Exploring Books Through Articles, Reviews, Announcements, & Lists 2021-3

Third quarter, July-Sept. 2021. Continues: Book Talk: Exploring Books Through Articles, Reviews, Announcements & Lists 2021-2.

TLS, July 02, 2021; no. 6170:

Literature:

Trisha Ayrton. Riches held in great esteem: The story of a notebook of Emily Brontë’s poems. (Essay)

Harry Cochrane. Quarries of silence: The work and legacy of Geoffrey Hill, who died five years ago. (Essay)

Margaret Drabble. From Oprah to Medusa: The endlessly various world of Russell Hoban. (Essay)

A.S.G. Edmunds. Gladly wolde he lerne?: Why Chaucer is disappearing from the university curriculum. (Essay)

Mary C. Flannery. Not all sunshine and roses: Medieval tales of enchantment, seduction and adventure. Review of: Rosalind Kerven: Medieval Legends of Love and Lust.

Will Bowers. The world and what it fears: A contemporary poet’s take on Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Review of: Fiona Sampson: Two Way Mirror: The life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

Eileen M. Hunt. Everything an allusion: Wisdom gleaned from a lifetime of reading poems and novels. Review of: Harold Bloom: The Bright Book of Life: Novels to read and reread and Take Arms Against a Sea of Troubles: The power of the reader’s mind over a universe of death.

In Brief Review of: Nick Holland: Crave the Rose: Anne Bronte at 100.

Also of interest: two letters on the topic of Elaine Showalter's review of Deirdre Bair's Parisian Lives, and the N.B. Column on a review of literary reviews.

Language and Linguistics:

Sarah Watling. Speaking truth to power: On the complex, vital role played by interpreters. Review of: Anna Aslanyan: Dancing on Ropes: Translators and the balance of history.

Lamorna Ash. On rough ground: A memoir of learning Japanese that conveys the importance of doubt. Review of: Polly Barton: Fifty Sounds.

Philosophy:

Clare Carlisle. This time it’s personal: Taking an ecumenical approach to art and belief. Review of: Charles Taliaferro and Jil Evans: Is God Invisible?: An essay on religion and aestheticsF.

Sciences:

Philip Ball. Up and atom: Myths and mysteries of the universe. Review of: Guido Tonelli, Translated by Erica Segre and Simon Carnell: Genesis: The story of how everything began -- Florian Fleistetter, Translated by Gesche Ipsen: A History of the Universe in 100 Stars.

Politics:

Rana Mitter. Permanent revolution: The Chinese Communist Party at 100. (Essay)

Niall Ferguson. Most threatening when weak?: The risks China poses to global security. (Essay)

In Brief Review of: Jason L. Riley: Maverick: A Biography of Thomas Sowell.

History:

Christian Sahner. Waste not, want not: A lively study of Cairo state documents preserved by their use as scrap paper. Review of: Marina Rustow: The Lost Archive: Traces of a caliphate in a Cairo synagogue.

Natasha Hodgson. After ‘Knightfall’: The roles played by women in the crusade movement. Review of: Katharine Pangonis: Queens of Jerusalem: The women who dared to rule.

In Brief Review of: Daniel James Brown: Facing the Mountain: The Forgotten Heroes of World War II. "A history of first generation Japanese immigrants to the US during the Second World War."

New York Review of Books for July 1 2021 online (most of this paywalled I'm sure):

Arts & Sciences:

Catherine Nicholson. Nazis and Nobles: The History of a Misalliance The Triumph of Mutabilitie. Review of: Hazel Wilkinson: Edmund Spenser and the Eighteenth Century Book and Gordon Teskey: Spenserian Moments.

Robert McFarlane. The Landscapes Inside Us. Review of: M.R. O'Connor: Wayfinding: The Science and Mystery of How Humans Navigate the World -- Michael Bond: From Here to There: The Art and Science of Finding and Losing Our Way -- Jon T. Coleman: Nature Shock: Getting Lost in America.

Priyamvada Natarajan. All Things Great and Small. Review of: Katia Moskvitch: Neutron Stars: The Quest to Understand the Zombies of the Cosmos -- Katie Mack: The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking) -- Frank Wilczeck: Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality.

Brenda Wineapple. Dickinson's Improvisations. Review of: Marta Werner: Writing in Time: Emily Dickinson's Master Hours.

Gary Saul Morson. Dostoyevsky and his Demons. Review of: Thomas Gaiton Marullo: Fyodor Dostoevsky: A Life in Letters, Memoirs, and Criticism -- Alex Christofi: Dostoevsky in Love: An Intimate Life -- Joseph Frank, edited by Marina Brodskaya and Marguerite Frank: Lectures on Dostoevsky.

Imani Perry. In Her Own Voice. Lorraine Hansberry, edited by Mollie Godfrey: Conversations with Lorraine Hansberry.

Lorrie Moore. The Inspired Bricolage of Bruno Mars. (Essay)

NYRB July 1, 2021, continued.

History, Politics, Social Studies:

Sean Wilentz. Forging an Early Black Politics. Review of: Kate Masur: Until Justice Be Done: America’s First Civil Rights Movement, from the Revolution to Reconstruction and Van Gosse: The First Reconstruction: Black Politics in America from the Revolution to the Civil War.

Fara Dabhoiwala. Imperial Delusions. Review of: Priya Satia: Time’s Monster: How History Makes History -- Mahmood Mamdani: Neither Settler nor Native: The Making and Unmaking of Permanent Minorities -- Adom Getachew: Worldmaking after Empire: The Rise and Fall of Self-Determination.

Christopher Browning. Blue Bloods and Brownshirts. Review of: Stephan Malinowski, translated from the German by Jon Andrews: Nazis and Nobles: The History of a Misalliance.

Lindsey L. Hilsum. More Than Accomplices. by Izabela Steflja and Jessica Trisko Darden: Women as War Criminals: Gender, Agency, and Justice.

David A. Bell. A Haunted Patrimony. Review of: James McAuley: The House of Fragile Things: Jewish Art Collectors and the Fall of France.

Linda Greenhouse. Grievance Conservatives Are Here to Stay. Review of: Katherine Stewart: The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism -- Andrew Koppelman: Gay Rights vs. Religious Liberty?: The Unnecessary Conflict.

Mark Danner. ‘Reality Rebellion’: By doubling down on Trump’s Big Lie that the election was stolen, Republicans are making their base angrier, more radical, and more likely to turn to violence. (Essay)

Caitlin Zaloom. The Broken Promise of Retirement. Review of: Nathan Bomey: Detroit Resurrected: To Bankruptcy and Back -- Teresa Ghilarducci and Tony James, with a foreword by Timothy Geithner: Rescuing Retirement: A Plan to Guarantee Retirement Security for All Americans -- Sarah L. Quinn: American Bonds: How Credit Markets Shaped a Nation -- Katherine S. Newman: Downhill from Here: Retirement Insecurity in the Age of Inequality.

Hari Kunzru. As American as Family Separation. Review of: Jacob Soboroff: Separated: Inside an American Tragedy -- Laura Briggs: Taking Children: A History of American Terror.

Ian Johnson. A Most Adaptable Party. Review of: Tony Saich: From Rebel to Ruler: One Hundred Years of the Chinese Communist Party -- Bruce J. Dickson: The Party and the People: Chinese Politics in the 21st Century -- Timothy Cheek, Klaus Mühlhahn, and Hans van der Ven, editors: The Chinese Communist Party: A Century in Ten Lives -- Gao Hua, translated from the Chinese by Stacy Mosher and Guo Jian: How the Red Sun Rose: The Origin and Development of the Yan’an Rectification Movement, 1930–45.

David Shulman. Cracks in the Israeli Consensus: The latest round of violence in Gaza has led to the reemergence of the Palestinian national movement—as well as more skepticism among Israelis about repeatedly making war on Hamas. (Essay)

From the July 22 2021 issue of NYRB (most of it paywalled):

Arts & Sciences:

Caroline Fraser. Murder Is My Business. Review of: Eric Godtland, edited by Dian Hanson: True Crime Detective Magazines 1924–1969 -- Michelle McNamara, with an introduction by Gillian Flynn and an afterword by Patton Oswalt: I’ll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer -- I'll Be Gone in the Dark (HBO documentary series directed by Liz Garbus, Elizabeth Wolff, Myles Kane, and Josh Koury) -- My Favorite Murder (podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark) -- The Ripper (BBC/Netflix documentary series directed by Jesse Vile and Elena Wood) -- Tales of the Grim Sleeper (documentary film written and directed by Nick Broomfield, Barney Broomfield, and Marc Hoeferlin) -- Sarah Weinman, editor, with an introduction by Patrick Radden Keef: Unspeakable Acts: True Tales of Crime, Murder, Deceit, and Obsession -- Ann Rule: The Stranger Beside Me: The Shocking Inside Story of Serial Killer Ted Bundy.

Jed Perl. Interpreting Nature. Review of the exhibition Cezanne Drawing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, June 6-Sept. 25 2021.

Michael Greenberg. Janet Malcolm (1934–2021).

Mark O'Connell. Uncanny Planet. Review of: Nathaniel Rich: Second Nature: Scenes from a World Remade. See also Olivia Schwab. LARB, June 30, 2021: Grieving Earth.

Claire Wills. The Possessed. Review of Carl Frode Tiller’s trilogy of novels, all translated from the Norwegian by Barbara J. Haveland: Encircling.

Fintan O'Toole. Freedom for Sale. Review of: Louis Menand: The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War.

Sanford Schwarz. Daydream Kingdoms. Review of the exhibition Parallel Phenomena: Works on Paper by Carroll Dunham, Susan Te Kahurangi King, Gladys Nilsson, and Peter Saul at Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York City, May 13–July 2, 2021.

Michael Hofmann. Heine’s Heartmobile. Review of: George Prochnik: Heinrich Heine: Writing the Revolution.

Part 2 of NYRB (mostly paywalled) for July 22, 2021:

History, Politics, & Social Studies:

Alma Guillermoprieto. Confrontation in Colombia. (Essay) "Protesters have demanded not just the rejection of a tax bill but a whole new society."

Peter C. Baker. Death Drives. Review of: Angie Schmitt: Right of Way: Race, Class, and the Silent Epidemic of Pedestrian Deaths in America.

Josephine Quinn. Ravenna Between East and West. Review of: Judith Herrin: Ravenna: Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe.

Fred Kaplan. Why Did We Invade Iraq? Review of: Robert Draper: To Start a War: How the Bush Administration Took America into Iraq.

Christine Smallwood. The Power of Questions. Review of: Jacqueline Rose: On Violence and On Violence Against Women.

Adam Hochschild. All American Vigilantes. (Essay) "When the US entered World War I, right-wing organizations seized the opportunity to round up leftists, labor organizers, and suspected draft dodgers."

Colin Thubron. Pleasure Domes and Postal Routes. Review of: Marie Favereau: The Horde: How the Mongols Changed the World and Shane McCausland: The Mongol Century: Visual Cultures of Yuan China, 1271–1368.

Neal Ascherson. Into the Wrecks. Review of: James P. Delgado: War at Sea: A Shipwrecked History from Antiquity to the Cold War.

Anne Diebel. Cubicle Messiah. Review of: Eliot Brown and Maureen Farrell: The Cult of We: WeWork, Adam Neumann, and the Great Startup Delusion -- Reeves Wiedeman: Billion Dollar Loser: The Epic Rise and Spectacular Fall of Adam Neumann and WeWork.

From the July 2021 issue of Literary Review (UK):

John Adamson. Night of the Guillotine. Review of: Colin Jones: The Fall of Robespierre: 24 Hours in Revolutionary Paris.

Julian Baggini. #Meat Too. Review of: Henry Mance: How to Love Animals in a Human-Shaped World.

Cal Flyn. All By Himself. Review of: Retreat: The Risks and Rewards of Stepping Back from the World.

Tanya Harrod. Full of Spikes & Fish Bones. Review of: Anne Umland & Walburga Krupp, with Charlotte Healy (edd): Sophie Taeuber-Arp: Living Abstraction -- Silvia Boadella (Translated from German by Tess Lewis): Sophie Taeuber-Arp: A Life through Art.

Tim Stanley. All the President’s Mendacity. Review of: Michael Dobbs: King Richard: Nixon and Watergate – an American Tragedy.

Anthony Cummins. You're In the Army Now. Review of: Adam Mars-Jones: Batlava Lake.

Anthropology & religion in two academic studies:

Noel Blanco Morelle. Public Books, 07/02/2021: What Will Be Impossible? Review of: Éric Vuillard, translated from the French by Mark Polizzotti: The War of the Poor and Carlo Ginzburg and Bruce Lincoln: Old Thiess, a Livonian Werewolf: A Classic Case in Comparative Perspective.

On a modernist poem found in an old issue of Life Magazine:

David Ben-Merre. Public Books, 07/01/2021: B-Sides: Elinor Wylie's "Atavism."

From Bookforum, June/July/August 2021:

Gene Seymour. Alt That’s Fit to Print: The dangers and rewards of speculative fiction.

Moira Donegan. How to Survive a Movement. Review of: Sarah Schulman: Let the Record Show.

Christian Lorentzen.
Like Rain on Your Wedding Day: Between the sentimental, the gothic, and the ironic.

Langdon Hammer reminiscing about the Yale English Department:

Langdon Hammer. LARB, 07/03/2021: Shadows Walking: With Wallace Stevens in New Haven.

On Peter Matthiessen's The Snow Leopard:

Kathryn Schulz. The New Yorker, 07/12-19/2021: What Do We Hope to Find When We Look for a Snow Leopard?.

"Certain books are associated with certain ages, others with certain life events. ... I’ve been thinking about why we read what we do because I am pregnant, and women who are expecting a child are told to read a great many things."

Casey Cep. The New Yorker, 07/07/2001: Reading the Old Testament While Pregnant.

TLS, July 9, 2021|No. 6171. Mostly essays rather than book reviews this week.

Literature:

Adam Watt. Life outside the window: Proust at 150. (Essay)

Sara Lonsdale. Devon Knows. (Essay on re-reading E. M. Delafield’s Diary of a Provincial Lady).

Simon Goldhill. Vexes as it teaches: A provocative study of the tragic arts. Review of: Terry Eagleton: Tragedy.

Heather Clark. The Pram in the Hall: How Adrienne Rich fought her way to success. Review of: Hilary Holladay: The Power of Adrienne Rich: A Biography.

Andrew Hadfield. Where truth is hid: A theory about a source for Shakespeare. Review of: Dennis McCarthy and June Schlueter, Editors: Thomas North's 1555 Travel Journal: From Italy to Shakespeare and, Michael Blanding: North By Shakespeare: A rogue scholar’s quest for the truth behind the Bard’s work.

In Brief Review of: Judith Paltin: Modernism and the Idea of the Crowd.

In Brief Review of: Josh Cohen: How to Live. What to Do: In search of ourselves in life and literature

Language & Linguistics:

Audrey Borowski. Using loaded language: German and its place in European Jewish culture. Review of: Marc Volovici: German as a Jewish Problem: The language politics of Jewish Nationalism.

Ritchie Robinson. Sins of the father: One family’s changing fascination with ‘thieves’ cant’. Review of: Martin Puchner: The Language of Thieves: The story of Rotwelsch and one family’s secret history.

Visual Arts:

Rod Mengham.Tradition demolition: The subversive energy of Jean Dubuffet. (Exhibition Review)

Philosophy:

Vid Simoniti. Game Changer: A philosophy for Homo ludens. Review of: C. Thi Nguyen: Games: Agency as Art.

Culture, Politics, Religion, History:

Rebecca L. Spang. Medium and messenger: How money works, and what it means. (Essay)

Sudhir Hazareesingh. Une part de nous: Emmanuel Macron’s admiration for Napoleon. (Essay)

Michael Saler. Murder Inc.: The life of an unrepentant Jewish gangster. Review of: Michael Shnayerson: Bugsy Siegel: The dark side of the American Dream.

Adam Le Bor. The lost world of the Yekkes: The golden age of Jerusalem’s Rehavia district. Review of: Review of: Thomas Sparr: German Jerusalem: The remarkable life of a German–Jewish neighbourhood in the Holy City

In Brief Review of: Megan Rosenbloom: Dark Archives: A librarian’s investigation into the science and history of books bound in human skin.

In Brief Review of: Jennifer Kavanagh: Let Me Take You By the Hand: True Tales from London's Streets.

In Brief Review of: Brian Patrick McGuire: Bernard of Clairvaux: An Inner Life.

TLS, July 16, 2021|No. 6172:

Literature:

Craig Raine. Are you looking at me, Jimmy?: Ten duels in literature. (Essay)

Alice Kelly. As American as apple pie: The cultural impact of war. Review of: Jennifer Haytock, editor: War and American Literature and Tim Dayton and Mark W. Van Wienen, editors: A History of American Literature and the Culture of the First World War.

Alex Zwieber Leslie. Elegy for Main Street: How poetry influenced the identity of small-town America. Review of: Jason Stacy: Spoon River America: Edgar Lee Masters and the myth of the American small town.

Kate Hexit. Divine decadence: The epistolary ‘almost love affair’ of Carl Van Vechten and Ronald Firbank. (Essay).

Jude Cook. Anecdote as allegory: An unlikely meeting, reimagined. Josh Cohen: The Netanyahus.

In Brief Review of: Sherrill Grace: TFF: A Life of Timothy Findley.

Arts & Culture:

Kieran Setiya. Mob rule?: The power of stadium crowds. Review of: Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht: Crowds: The stadium as a ritual of intensity.

Houman Berakat. Goal thief: The life and character of one of the world’s greatest footballers. Review of: Guillem Balagué: Maradona: The boy. The rebel. The god.

Jacqueline Banerjee. Unhappy Mediums: How women gained prominence in the Spiritualist movement. Review of: Emily Midorikawa: Out of the Shadows: Six visionary women in search of a public voice.

Richard Davenport-Hines. Blighty’s bounder: The life and loves of a predatory pot-boiling populist. Review of: W. Sydney Robinson: Historic Affairs: The muses of Sir Arthur Bryant.

In Brief Review of: Richard Thompson: Beeswing: Fairport, folk rock and finding my voice 1967–75.

Philosophy, Religion, & Psychology:

Karen Olsson. Pacifist, soldier, mystic, saint: The complex identity of Simone Weil. Review of: Robert Zaretsky: The Subversive Simone Weil: A life in five ideas.

D. L. Dusenbury. A choice, and not a law: The role of virginity in Foucault’s thinking. Review of: Michel Foucault, translated by Robert Hurley: The History of Sexuality: Volume Four: Confessions of the flesh.

Stephen J. Plant. Keeping God outside the world: The life of the great theologian Karl Barth. Review of: Christiane Tietz, translated by Victoria J. Barnett: Karl Barth: A life in conflict.

In Brief Review of: Kenneth R. Rosen: Troubled: The failed promise of America’s behavioral treatment programs.

In Brief Review of: Luigi Amara, Translated by Christina MacSweeney: The Wig: A hairbrained history.

Travel:

Jane Yager. From Checkpoint Charlie: Essays on Europe’s youth capital. Review of the Berlin issue of the Passenger series.

Noo Saro-Wiwa. Under Western eyes?: The status of travel writing in the age of mass tourism. Review of: Tim Hannigan: The Travel Writing Tribe: Journeys in search of a genre.

Politics & Society:

Eric I. Ianelli. Both cops and robbers: Three studies of policing and crime in America. Review of: Julian Rubinstein: The Holly: Five bullets, one gun and the struggle to save an American neighborhood -- Justin Fenton: We Own This City: A true story of crime, cops and corruption in an American city -- Rosa Brookes: Tangled Up in Blue: Policing the American city.

Henrietta Wilson. Send in the drones: Failings and excesses of the US military industrial complex. Review of: William M. Arkin, with E. D. Cauchi: The Generals Have No Clothes: The untold story of our endless wars.

Alex De Waal. ‘We did this ourselves’: Which way should peacemaking work – top-down or bottom-up?. Review of: Séverine Autesserre: The Frontlines of Peace: An insider’s guide to changing the world.

In Brief Review of: Michael Burleigh: Day of the Assassins: A history of political murder.

Two interviews from fivebooks.com worth remembering:

John H. Smith, interviewed by Benedict King. The best books on Religion in US Politics. J.H. Smith is the author of: A Dream of the Judgment Day: American Millennialism and Apocalypticism, 1620-1890.

David Campbell, interviewed by Cal Flyn. Five of the Best European Classics.

NXIVM & defining a cult:

Zoe Heller. The New Yorker, 07/05/2021: What Makes a Cult a Cult?. Review of: Sarah Berman: Don't Call It a Cult.

Review of the new Louis Menand tome, The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War:

Michael Kimmage. The American Prospect, 07/16/2021: Menand’s Cold War.

Two recent book-related articles from The Atlantic:

"How your Netflix habit is changing contemporary fiction."

Alexander Manshel, Laura B. McGrath, and J. D. Porter. The Atlantic, 07/16/2021: The Rise of Must-Read TV.

For the earlier generation:

Jonathan Segal. The Atlantic, 07/15/2021: Two Editors Who Showed What Publishing Should Be. "My colleagues Sonny Mehta and Dan Frank had an enthusiastic, expansive vision for American literary life."

Not my favorite critic, but here's a memoir of Marvin Mudrick:

Bob Blaisdell. LARB, 07/17/2021: Mr. Mudrick Is 100.

Will most research be done online in the future?:

Sarah Pillai. LARB, 07/16/2021: Archival Futures: The Archive as a Place and the Place of the Archive

The Fifth Avenue branch of NYPL transformed. "A mighty wall of books impresses in the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library, a transformed branch that bursts with new services and technology."

James S. Russell. NYT, 07/04/2021: A Glowing Shrine to the Printed Word

Sounds like my reading decisions:

Richard Hughes Gibson. The Hedgehog Review, 01/13/2021: The Idiosyncratic School of Reading And the guiding muse of Whim.

TLS, July 23, 2021|No. 6173:

Literature, Arts, & Bibliography:

Mick Herron. Neither Bond nor Harry: Revisiting Len Deighton’s world of downbeat glamour. (Essay)

Sam Leith. Lay it low and look for leads: A romantic amid the sleaze of mid-century Hollywood. Review of James Ellroy: Widespread Panic.

Beejay Silcox. Tropes, trauma, spectacle: The travails of a heroine who wants no absolution. Review of: Lisa Taddeo: Animal.

Boris Dralyuck. Times on the rack: How a Russian Formalist resisted socialist realism. Review of: Yuri Tynianov, edited & translated by Ainsley Morse and Philip Redko: Permanent Evolution: Selected Essays on literature, theory and film -- Yuri Tynianov, Translated by Anna Kurkina Rush and Christopher Rush: The Death of Vazir-Mukhtar -- Alexander Griboedov, translated by Betsy Hulick: Woe From Wit: A verse comedy in four acts.

Lachlan Mackinnon. The wind’s warning: A multi-talented artist whose time is overdue. Review of: Kate Kennedy: Dweller in Shadows: A Life of Ivor Gurney.

Barbara Graziosi. Home not-so-sweet home: Literature, a widespread yearning and a failed politician. Review of: Kathleen Riley. Imagining Ithaca: Nostos and nostalgia since the Great War.

Laura Hackett. Next to the end of the world: The characteristics and tensions of open-air Shakespeare performances. Review of: Evelyn O'Malley: Weathering Shakespeare: Audiences and open-air performances.

Michael Caines. No joyful news at hand: The timeless and timely violence of fair Verona’s streets. (Essay)

Eric Bulson. Minestrone vs poetry: The creation of a hybrid literary form. Review of: Gianlucca Rizzo: Poetry on Stage: The theatre of the Italian neo-avant-garde.

A.N. Wilson. Shelf lives: A history of private libraries from the Sumerians to the age of Kindle. Review of: Reid Byers: Private Libraries: The history of the architecture and furnishing of the domestic bookroom.

Keith Hopper. ‘I’m walkin’ here!’: How Midnight Cowboy brought gritty realism back to film-making. Review of: Glenn Frankel: Shooting Midnight Cowboy: Art, sex, loneliness, liberation, and the making of a dark classic.

Joseph Farrell. Stagestruck Duce: The dictator’s profound interest in theatre. Review of: Patricia Gaborik: Mussolini's Theater: Fascist experiments in art and politics.

M.C. NB Column: Taxing matters: Books after Brexit, A book lover’s bucket list, Beryl Bainbridge’s bed.

History, Politics, Society, Technology:

Regina Rini. Love thy robot neighbour: Why our relationship with AI is both promising and dangerous. Kate Darling: The New Breed: How to Think About Robots.

Jonathan Buckley. Anti-social climbers: A mountain and what it reveals about human nature. Review of: Mark Synnott: The Third Pole: My Everest climb to find the truth about Mallory and Irvine.

Peter Geoghegan. Hacks for hire, spooks for sale: The murky world of ‘corporate intelligence’. Review of: Barry Meier: Spooked: The Trump dossier, Black Cube, and the rise of private spies.

Bernard E. Harcourt. Show and tell: The surveillance society and what to do about it. Review of: Jon Fasman: We See It All: Liberty and justice in an age of perpetual surveillance and Jillian C. York: Silicon Values: The future of free speech under surveillance capitalism.

Will Grant. Straight shooter: Jair Bolsonaro’s resistible rise. Review of: Richard Lapper: Beef, Bible, and Bullets: Brazil in the age of Bolsonaro.

Eva Hoffman. They died with honour: Resistance to the Nazis in occupied Poland. Review of: Judy Batalion: The Light of Days: Women fighters of the Jewish Resistance.

In Brief Review of: Gordon Campbell: Norse America: The story of a founding myth.

In Brief Review of: Alice Oswald and Paul Keegan, editors: Gigantic Cinema: A Weather Anthology.

In Brief Review of: Ōgimachi Machiko, translated by G. G. Rowley: In the Shelter of the Pine: A memoir of Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu and Tokugawa Japan.

TLS July 30, 2021|No. 6174l

Literature:

Nick Groom. Not from our world: The genius and modern resonance of William Blake. Review of: John Higgs: William Blake vs The World.

Philosophy:

Skye C. Cleary. Putting our heads together: Companionable essays that combine philosophical analysis with personal narrative. Simon Critchley: Bald: 35 philosophical short cuts.

Food and Drink:

Lamorna Asha. The universe in a grain of wheat: A comprehensive guide to the quintessential Italian carb. Review of: Rachel Roddy: An A-Z of Pasta.

History:

Marina Warner. Mosaic and melting pot: A ‘sweeping yet detailed’ account of a porous, fertile island. Jamie Mackay: The Invention of Sicily: A Mediterranean History.

Omer Bartov. Through a glass darkly: Barbarossa, and the divergent conclusions to be drawn from one body of knowledge. Review of: Stewart Binns: Barbarossa: And the bloodiest war in history -- Jonathan Dimbleby: Barbarossa: How Hitler Lost the War -- Sean McMeekin: Stalin's War: A new history of the Second World War.

Stanley Bill. Margins of the Holocaust: Examining cases of collaboration in Poland. Andrew Kornbluth: The August Trials: The Holocaust and postwar justice in Poland.

Uilleam Blacker. Hall of mirrors: A Soviet crime long hidden, and its legacy. Review of: Jane Rogoyska: Surviving Katyn: Stalin’s Polish massacre and the search for truth.

Clare Pettitt. Filberds and trinkets: The antiquarian pursuit of ‘non-verbal’ history. Review of: Rosemary Hill: Time's Witness: History in the age of Romanticism.

Politics & Society:

Frederick Mount. The guidance of brains: How much is too much meritocracy?. Review of: Adrian Wooldridge: The Aristocracy of Talent: How meritocracy made the modern world.

Sarah Baxter. Keep on running: Why the forty-fifth US president isn’t done quite yet. Review of: Michael Wolff: Landslide: The final days of the Trump presidency.

Zoe Williams. People unlike me: A new recipe for social cohesion. Review of: Jon Yates: Fractured: Why our societies are coming apart and how to put them back together again.

Madhavi Menon. The deep presence of shame: The limits of thinking of sexual violence in religious terms. Review of: Martha C. Nussbaum: Citadels of Pride: Sexual assault, accountability, and reconciliation.

Claire Kohda. Still me too: How Japanese law and culture abuse the victims of rape. Review of: Shiori Ito, translated by Allison Markin Powell: Black Box.

James Kirchick. Injustice upon injustice: Compensating for decades of discrimination. Review of: Omar G. Encarnación: The Case for Gay Reparations.

Two from LARB:

Abraham Gutman. 08/01/2021: Love for Shale. Review of: Colin Jerolmack: Up to Heaven and Down to Hell: Fracking, Freedom, and Community in an American Town.

Robert S. Levine. 08/02/2021: Frederick Douglass and the Trouble with Critical Race Theory.

"In his teens, Bragg was saved by books. He’s now spent more than fifty years championing the joy, value, and fascination of knowledge."

Sarah Walters. New Yorker, 08/01/2021: The Education of Melvyn Bragg. (Interview)

"WG Sebald’s writing on the Holocaust was driven by the anger and distress he felt over his father’s service in Hitler’s army."

Donna Ferguson. The Guardian, 07/30/2021: Revealed: the secret trauma that inspired German literary giant. Reporting on forthcoming bio: Carole Angier: Speak, Silence: In Search of WG Sebald.

New York Review of Books, Aug. 19, 2021:

Susan Tallman. Knowing How. Review of: Glenn Adamson: Craft: An American History -- Allan Sekula, edited by Sally Stein and Ina Steiner: Art Isn’t Fair: Further Essays on the Traffic in Photographs and Related Media.

Verlyn Klinkenborg. Requiem for a Heavyweight. Review of: Rebecca Giggs: Fathoms: The World in the Whale.

Deborah Eisenberg. Poised and Precarious. Review of: Anthony Veasna So: Afterparties.

Tim Parks. The Eternal Colony. Review of: Jamie Mackay: The Invention of Sicily: A Mediterranean History -- John Julius Norwich: Sicily: An Island at the Crossroads of History -- Lucy Riall: Under the Volcano: Revolution in a Sicilian Town.

Anne Enright. The Burden of ‘Yes’. Review of: Katherine Angel: Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again: Women and Desire in the Age of Consent.

Christopher Benfey. ‘A Searing Bolt of Turquoise’. Review of: Jon Dunn: The Glitter in the Green: In Search of Hummingbirds -- Jeff VanderMeer: Hummingbird Salamander -- Sanford Schwartz: On Edward Hicks.

Christopher Benfey. Pranksters and Puritans. Review of: Peter C. Mancall: The Trials of Thomas Morton: An Anglican Lawyer, His Puritan Foes, and the Battle for a New England.

Annette Gordon-Reed. The Color Line. Review of: Whitney Battle-Baptiste and Britt Rusert, editors: W.E.B. Du Bois’s Data Portraits: Visualizing Black America: The Color Line at the Turn of the Twentieth Century -- Julian Rothenstein, editor, with an introduction by Jacqueline Francis and Stephen G. Hal: Black Lives 1900: W.E.B. Du Bois at the Paris Exposition -- Michael Friendly and Howard Wainer: A History of Data Visualization and Graphic Communication.

Joshua Hammer. Marooned!: Julian Sancton recounts the largely forgotten story of the Belgica’s disastrous Antarctic expedition in the late 1890. Review of: Julian Sancton: Madhouse at the End of the Earth: The Belgica’s Journey into the Dark Antarctic Night.

J. Hoberman. Marvel’s Ringmaster. Review of: Abraham Riesman: True Believer: The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee -- Liel Leibovitz: Stan Lee: A Life in Comics -- Matt Yockey, editor: Make Ours Marvel: Media Convergence and a Comics Universe.

Christopher de Bellaigue. A Visionary Psychopath, Review of: Alan Mikhail: God’s Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World.

Nicole Rudick. Slavery vs. White Supremacy. Review of: Nathalie Léger, translated from the French by Amanda DeMarco: Exposition -- Nathalie Léger, translated from the French by Natasha Lehrer and Cécile Menon: Suite for Barbara Loden -- Nathalie Léger, translated from the French by Natasha Lehrer: The White Dress.

Edward Chanceller. The Delusions of Crowds: Why People Go Mad in Groups -- William Quinn and John D. Turner: Boom and Bust: A Global History of Financial Bubbles.

Ed Vulliamy, The Vindication of Sanora Babb. Joanne Dearcopp and Christine Hill Smith, with a foreword by David M. Wrobel, editors: Unknown No More: Recovering Sanora Babb -- Sanora Babb, with an introduction by Erin Royston Battat: The Dark Earth and Selected Prose from the Great Depression & 6 other books.

Van Gosse, reply by Sean Wilentz. Slavery vs. White Supremacy. From the NYRB Letters section.

Bookforum contributors on boundaries (if any) on reading literature:

June/July/Aug. issue: What forms of art, activism, and literature can speak authentically today?: Bookforum contributors on the risky books they’d like to read now. Opinions from Emily Gould, Ottessa Moshfeg, Leo Robson, Julian Lucas, Michelle Orange, Susan Choi, Merve Emre, Karan Mahajan, Ed Park, Negar Azimi, Sarah Nicole Prickett, Rachel Kushner.

Short reviews from the August 2021 Literary Review:

Adrian Tinniswood. Purple prose. Review of: James Fox: The World According to Colour: A Cultural History.

Alberto Manguel. Strange Case of Dr Nabos & Mr Reis. Review of: Richard Zenith: Pessoa: An Experimental Life.

Fergus Butler-Gallie. Fornicating Under Consent of King. Review of: John McWhorter: Nine Nasty Words: English in the Gutter – Then, Now, and Forever.

Charles Darwent. Virtuosos of the Asylum. Review of: Charlie English: The Gallery of Miracles and Madness: Insanity, Art and Hitler’s First Mass-Murder Programme.

Anna Keay. Young Ironsides. Review of: Ronald Hutton: The Making of Oliver Cromwell.

Peter Conrad. Short Stories & Tall Tales. Review of the documentary Hemingway dir. by Ken Burns & Lynn Novick.

"Their archival history of 20th-century English pedagogy reveals that what goes on in the classroom today is for the most part what has been going on since vernacular literature was first taught in the colleges and universities: a peaceful and largely collaborative labor, in which teachers and students work together to makes sense of literature ..."

John Guillory. LARB, 07/29/2021: “Flipping” the History of Literary Studies. Review of: Rachel Sagner Buurma & Laura Heffernan: The Teaching Archive: A New History for Literary Study.

TLS, August 6, 2021|No. 6175:

Literature & Language:

Beejay Silcox. All you need is bots: A futurist’s plea for ‘a total reboot of our priorities and methods’. Review of Jeanette Winterson: 12 Bytes: How we got here. Where we might go next.

Jessica Loudis. Schticked-off: A Swiftian polemic about pre-pandemic times. Review of: Lucy Ellmann: Things Are Against Us.

Peter Thonemann. Flipping big book: The substantial pleasure of a new Classics glossary. Review of: James Diggle, Editor-in-Chief, The Cambridge Greek Lexicon.

Hilary Davies. Moving away from ancient certainties: What did Heaney really believe?. Review of: Kieran Quinlan: Seamus Heaney and the End of Catholic Ireland.

Charlie Louth. Clearing a space for something other: Poetry: a ‘glimpsed alternative’ to the world as it is. Ian Cooper: Poetry and the Question of Modernity: From Heidegger to the present.

Eri Hotta. Writing pleasure: Sadomasochism, desire and the female gaze. Review of: Taeko Kono, translated by Lucy North: Toddler-Hunting and Other Stories.

Anne Mcdermott. Better close up than far away: Reaching for the heart of darkness in the novels of Sarah Mesa. Review of: Sara Mesa, translator Katie Whittemore: Four by Four -- translator Megan McDowell: Among the Hedges -- Un amour.

Christopher Shrimpton. Delighting in the gruesome: Re-reading In Youth Is Pleasure by Denton Welch. (Essay)

In Brief Review of: Nil Santiañez: The Literature of Absolute War: Transnationalism and World War II.

TLS on its splash page has a link to its reviews of all the Booker Prize nominees: Booker Prize 2021.

Music:

Paul Genders. Greatests hits: The influence of pop music on literature. Review of: Tom Gatti, editor: Long Players: Writers on the albums that shaped them.

Anna Picard. Songs in the key of life: Canon, instinct and human harmony. Review of: Nicholas Kenyon: The Life of Music: New adventures in the western classical tradition -- Michael Spitzer: The Musical Human: A history of life on earth.

Science:

Jenann T. Ismael. What is going on under the bonnet?: Werner Heisenberg, and new answers to old quantum riddles. Review of: Carlo Rovelli, translated by Erica Segre and Simon Carnell: Helgoland.

Thomas Morris. Return of the Warburg Effect: A leading cancer researcher’s extraordinary life and influence. Review of: Sam Apple: Ravenous: Otto Warburg, the Nazis, and the search for the cancer-diet connection.

Politics & Society:

Patricia J. Williams. They, the people: Social Darwinism in the United States. Review of: Charles Murray: Facing Reality: Two truths about race in America.

David Freud. Making allowances: The misunderstood triumph of Universal Credit. Review of: David Freud: Clashing Agendas: Inside the Welfare Trap. How the British welfare system was revamped.

Diana Darke. Battles in black camouflage: A partial account of the Kurdish revolt against IS. Review of: Gayle Tzemach Lemmon: The Daughters of Kobani: The women who took on the Islamic State.

Anne Nelson. Ashamed of mankind: The careers and traumas of three generations of female war correspondents. Review of: Judith Mackrell: Going with the Boys: Six extraordinary women writing from the front line -- Elizabeth Becker: You Don't Belong Here: How three women rewrote the story of war -- Clarissa Ward: On All Fronts: The education of a journalist.

Ian Cawood. The price of Union subsidies: Can money keep the Four Nations together?. Review of Julian Hoppit: The Dreadful Monster and its Poor Relations: Taxing and spending in the United Kingdom.

In Brief Review of: Daniel Kahneman, Olivier Sibony and Cass R. Sunstein: Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgement.

TLS, August 13, 2021|No. 6176.

Literature:

David Midgeley. Döbliners: Outlandish visions of man and society. Review of: Alfred Döblin, translated by C. D. Godwin: Mountains Oceans Giants: A novel of the 27th century -- Alfred Döblin, translated by C. D. Godwin: Manas: An Epic Poem.

Miranda France. Long arms, long legs, tiny feet: The first English translations of two fin-de-siècle courtesan novel. Review of: Liane de Pougy, translated by Graham Anderson: Chasing the Dream and A Woman's Affair.

A.E. Stallings. Eels of Eden: Homeric echoes in a lost Greater Greece. Review of: Ilias Venezis, translated by Therese Sellers: Landa of Aeolia.

Joshua Pugh. When two minds meet: The emotional impact of reading literature. Review of: Thor Magnus Tangerås: Literature and Transformation: A narrative study of life-changing reading experiences.

D.J. Taylor. Out on a limb: What happens when a well-known novelist deviates from a well-trodden path. (Essay)

M.C. N.B. Column: Compass errors: National Book Lovers Day, Imaginary Books, The TLS in Literature.

Arts:

In Brief Review of: Silvia Bottinelli: Double-Edged Comforts: Domestic life in modern Italian art and visual culture.

In Brief Review of: Stephanie Ross: Two Thumbs Up: How critics aid appreciation

History:

Navtej Sarna. Mother country of cremation: How a sacred rite became a vehicle for Indian national identity. Review of: David Arnold: Burning the Dead: Hindu nationhood and the global construction of Indian tradition.

Michael Braddick. The New Model Cromwell: Why success on the battlefield was the making of the Protector. Review of: Ronald Hutton: The Making of Oliver Cromwell.

In Brief Review of: Ross Carroll: Uncivil Mirth: Ridicule in Enlightenment Britain.

Politics, Society, & Culture:

R.W. Johnson. Fire in the holdings: What the loss of the Jagger Library means for UCT. (Essay -- "UCT" = University of Cape Town)

Sonia Faliero. Curdled hopes: How Narendra Modi has turned India into a ‘Hindu Pakistan’. Review of: Debasish Roy Chowdhury and John Keane: To Kill a Democracy: India’s passage to despotism and Suchitra Vijayan: Midnight's Borders: A people’s history of modern India.

Lawrence Douglas. Renovate, reform: The fragility of the democratic consensus. Review of: Cass R. Sunstein: This is Not Normal: The politics of everyday expectations -- Jan-Werner Müller: Democracy Rules.

Olivia Laing. Express yourself or feed the pigs?: Experiments in alternative living. Review of: Anna Neima: The Utopians: Six attempts to build the perfect society -- Ken Worpole: No Matter How Many Skies Have Fallen: Back to the land in wartime Britain.

Nicola Shulman. Now boarding: The hidden costs of an expensive education. Review of: Richard Beard: Sad Little Men: Private schools and the ruin of England.

In Brief Review of: Nadia Owusu: Aftershocks: Dispatches from the frontlines of identity

Religion:

Simon Franklin. God will sort it out: A very modern seventeenth-century voice. Review of: Archpriest Avvakum, translated by Kenneth N. Brostrom: The Life Written By Himself.

Maryanne Saunders. Erotica of devotion: Thinking theologically through art. Review of: Natalie Wigg-Stevenson: Transgressive Devotion: Theology as performance art.

Two links from AL Direct newsletter I found interesting:

Megan McCluskey. Time Magazine, 08/09/2021: How Extortion Scams and Review Bombing Trolls Turned Goodreads Into Many Authors’ Worst Nightmare.

Molly Templeton. Tor.com, 08/05/2021: Maybe You Can Have Too Many Books in Your TBR Pile. "Tsundoku" -- Japanese term for a stack of purchased books that are purchased but not yet read.

TLS August 20 / 27, 2021|No. 6177/8

Literature:

Claire Lowden. Back from the wilderness: How Barbara Pym became a victim of her own caricature. Review of: Paula Byrne: The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym.

Vilma De Gasperin. Reeds in the wind: A Sardinian novelist admired by Lawrence and Mansfield. Review of: Grazia Deledda, Translated by M. G. Steegmann: La Madre.

Ruth Scurr. Pyrrhic victories: Lamentations for a ruined city in Pat Barker’s latest retelling of the Iliad. Review of: Pat Barker: The Women of Troy.

Culture & Philosophy:

Lucy Mcdonald. Blame without shame: Do thoughtless mistakes contribute to oppression? Regina Rini: The Ethics of Microaggression.

Lisa Hilton. Russia’s Beaux Stratagem: The double history of a classic perfume. Review of: Karl Schlögel, Translated by Jessica Spengler: The Scent of Empires: Chanel No.5 and Red Moscow.

Caroline Eden. Vittles along the Volga: The stories that shaped the Russian table. Review of: Alison K. Smith: Cabbage and Caviar: A history of food in Russia.

Josh Raymond. Seed no evil: Psychoactive stimulants and the modern world. Review of: Michael Pollan: This Is Your Mind on Plants: Opium – caffeine – mescaline.

Paula Byrne. In Austen’s kitchen: Remedies, recipes and the writing of her novels. Review of: Julienne Gehrer, introduction & annotation, with a foreword by Deirdre Le Faye: Martha Lloyd's Household Book.

In Brief Review of: John McWhorter: Nine Nasty Words - English in the Gutter: Then, Now, and Forever.

In Brief Review of: Catherine and John Pawson: Home Farm Cooking.

History & Society:

Shauna Isaac. Comfortably numb: How one family drove the opioid crisis in America. Review of: Patrick Radden Keefe: Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Family.

Krishan Kumar. Queen of hearts: Why Charlottesville should memorialize the wife of George III. (Essay)

Simon Jenkins. Ideas made us: The resilience, so far, of our political institutions. Review of: Michael Braddick: A Useful History of Britain: The politics of getting things done.

A.N. Wilson. Nice to the Nazis: A former King’s allegiances. Review of: Andrew Lownie: The Traitor King: The scandalous exile of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.

In Brief Review of: Krystale E. Littlejohn: Just Get on the Pill: The uneven burden of reproductive politics.

"Dickens’s life in 1851, a momentous year for the novelist and Britain as a whole":

Anthony Quinn. Guardian, 08/22/2021: The Turning Point review – how Charles Dickens built Bleak House. Review of: Robert Douglas-Fairhurst: The Turning Point: A Year That Changed Dickens and the World.

An appreciation of my favorite New Yorker writer from my high school years. For me, none of the New Yorker's "casuals" writers -- including Benchley -- has been able to match him.

Adam Gopnick. The New Yorker, 08/24/2021: Having a Laugh with S. J. Perelman. From the introduction to the Library of America edition of S.J. Perelman: Selected Writings.

TLS September 3, 2021|No. 6179

Literature:

Ben Hutchinson. "You must change your life: The haunting ‘heart-work’ of Rainer Maria Rilke". Review of: Charlie Louth: Rilke: The Life of the Work.

Anne Enright. Singular talent, double life: The two versions of John Cheever. Review of John Cheever: A Vision of the World: Selected Short Stories.

Declan Ryan. Reconstruction Road: On the trail of Richard Yates’s London period.

Mia Levitin. Relief and despair: What freedom means to sex, drugs, art and climate activism. Review of: Maggie Nelson, On Freedom: Four songs of care and constraint.

Alison Kelly. Portnoy’s constraints: Inside the fortress of Philip Roth. Review of : Ira Nadel, Philip Roth: A counterlife.

Katherine Ashenburg. Never for ever: A novelist mourns her father. Review of: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Notes on Grief.

Annette Federico. Signpost for the future: Dickens and the pivotal influence of the Great Exhibition. Review of: Robert Douglas-Fairhurst, The Turning Point: A year that changed Dickens and the world.

Stefan Collini. Optimist at work: The inspiring example of Raymond Williams’s ‘sobered utopianism’. Review of: Paul Stasi, editor, Raymond Willilams at 100.

Arts:

John-Paul Stonard. Interesting soup: Museum-building and the modern experience of art. Review of: Charles Saumarez Smith, The Art Museum in Modern Times.

History, Politics, & Culture:

Rebecca L. Spang. Virtue, terror, muddle: The coup of Thermidor. Review of: Colin Jones, The Fall of Robespierre: 24 hours in revolutionary Paris.

Arif Ahmed. Your right to say it: Good and bad faith in the free speech debate. Review of: Gavin Titley, Is Free Speech Racist?

Paul Collier. Locked and loaded: How the Western response to Covid-19 revealed an underlying policy crisis. Review of: Adam Tooze, Shutdown: How Covid shook the world’s economy.

Trevor Mostyn. When is a sect a religion?: New perspectives on the two branches of Islam. Review of: Fanar Haddad, Understanding 'Sectarianism': Sunni–Shia relations in the modern Arab world and Azmi Bishara, Sectarianism without Sects.

In the NB column, M.C. considers some off the beaten track beach reading, and a fairy tale by James Joyce & its illustrations.

Didn't know Roberto Calasso (The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony, Ka) had passed. His contributions to the publishing house Adelphi recalled.

Francesco Pacifico. Sidecar, 09/07/2021: The Sorcerer.

A new book on Silicon Valley mover and shaker Peter Thiel:

Charlie Tyson. The Baffler, 09/20/2021: The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s Pursuit of Power.

TLS September 17, 2021|No. 6181

Literature:

Barbara Graziosi. On the plectrum spectrum: Desire and controversy in the Sapphic fragments. Review of: P. J. Finglass and Adrian Kelly, editors: The Cambridge Companion to Sappho.

Arts:

Paula Marantz Cohen. Fear and clothing: Portraits of a master filmmaker. Review of: Edward White: The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock.

Mary Beard. Judgements in stone: The two contrasting styles of Edmonia Lewis, the first African American woman sculptor. (Essay)

History:

Margarette Lincoln. Europe’s first point of sail: How trade drove English sea power. Review of: Laurence Bergreen: In Search of a Kingdom: Francis Drake, Elizabeth I, and the perilous birth of the British Empire -- Edmond Smith: Merchants: The community that shaped England’s trade and empire, 1550–1650.

Social & Cultural Studies:

Irina Dumitrescu. Smell the burn: What is the point of physical exercise?. Review of: Jürgen Martschukat, translated by Alex Skinner: The Age of Fitness: How the body came to symbolize success and achievement -- Daniel Lieberman: Exercised: The science of physical activity, rest and health -- Sarah Everts: The Joy of Sweat: The strange science of perspiration -- Alison Bechdel: The Secret to Superhuman Strength.

M. M. Owen. Present and elsewhere: What draws people to silence and contemplation. Nat Segnit: Retreat: The risks and rewards of stepping back from the world.

European Politics:

Anne Mcelvoy. Postwar, post-Wall, post-Mutti: A new era for Germany awaits. Review of: Rebecca Pates and Julia Leser: The Wolves Are Coming Back: The politics of fear in East Germany -- John Lough: Germany's Russia Problem: The struggle for balance in Europe.

TLS September 24, 2021|No. 6182

Literature:

Ritchie Robertson. Sex, shrinks and nudists: Auden, Isherwood et al, in the flawed paradise of Weimar. Review of Stefano Evangelista and Gesa Stedman, editors: Happy in Berlin? English writers in the city, the 1920s and beyond.

Nat Segnit. Same mess, better suits: American social history in the form of a 1960s mobster novel. Review of Colson Whitehead: Harlem Shuffle.

Skye C. Cleary. Her brilliant friend: Simone de Beauvoir’s long-suppressed portrait of devotion in adolescence. Review of Simone de Beauvoir, translator Lauren Elkin: The Inseparables.

Ben Masters. Chemical bonds: A novel of universal wonderment – and paternal love. Review of Richard Powers: Bewilderment.

Arts:

Mark Glanville. Small scale avant-garde: A great Lieder composer inspired and stifled by Wagner. Review of Richard Stokes: The Complete Songs of Hugo Wolf: Life, Letters, Lieder.

Aida Amoako. Electric eccentrics: How ‘crossover’ music synthesized 1980s pop. Review of: Michaelangelo Matos: Can't Slow Down: How 1984 became pop’s blockbuster year -- David Elliott: 1984: British Pop's Dividing Year.

James Cahill. Emperor’s new clothes: The role of imagination in representations of the Caesars. Review of Mary Beard: Twelve Caesars: Images of power from the ancient world to the modern.

Philosophy:

Costica Bradatan. Empiricist, bishop and weirdo: The deep spiritualism of Ireland’s best-known philosopher. Review of: Tom Jones: George Berkeley: A Philosophical Life.

Paul Russell. Self-help on the go: Sketches of ‘le bon David’ and the good life. Review of: Julian Baggini: The Great Guide: What David Hume can teach us about being human and living well.

Science and Technology

Barbara J. King. Blind mice, armless octopuses: Our creaturely experience of the world. Review of Jackie Higgins: Sentient: What animals reveal about our senses.

Elizabeth Scott Baumann. Deliciously discriminating: How the tongue became an instrument of judgement. Review of Elizabeth L. Swann: Taste and Knowledge in Early Modern England.

History:

John Darwin. End of empires: How the Second World War changed the world. Review of: Richard Overy: Blood and Ruins: The great imperial war 1931–1945.

David Motadel. The Reich or the Reds: Communism and the Second World War. Review of: Jonathan Haslam: The Spectre of War: International communism and the origins of World War II.

Politics and Society

Lydia Wilson. Reds are better than blues: Why prejudice is innate but hatred is not. Review of: John W. Dean and Bob Altemeyer: Authoritarian Nightmare: Trump and his Followers -- Matthew Williams: The Science of Hate: How prejudice becomes hate and what we can do to stop it.

Louis Amis. Haters gonna hate: Democracy adrift in the US. Review of Evan Osnos: Wildland: The Making of America's Fury.

Imogen Russell Williams. A true calling: Teaching people to talk about difference and prejudice. Review of: Beverly Daniel Tatum: Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And other conversations about race.

Anne Kennedy Smith. Review of: Katina Manko: Ding Dong! Avon Calling!: The women and men of Avon Products, Incorporated.

TLS, October 1, 2021|No. 6183

Literature:

Naush Sabah. Clear water between the stresses: Gentle poems about poetic technique. Review of: Lucy Newlyn: The Craft of Poetry: A Primer in Verse.

Edmund Gordon. Divorce, doubt and doobies: Jonathan Franzen’s morality tale. Review of: Jonathan Franzen: Crossroads.

Claire Lowden. ‘Why should I pretend?’: Karl Ove Knausgaard goes back to making things up. Review of: Karl Ove Knausgaard, translated by Martin Aitkin: The Morning Star.

Rozalind Dineen. Normal hypocrites: Sally Rooney reshuffles her pack. Review of: Sally Rooney: Beautiful World, Where Are You.

Ben Wilkinson. Make it sound musical: Rediscovering an English symbolist. Review of: William Wootten, editor: Reading Walter De La Mare.

Derek Hughes and Janet Todd. Revival of the wittiest: Restoration England’s first woman of letters. Review of: Rachel Adcock, Kate Aughterson, Claire Bowditch, Elaine Hobby, Alan James Hogarth, Anita Pacheco and Margarete Rubik, editors: The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Aphra Behn: Volume IV: Plays, 1682–1696.

Arts:

Stephen Isserlis. Works from a different world: The universal ideals of Bach’s music – and how he speaks to us through his Cello Suites. (Essay)

Nat Segnit. The pain of wanting things: Thirty years before The Sopranos, the story continues. Essay/review of The Many Saints of Newark and The Sopranos.

Clothes & Fashion:

En Liang Khong. Full speckled jacket: Why clothes matter in the art world. Review of: Chalie Porter: What Artists Wear.

Sophie Oliver. Memory’s running thread: Textiles, fashion and the fabric of life. Review of: Claire Wilcox. Patch Work: A Life Amongst Clothes.

Society, Politics, History:

Nat Segnit. Are friends electro-sensitive?: A wifi-free community and its attraction for eccentrics. Review of: Stephen Kurczy: The Quiet Zone: Unraveling the mystery of a town suspended in silence.

Kathryn Murphy. Czech points: Five figures and their civic visions of their hometown. Review of: Chad Bryant: Prague: Belonging in the Modern City.

Rory Stewart. Best-laid plans: Why Afghanistan did not fail for lack of strategies. Review of: Craig Whitlock: The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War.

Peter Coates. Matter maketh the man: How raw materials decide our development. Review of: Alexander Etkind, translated by Sarah Jolly: Nature's Evil: A cultural history of natural resources.

Patrick Wilcken. Grey areas in the green gold rush: The industrial exploitation of Latin America. Review of: Andy Robinson: Gold, Oil, and Avocadoes: A recent history of Latin America in sixteen commodities.

Ethan Pollock. On the brink: Armageddon and how it was averted. Review of: Serhii Plokhy: Nuclear Folly: A New History of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Barnaby Phillips. Death on an African lifeline: The suffering behind a ‘masterpiece of engineering’. Review of: J. P. Daughton: The Violence of Empire: The forgotten history of the Congo-Océan railroad.

Ronald Hutton. All the devils are here: Palatial power in a bewildering, divided country. Review of: Simon Thurley: Palaces of Revolution: Life, death and art at the Stuart court -- Clare Jackson: Devil-Land: England under siege, 1588–1688.

Anne Chisholm. Living in inciting times: How Britain changed fifty years ago – for better and for worse. Review of: David Kynaston: On the Cusp: The Days of '62.

"How the Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker became one of the world’s most contentious thinkers."

Alex Blasdel. The Guardian, 09/28/2021: Pinker’s progress: the celebrity scientist at the centre of the culture wars.

Recent book reviews from The New Yorker:

Alexandra Schwartz. 09/27/2021. We’re Shaped by Our Sexual Desires. Can We Shape Them?. Review of: Amia Srinivasan: The Right to Sex.

James Wood. 09/27/2021. Anthony Doerr’s Optimism Engine. Review of: Anthony Doerr: Cloud Cuckoo Land.

Kathryn Schulz. 09/27/2021. The Church of Jonathan Franzen. Review of: Jonathan Franzen: Crossroads.

Katy Waldman. 09/27/2021. Joy Williams Does Not Write for Humanity. Review of: Joy Williams: Harrow.

Anna Russell. 09/27/2021. Jane Goodall’s Survival Guide. Review of Goodall's The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times (Global Icons Series) (Publication date: Oct. 19)

Hilton Als. 10/04/2021. Gayl Jones’s Novels of Oppression. (Essay)

The WaPo literature critic on one of his preferred genres:

Michael Dirda. WaPo, 09/29/2021. I love books about books. Here are seven of my current favorites..

Continued by: Exploring Books Through Articles, Reviews, Announcements, & Lists 2021-4.