Andrew Wylie’s rules for life
America’s most feared literary agent on his friend Salman Rushdie, what Sally Rooney taught him, and how he has thrived…
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Immerse yourself in the captivating world of literature with our collection of articles, offering literary analysis, book recommendations, author spotlights, and thought-provoking discussions that celebrate the written word.
Richard Milward: “I use humour as a coping mechanism”
Polari is the “perfect slang for a freewheeling anarchist”, says the author of the Goldsmiths-shortlisted Man-Eating Typewriter.
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Americans don’t belong in Europe
Henry James showed how the New World is incapable of understanding the Old World.
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The 10 best modern poems
Poets including Michael Rosen, Kathleen Jamie, Andrew Motion and Raymond Antrobus select their favourite poems of the 21st century.
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Jon Fosse and the art of tedium
The Norwegian author’s masterwork Septology finds a mysterious beauty in repetition.
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The 2023 Goldsmiths Prize shortlist celebrates northern fiction
The award for “fiction at its most novel” is dominated this year by authors from and writing about the north…
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Lydia Davis’s war on Amazon
The short-story writer on why the tech giant’s profit-seeking is corrupting culture.
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Lorrie Moore’s Q&A: “US gun regulation should be a public health policy”
The author and critic on epidemiology, the joy of wine and coffee, and the soul of Abraham Lincoln.
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Colson Whitehead’s Q&A: “In the US, we throw up statues of any old dimwit”
The two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning author on Mark Rothko, Harrison Ford and tender baby-back ribs.
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From Daljit Nagra to Charlie Porter: new books reviewed in short
Also featuring National Dish by Anya von Bremzen and Metropolitan by Andrew Martin.
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Evelyn Waugh is laughing at you
His lethally coherent worldview still turns reality into a farce.
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The noble art of procrastination
I expend more energy planning work than doing it, but the writing routines of literary titans, from Balzac to Patricia…
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Cormac McCarthy’s art of war
In Blood Meridian the author reaches the dark heart of the American novel – where violence is timeless.
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The “trauma” of publishing a novel
I once found it risible to hear authors describe the publication process as “traumatising”. Then my first novel came out,…
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Milan Kundera’s sexual revolutions
The misunderstood author cared more about skirt-chasing than power politics.
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Antonia Fraser: “I don’t like being unpopular”
The historian on growing up as “a boy”, her “last” biography, and the joy of having close male friends in…
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Simone de Beauvoir and the art of loss
Sixty years ago, the French writer’s unflinching memoir of her mother’s death tested the limits of her existentialism.
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How not to drown
Growing up as a fish out of water.
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Virginia Woolf’s living book
The writer’s diaries reveal a mind striving to capture the elusive moment.
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A TikTok publishing house is bad news for books
Do we really want our literary landscape to be overrun with romance novels, trashy thrillers and scientifically dubious self-help?
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