‘I Scribble, therefore I am’: this Cartesian quip is typical of Simon Schama, as is the comprehensive subtitle: ‘Writings on Ice Cream, Obama, Churchill and My Mother,’ among other topics, of course.
‘I Scribble, therefore I am’: this Cartesian quip is typical of Simon Schama, as is the comprehensive subtitle: ‘Writings on Ice Cream, Obama, Churchill and My Mother,’ among other topics, of course. This gives the flavour of the delights on offer: a miscellany of observations, reviews, mini-lectures and reminiscences written between 1979 and 2010.
Schama and Starkey, TV’s duo of history gurus, have helped to re-popularise a subject often dismissed as irrelevant; but whereas Starkey can come across as a quirky martinet, here Schama seems as benign and equable as everyone’s ideal grandfather. But don’t be deceived: his mind is as sharp as a scalpel.
Divided into eight sections under broad headings, his subjects range from Charlotte Rampling to Ruskin; art to democracy; fountain pens to food; Cunard to cookery.
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