Peculiar world of a singular talent
Highsmith was a great writer, with a moral vision bracing enough to clarify the terrors of the twentieth century
Bedtime reading for boomers
You will search in vain for a new life of any rocker who made his name after the advent of punk
Derrida deconstructed
Derrida’s prose, which stops being turgid only in order to be turbid, is utterly incomprehensible
Time flies, relatively speaking
The older you are, the quicker you count out a minute
An incomplete history of the Swinging Sixties
Any history of the 1960s that neglects mass culture is not to be taken entirely seriously
The jokes must go on
Christopher Bray reviews Apropos of Nothing by Woody Allen
Mass-goer who glorified mass production
Christopher Bray reviews Warhol by Blake Gopnik
Insight of a prolix pluralist
Christopher Bray reviews The Philosophy of Isaiah Berlin by Johnny Lyons
Inveterate ignoramus
Christopher Bray reviews History and Imperialism by Louis Althusser
The all-round smart cookie with a tin ear
Sontag’s influential pieces are rather fewer than this book’s breezeblock dimensions might suggest
Welcome to Covidworld
Ian James Kidd and Matthew Ratcliffe assess our new altered reality, where accepted norms do not apply
Murders ranging widely
Jeremy Black recommends an array of crime fiction novels, both modern and classic, to keep you entertained in January
Court out
Court delays and backlogs gave the government wide margins of authority during Covid-19
Starting pistol
Brexiteer anger is beginning to spill over into actions
The assassination of Soleimani
The Arab Spring didn’t amount to much, but when the US killed Soleimani last year it was a unexpectedly positive counterpoint
The MAGA mob
Was it worth it?
Feminist art historians get Artemisia Gentileschi wrong
Contemporary feminist art theory: little help in understanding a seventeenth century artist
Cancel this
I keep my distance, but you still catch my eye
What makes a hero?
Today, our heroes are demi-gods with superhuman powers, genius detectives and, painful though it is to admit, activists
Christmas doesn’t have to be cancelled
A Covid Christmas could be the right time to introduce new festive traditions