News and reviews

Folklore reviewed in the TLS

Added on 26/06/2026

What do these things have to do with one another? They are examples of the traditions, beliefs and practices of “the folk”, and hence are folklore, a category without any obvious further circumscription. In Folklore, Owen Davies and Ceri Houlbrook, two folklore studies academics, choose not to put many limits on their subject, other than geographical ones.

A Passage to Europe reviewed in the TLS

Added on 26/06/2026

It was 1796. Revolutionary France was as much at war with itself as it was with nations beyond its borders, the Ottoman Empire was manoeuvring uneasily in response to new geopolitical pressures and, in India, the East India Company was tightening its grip, even as its nightmares were haunted by the formidable ruler of Mysore, Tipu Sultan, whose summer palace proudly displayed a mechanical tiger that growled as it mauled a European soldier caught in its powerful claws.

The Masquerade reviewed in the London Review of Books

Added on 25/06/2026

Early in the first notebook of Jane Austen’s teenage writings is a work entitled ‘Jack and Alice: a novel’; it runs to a little over 5500 words and was probably written between 1789 and 1791.

The Breaking of the English Working Class featured in the Observer

Added on 22/06/2026

“I’m England till I die. I know I am, I’m sure I am, I’m England till I die!” Sandra Forsyth was almost 50 when she found her voice marching across Tower Bridge with several hundred supporters of the English Defence League. “Have you spoken to Mum lately?” her son Billy wrote to his sister Nicola from prison. “She’s turned into a fascist, lols.”

The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI reviewed in the Guardian

Added on 22/06/2026

As former Google CEO Eric Schmidt could tell you, AI is a hard sell these days. Last month, he tried talking up the AI revolution during a commencement address at the University of Arizona and was loudly booed by students about to enter an AI-ravaged job market. His discombobulation was telling.

A Passage to Europe reviewed in the Daily Mail

Added on 14/06/2026

The next time you’re delayed for hours at an airport, or bumped off your flight and made to wait for 24 hours, spare a thought for Ahmad Khan. In the late 18th century, he set off as part of the entourage of three high-born sons of the deceased nawab (Muslim governor) of Broach (now Bharuch) in India, heading to London.

The Rest Is Silence reviewed in the TLS

Added on 12/06/2026

Those who hold that death is the permanent cessation of consciousness divide into opposing camps. On the one side are the petrified, for whom the prospect of the void induces an electric terror. On the other are those who fear untimely death, but cannot get worked up about the fact that life will end.

Manga reviewed in the TLS

Added on 12/06/2026

It is probably unfashionable these days to ascribe a particular artistic ability to an entire nation, but if you have ever enjoyed a written correspondence with Japanese friends, you will have noticed how often they begin doodling and illustrating in the middle of their sentences.

Ruthless reviewed in the TLS

Added on 12/06/2026

When Marco Polo visited China in the late thirteenth century, he reported that Hangzhou was “the greatest city that is or ever was in the world”, and that the revenue of the Great Khan from the salt tax was “greater than that of any Christian king”.

Unfrozen reviewed in the TLS

Added on 12/06/2026

The future of the Arctic seems more uncertain than ever. New and resurgent political actors are undermining the security and safety of the region, while climate change is dismantling long-held assumptions about permanence and predictability.

The Radical Spanish Empire reviewed in the TLS

Added on 12/06/2026

The history of the European overseas empires – Spanish, French, British and other – is often presented as one of initial conquest and colonization, followed by the slow erosion of imperial rule, then its eventual displacement by newly independent states.

The Analogue Idyll referenced in the Guardian

Added on 11/06/2026

Ten years after the last video recorder manufacturer ceased production, the first straight-to-video movie for two decades – This Is How the World Ends – was released this month. The resurgence of vinyl began long ago; sales are at their highest level for over 30 years.