Jonathan Sumption Barbara Emerson’s The First Cold War: Anglo-Russian Relations in the 19th Century (Hurst, £35) is an outstanding account of Britain’s relations with Russia at a time when ambassadors mattered and Britain was the only world power. No one has explained the Great Game in Central Asia or the intricacies of European dynastic politics
The words ‘country houses’ immediately make one think of England, yet only five of the 15 featured in this hefty, impressively illustrated book are in Britain. It is a compilation of essays: part histories of various Jewish families, part architectural descriptions and part stories of the chateaux, mansions, villas and, of course, country houses all
Unfortunately, She Was a Nymphomaniac must be one of the most eye-catching book titles of the year. I assumed it was just a riff on John Ford’s 17th-century tragedy ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore, but apparently it came directly from the mouth of a modern tour guide in a museum in Rome. The man was
Jeremy Catto’s first sexual experiences were with a greengrocer’s son, but he lost interest in the boy after discovering that his family used tea bags rather than tea leaves. As a youth he marched with the Oxford branch of the Committee for Nuclear Disarmament, but bearing aloft a banner calling for the restoration of the
In ‘Church Going’, the poem that gives this charming book its title, Philip Larkin talks about ‘one of the crew that tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were… Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique’. Well, Andrew Ziminski is king of the ruin-bibbers, randy for antique churches. He doesn’t just know what a rood-loft is; he’s
Somewhere, there must be a PhD: Flashing: Exhibitionistic Disorder in the Oeuvre of Alan Bennett. It’s there in the first of his Talking Heads monologues (‘He’s been had up for exposing himself in Sainsbury’s doorway – as mother said, Tesco, you could understand it’) and in the last, Waiting for the Telegram, which opened with
As Hilary Mantel memorably noted, history represents what people try to hide, and researching it is a question of ferreting out what they want you not to discover. Claire Hubbard-Hall’s plan to unearth the identities and lives of the legions of women who have worked unheralded in the British secret services was bold: looking for
Many readers of Dante get no further than the Inferno. The inscription over the gates of Hell, the demon-haunted circles, the howling winds that buffet the lovers Paolo and Francesca, even the poet’s grim profile and bonnet, are part of the world’s literary and artistic heritage. Several translators also stop at the point that the
In Regency Britain, balls were often timed to coincide with full moons. Provided there was no cloud cover, moonlight made it safer to send out carriages. When Ronald Blythe accepted social invitations, he also took the lunar calendar into account – because a full moon was ‘best for a merry bicyclist wheeling homeward along unlit
You’d think a book about a paralysed man lying in hospital for a year would be bound to be depressing. It never is. Hanif Kureishi is such an exhilarating writer that you read agog even when he’s describing having his nappies changed or fingers stuck up his bottom. It all started on Boxing Day 2022
I have to confess that I am not a fan of horror fiction. I have a stack of unread H.P. Lovecrafts sent to me by enthusiasts. M.R. James scares me silly. Even Elizabeth Bowen’s ghost stories remain neglected among her other much-loved books. I have, however, been impressed over the years by writers usually identified as belonging
‘Gliff’ is a word which can mean ‘a short moment’, ‘a wallop’, and ‘a post-ejaculatory sex act’; to ‘dispel snow’, ‘to frighten’, and to ‘escape something quickly’. It’s ‘really excitingly polysemous’, says one of Ali Smith’s characters. It’s certainly an apt title for a book which can’t seem to define itself. At its centre are
One of the joys of getting older is the appreciation of the solitary pint. But what to do as you sip your hard-earned beer? Usually after a suitable period of contemplation I’ll start fiddling with my phone. Not Adrian Tierney-Jones; he writes books, and his latest, A Pub for All Seasons (Headline, £20), is a
