Sam Leith

In this week’s books podcast, we’re using the occasion of the Man Booker International Prize shortlist to talk about the pleasures and perils of literature in translation. I’m joined by Boyd Tonkin, a former chair of the International Booker and author of the forthcoming The 100 Best Novels In Translation, and Frank Wynne, whose translation of Virginie Despentes’s Vernon Subutex 1 appears on this year’s shortlist. They tell me how to really annoy Milan Kundera, about why the best author to translate is a dead author, how the UK fell into “the parochialism of large nations”, and how a translator saved Italo Calvino from himself. Do give it a listen.

In this week’s Books Podcast, I’m talking to the historian Lisa Hilton about the latest in her series of what she calls “filthy books” — the raunchy art-world thrillers she writes as L.S. Hilton. The third in the trilogy that began with Maestra (described as “like Lee Child, but with sex instead of punching”), Ultima is out this week and concludes the story of Judith Rashleigh’s corpse-strewn progress across the international scene. Lisa tells me about why murderers might slide down bannisters, why she hates her American editors, how she came to love her sociopathic heroine, and what she learnt from Joseph Roth, Patricia Highsmith and Shirley Conran.

In this week’s Books Podcast, I’m talking to Richard Holloway about his new book Waiting For The Last Bus. Richard is famous for having, as some would think rather inconveniently, “lost his faith” while serving as Bishop of Edinburgh. He talks to me about how it’s all a bit more complicated than that, and about how being half in and half out of Christianity has given him a special perspective on old age, death and dying. Does he look to an afterlife? Not since a particularly momentous walk in the Pentlands. And how is it that he maintains Philip Larkin — who wrote of religion as a “vast moth-eaten musical brocade” — had “the soul of a priest”? Listen in and find out.

In this week’s Books Podcast, I’m talking to N. T. Wright, one of the world’s foremost scholars of the theology of St Paul, about a new book — Paul: A Biography — in which he takes an approach to the man. He tells me what Paul was really like, how our understanding of him is distorted both by medieval theology and modern secularism, why you should spell “pneuma” with a lowercase P, and how we’ve got it all wrong about the Road to Damascus…. You can listen to our conversation here: And if you enjoyed that, do subscribe on iTunes.

The longlist for the Man Booker International Prize for fiction – judged by a very impressive panel headed by Lisa Appignanesi and including Michael Hofmann, Hari Kunzru, Helen Oyeyemi and our own Tim Martin – is out. Special props to super-translator Frank Wynne, who has translated not one but two of the thirteen books on the longlist; one from French and one from Spanish, smarty-pants that he is. It also bears noting how many of these books have only appeared in English thanks to the perspicacity of small presses, and lists with a special interest in translated fiction. Not one of these books is on the main imprint of a major fiction house – bearing out Milan Kundera’s wise remarks about what he calls the 'parochialism of large nations'.

In this week’s Books podcast, I’m joined by the great Wendy Cope, whose new collection Anecdotal Evidence is just out. I talk to her about why she’s funniest when she’s most serious, the fascination of writing in form, the disappearance of Jake Strugnell, the recent row over whether the spoken-word work of Hollie McNish and Kate Tempest counts as “real poetry”, and get the scoop on her second-worst marital row ever — plus, she reads some poems from her new book. You can listen to our conversation here: And do subscribe on iTunes for more like this.

I had the privilege – alongside the wise and learned Caroline Moorehead and Ian Kelly – of helping judge this year’s Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize, which was last night awarded to Edmund Gordon for his superb The Invention of Angela Carter. Since we had a truly belting shortlist for this prize, I thought it might be worth reposting the remarks I made in running over the shortlist, and linking, where possible, to the Spectator’s coverage of the books in question. (It’s to my shame that we didn’t review Gareth Russell. As I mention, popular Tudor history books come thick and fast and sometimes the good ones slip through.

This week’s books podcast was recorded live at a special Spectator subscriber event in London, where I was talking to the Harvard scientist and leading public intellectual Steven Pinker about his new book Enlightenment Now. Steven argues that - despite what the news tells us by every measure human well-being now is greater than at any previous point in history. And he attributes this to the values of the Enlightenment. I asked him: which Enlightenment? Can morality really be based on reason alone? And what’s a professor of cognitive science and linguistics doing in this subject area anyway? You can hear his answers below. And if you enjoyed that, please do subscribe on iTunes.

My guest in this week’s podcast is the incomparable spy writer Mick Herron - these days, happily, a less and less well kept secret. He’s the author of the Slough House stories - funny and gripping novels about an awkward squad of failed James Bonds under the aegis of the wonderfully unspeakable Jackson Lamb. The latest is London Rules, and Mick joins me to talk about crap spies, finding a voice, the necessity of killing off the odd main character, and the real life Slough House. You can listen to our conversation here: And if you enjoyed that, do subscribe on iTunes for a new episode every Thursday.

In this week’s books podcast I’m talking to the award-festooned writer Mohsin Hamid about his latest novel Exit West — touching on the effects of technology, the migrant crisis, political writing and why his eight-year-old daughter is shaping up to be an emo kid. You can listen to our conversation here: And do subscribe on iTunes for more like this, every week.

This week’s books podcast celebrates the centenary of Muriel Spark. I’m joined by Alan Taylor (author of a new memoir of his friendship with Spark, Appointment in Arezzo) and the critic Philip Hensher to talk about Spark’s life, legacy, special strengths as a novelist — and the mystique that continues to surround the Scottish-born, Tuscan-dwelling author of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. You can listen to our conversation below: And do subscribe on iTunes for more like that every week.

It LIVES! This week’s books podcast honours the bicentenary of the publication of Frankenstein. To cut through all those high camp, bolt-through-the-neck film versions clouding our collective memory, I’m joined by the poet and critic Fiona Sampson, whose fine new book In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein (reviewed in this week’s magazine by Elaine Showalter) tries to bring the monster, and his creator, and his creator’s creator, back to life as they originally were. Mary Shelley’s fascinating, brave and unconventional life — and the literary excellence of her most famous novel — are our subjects today.