Category Archives: Literature

The rose opens her petals And embraces the violet The lily too has awakened. They bare their heads to the zephyrs. Yes, it’s dreadful; and it’s translated, too. If I gave the original language away, it would be too easy. … Continue reading → Continue reading →

I had to ring Denis Healey today in re Conquest: they were both in the communist party at Oxford inthe late Thirties. He was delighted to hear Bob was still alive. “When you are over eighty,”, he said, “all your … Continue reading → Continue reading →

“Have begun big self-restraint programme with no drinks or smokes until 7.30pm and then only beer and wine till 10 or so. When I go out to lunch etc. I can have what I like. Works bloody well: I can … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Another Conquest fragment: When the earl pulled out his bloody great tool at tea To do the page-boy wrong, His chaplain cried in incredulity, ‘How long, oh Lord, how long!’. Continue reading →

Andrew Wilson’s Monday column in the Daily Telegraph is unfailingly excellent. He even manages to say something fresh about Christmas this year. Continue reading →

This one’s for sumac: I had gone out to California to profileBob Conquest for the Guardian. He should be famous for a lot of things, but one of his talents is an astonishing skill at filthy versification. I could not, … Continue reading → Continue reading →

I don’t often read Guardian profiles unless I have written them. I sometimes worry that this attitude will spread. But Bernard Williams looked like fun; it was. Very nicely written, and it had two quotes which made him appear entirely … Continue reading → Continue reading →

the Martin Amis memoirs, are shockingly good in parts. What he writes about his parents, and about his stepmother, Elizabeth Jane Howard, reveals him as a much better writer tackling more difficult themes than any of the famous novels, not … Continue reading → Continue reading →