Non-Fiction
Strongholds and strong women
Three non-fiction works beat out the general mediocrity of 2022
Walking the path of the stupidly rich
Serious Money tracks the excesses and indulgences of those with wealth to burn
The Critic Books Podcast: Portable Magic
Lucasta Miller discusses Emma Smith’s new book
Fishing with Ted Hughes
A new memoir finds the poet in a world of rivers, rods, and reels
Narcisssism and the naked arts graduate
This call for an overhaul of the sex industry is self-indulgent and short-sighted
Seductive, scholarly life of the poet-priest
This new biography of John Donne brings the centuries-dead poet to life
Writing outside the box
Elena Ferrante’s essay collection is an exploration of the delights and constraints of form
When bad reviews attack
Book reviews are not the preserve of the literary dilettantes — they have real power
The Nineties: smells like Gen X nostalgia
Chuck Klosterman’s book sheds rose-tinted light on the decade
The Critic Books Podcast: Bacon in Moscow
What was it like to take Francis Bacon to the USSR?
Grizelda Buncome
Peripatetic creative writing tutor
It’s time to stop the rot
Students denounced, lecturers cowed and managers with little interest in truth
Wragg must go
He should resign or be fired
London’s lamps live on
Thanks to the dedication of the Gasketeers, a beautiful tradition has been saved
The dangers of digital media
By abandoning physical media, have we exposed ourselves to censorship and corporate control?
Godfather of British geopolitics
The revolutionary global thinking of an Edwardian academic continues to shape attitudes today
Giving noticing a bad name
Observing factual differences is not the same as leaping to conclusions
Long story short
Movie length seems to have become a way for directors to tell us what serious people they are
With their pants down
The Conservatives are in a nightmare they cannot wake up from
Against stakeholderism
How ideas like “citizens’ assemblies” threaten democracy and effective policy-making
A Labour of unrequited love
It will take more than vague apologetic gestures to redeem the Labour Party
