sun 23/02/2025

book reviews and features

Jonathan Calvert and George Arbuthnott: Failures of State review - a devastating exposé, slightly mistimed

Sarah Collins

Almost a year ago, in the midst of the first national lockdown, The Sunday Times broke the news that Boris Johnson had failed to attend five consecutive Cobra meetings in the lead up to...

Read more...

Polly Barton: Fifty Sounds review - what is lost in translation

India Lewis

Fifty Sounds is translator Polly Barton’s first novel, conceived as part of Fitzcarraldo’s annual...

Read more...

Andrea Bajani: If You Kept a Record of Sins review - where blame, grief and discovery meet

Jessica Payn

“I think it happened to you, too, the first time you arrived.” So begins Andrea Bajani’s second novel (...

Read more...

Will Page: Tarzan Economics - a 'rockonomist' writes

Sebastian Scotney

The idea behind Tarzan Economics is, in its essence, that “if the vine we are holding onto is withering, we can have confidence to reach out for a new one.” This thesis expounded in Will...

Read more...

Extract: TV by Susan Bordo

theartsdesk

"Television and I grew up together." As a baby boomer born in 1947, Susan Bordo is roughly the same age as our beloved gogglebox, which began life as a broad box with a ten-inch screen, chunky and...

Read more...

theartsdesk Q&A: Author Sam Mills on the phenomenon of the 'chauvo-feminist'

CP Hunter

Sam Mills’s writing includes the wondrously weird novel The Quiddity of Will Self, the semi-memoir Fragments of My Father, and Chauvo-Feminism (The Indigo Press), which...

Read more...

Charles Saumarez Smith: The Art Museum In Modern Times review – the story of modern architecture

Daniel Baksi

“This book is a journey of historical discovery, set out sequentially in order to convey a sense of what has changed over time.” Add to this sentence, the title of the work from which it is taken...

Read more...

Craig Taylor: New Yorkers - A City and Its People in Our Time review

Liz Thomson

For the last couple of years, until we were so rudely interrupted, I’d been spending chunks of the year in New York, a city I’ve come to know...

Read more...

Prix Pictet: Confinement review - a year in photographs

Florence Hallett

Sustainability and the environment are watchwords for the Prix Pictet, the international...

Read more...

Alan Warner: Kitchenly 434 review – dreams and delusions in the backwaters of fame

Boyd Tonkin

“They think it’s all drugs and sex up here, Mrs H.” “Bless me.” The reality, at Kitchenly Mill Race, runs more to a nice pot of Tetley’s and a plate of Gypsy Creams. But “people are funny around...

Read more...

Pages

Subscribe to theartsdesk.com

Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.

To take a subscription now simply click here.

And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?

The future of Arts Journalism

 

You can stop theartsdesk.com closing!

We urgently need financing to survive. Our fundraising drive has thus far raised £33,000 but we need to reach £100,000 or we will be forced to close. Please contribute here: https://gofund.me/c3f6033d

And if you can forward this information to anyone who might assist, we’d be grateful.

 

latest in today

Help to give theartsdesk a future!

It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.

It followed some...

A Thousand Blows, Disney+ review - Peaky Blinders comes to R...

Steven Knight is beginning to resemble the British version of Taylor Sheridan. While Sheridan has been saturating our...

Hinds, St Lukes and the Winged Ox, Glasgow review - Spanish...

Hinds don't believe in God. They declared this as they surveyed the converted church that is St Luke's, and given the past few years you can...

Music Reissues Weekly: Diggin' For Gold Volume 14 - Nor...

In 1964, the Norwegian division of Philips Records began issuing singles labelled “Bergen Beat.” The picture sleeves of 45s by Davy Dean and the...

The Monkey review - a grisly wind-up

Longlegs’ trapdoor ending snapped tight on its clammy Lynchian mood, reconfiguring its Silence of the Lambs serial-killer yarn...

Richard II, Bridge Theatre review - handsomely mounted, emot...

Screen stardom is generally anointed at the box office so it's a very real delight to find the fast-rising Jonathan Bailey taking time out from...

Backstroke, Donmar Warehouse review - a complex journey thro...

The theatre director Anna Mackmin has...

Donald Rodney: Visceral Canker, Whitechapel Gallery review -...

Donald Rodney’s most moving work is a photograph titled In the House of My Father, 1997 (main picture). Nestling in the...

Album: Heather Nova - Breath and Air

With her 13th studio album, Heather Nova delivers what you might expect from one of the 90s' most distinctive alternative voices – though longtime...

newsletter

Get a weekly digest of our critical highlights in your inbox each Thursday!

Simply enter your email address in the box below

View previous newsletters