Vanity Fair Blog: Vidal loco

Christopher Hitchens explores Vidal's lurch towards "crackpot" writing.

Guardian Books: The world of G K Chesterton

This year is the centenary of one of Chesterton's oddest, but most intriguing books, writes Stuart Walton.

Art and Music: Nowhere Boy

Sam Taylor-Wood's biopic of the teenage John Lennon.

Der Spiegel Online: Western writers are choked by fear

Is the right to offend more important than protecting the offended?

Arts Beat (New York Times): Cigarettes and cinema

A O Scott on the connotations of smoking on film.