From Alexandra’s lace and pearls to Elizabeth II’s technicolour tweeds, royal attire has long projected continuity and control. Wendy Holden finds the craftsmen behind it all.
literaryreview.co.uk/sovereign-st...
'It is an almost-love story and an almost-self-love story – one
that celebrates drunken karaoke, violent crushes and the
transcendent, fleeting joy of believing you finally understand your own life' Zadie Loft reviews WHAT AM I A DEER? for @litreview.bsky.social: literaryreview.co.uk/sing-your-he...
Guns didn’t change war, they changed society. @catherinefletcher.info's The Firearm Revolution is out now. Read Alexander Lee’s review in the latest issue of @litreview.bsky.social:
Antiquary, biographer, folklorist and natural philosopher John Aubrey was born in this month four hundred years ago.
To mark his quadricentennial, Peter Davidson reflects on Aubrey’s legacy.
literaryreview.co.uk/speaking-thr...
In 1971 George Lucas wandered upstairs at Francis Ford Coppola’s party to watch a film called Duel. By the first commercial break he was convinced: director Steven Spielberg possessed rare talent.
Graham Daseler reflects on these three men.
literaryreview.co.uk/19715-2
A review in the new @litreview.bsky.social of Marianna Dudley's excellent book on wind power:
literaryreview.co.uk/blowing-in-t...
Despite adopting a pseudonym, George Sand lived much of her life in public view.
Lucasta Miller asks whether Sand’s fame has obscured her work.
literaryreview.co.uk/life-work-ad...
Delighted and extremely grateful for this kind review of Ghost Stations @cbeditions.bsky.social by Jonathan Keates in this month's @litreview.bsky.social . I'd like to stay on this train, thank you.
We’re delighted to see Dan Edelstein's The Revolution to Come reviewed in the latest issue of @litreview.bsky.social! Learn more about the "impressive range and subtlety" of this book here, plus save 30% with code PUP30:
Check out this review of the "remarkable" and "fluently written" Furious Minds by @lkatfield.bsky.social in @litreview.bsky.social: literaryreview.co.uk/19658-2
I thought I might prompt people to buy this book - you should, it's very good - but yesterday I learned that an acquaintance had bought *a pinball machine* on the strength of this review, so mind how you go. @litreview.bsky.social literaryreview.co.uk/a-bally-high
#HardStreets @profilebooks.bsky.social is on the cover of the new @litreview.bsky.social “Riding comes out as a local herself whose great-grandfather died in the Lambeth workhouse…I know these streets and I read this deeply researched and valuable book with passionate identification”. Many thanks 🎉
‘A richly rewarding book, which succeeds in painting a vivid portrait of one of the 17th century’s most intriguing figures.'
Alexander Lee's review of 'Lying abroad' in the latest @litreview.bsky.social, read it here: literaryreview.co.uk/rise-of-the-...
'Lying abroad' is out now! #booksky
I reviewed "Far-Right France: Le Pen, Bardella and the Future of Europe" by Victor Mallet for @litreview.bsky.social. (February issue) Article in free access below. 👇
literaryreview.co.uk/normal-circu...
Out now! Literary Review's February 2026 issue, featuring
Norma Clarke on Charlie Chaplin’s London
Richard Bourke on revolutions
Lucasta Miller on George Sand
Peter Davidson on Constable
@phmarliere.bsky.social on far-right France
and much, much more: literaryreview.co.uk
Margaret Atwood has become a cultural weathervane, blamed for predicting dystopia and celebrated for resisting it. Yet her ‘memoir of sorts’ reveals a more complicated, playful figure.
Sophie Oliver introduces us to a young Peggy.
literaryreview.co.uk/ms-fixits-ch...
For a writer so ubiquitous, George Orwell remains curiously elusive. His voice is lost, his image scarce; all that survives is the prose, and the interpretations built upon it.
@dorianlynskey.bsky.social wonders what is to be done.
literaryreview.co.uk/doublethink-...
The court of Henry VIII is easy to envision thanks to Hans Holbein the Younger’s portraits: the bearded king, Anne of Cleves in red and gold, Thomas Cromwell demure in black.
Peter Marshall paints a picture of the artist himself.
literaryreview.co.uk/varnish-virtue
The latest volume of T S Eliot’s letters, covering 1942–44, reveals a constant stream of correspondence. By contrast, his poetic output was negligible.
Robert Crawford ponders if Eliot the poet was beginning to be left behind.
literaryreview.co.uk/advice-to-po...
Jacques-Louis David immortalised Jean-Paul Marat as a serene martyr in a bathtub, but his life was spent in furious activity. David Andress considers the fruits of Marat's wild energy.
literaryreview.co.uk/exquisite-co...
My Notebook piece, 'In A Pickle', from the Christmas issue of Literary Review.
I'm in the bumper Christmas @litreview.bsky.social, talking mostly about pickles. #pickles
In the bumper Christmas issue of @litreview.bsky.social I review Dan Cruickshank's "The English House", which has affability and and erudition in abundance, and occasional longueurs: literaryreview.co.uk/door-to-door
Out now! Literary Review's December 2025 / January 2026 issue, featuring
Peter Marshall on Holbein
Sophie Oliver on Margaret Atwood
Joanna Kavenna on Camus's notebooks
@edwardshawcross.bsky.social on Mexico
@dorianlynskey.bsky.social on George Orwell
and much, much more: literaryreview.co.uk
The son of a notorious con man, John le Carré turned deception into an art form. Does his archive unmask the author or merely prove how well he learned to disappear?
John Phipps explores.
literaryreview.co.uk/approach-sed...
Out now! Literary Review's November 2025 issue, featuring
@jntod.bsky.social on Seamus Heaney
Kathryn Murphy on Vermeer
Sophie Oliver on Katherine Mansfield
Kirsten Tambling on two 18th-century artists
John Phipps on John le Carré
and much, much more: literaryreview.co.uk
Though Jean-Michel Basquiat was a sensation in his lifetime, it was thirty years after his death that one of his pieces fetched a record price of $110.5 million.
Stephen Smith explores the artist's starry afterlife.
literaryreview.co.uk/paint-fast-d...
In the summer of 1918, the Caspian port of Baku played host to a remarkable group of Allied soldiers, sent to defend oil wells against the Ottomans.
Anna Reid recounts their escapades.
literaryreview.co.uk/mission-impo...
I reviewed Lynda Nead's BRITISH BLONDE: WOMEN, DESIRE AND THE IMAGE IN POST-WAR BRITAIN for the latest issue of Literary Review @litreview.bsky.social Lovely stuff in four chapters, each about a different British Blonde; can you guess who they are? (One is easy!) literaryreview.co.uk/peroxide-pat...
Out now! Literary Review's October 2025 issue, featuring
John Adamson on the origins of news
Ritchie Robertson on Goethe
Stephen Smith on Basquiat
Anna Reid on oil and the First World War
Robert Hazell on constitutional monarchy
and much, much more: literaryreview.co.uk
Out now! Literary Review's September 2025 issue, featuring
@willtosh.bsky.social on Christopher Marlowe
@claireharman.bsky.social on Muriel Spark
Seamus Perry on Tennyson
Lucy Hughes-Hallett on the stiff upper lip
Patrick Wilcken on Easter Island
and much, much more: literaryreview.co.uk