has a good analysis to read alongside The Guardian’s own. What does it tell us about the state of British book publishing in the UK? Well first and…

Who, precisely, is it that decides buying a book of scripts is a good idea? Let me explain myself a little. Obviously aspiring scriptwriters can learn an awful lot from reading previously made scripts. Similarly, film or television students probably find scripts to be enormously helpful to study their arts – perhaps noting the differences…

A good piece on the Hollywood blacklisted writers who wrote for The Adventures of Robin Hood in Britain as the only way to continue working once Hollywood prevented them. The story is also well told in the TV film Fellow Traveller.

My local Ottakers has completed its transformation into a Waterstones.

At the weekend I noticed that my local Ottakers is to become a Waterstones in a matter of days. The “makeover” is only scheduled to take a day or so, and I expect to see nothing more than signage on the front of the store. The reason for the rush, according to something I read…

I’ve just been watching The Guardian’s webcast of Al Gore’s speech at the Hay-on-Wye literary festival (he’s got a book coming out later this year, so there is some reason for him to speak). He’s quite a speaker isn’t he? I think sometimes we forget that politicians, whatever we may think of them, have to…