News and reviews

Think to New Worlds reviewed in Nature

Added on 08/07/2024

In March 2024, a mammoth review by the US Department of Defense concluded that there was “no evidence” that the US government had encountered alien life. Yet, that pronouncement is unlikely to have changed many minds.

Liberty’s Grid reviewed in History Today

Added on 07/07/2024

The Great American Grid was not designed to be practical. Instead, the straight lines and right angles were to represent something much more important: freedom. The grid’s instigator was Thomas Jefferson, who regarded the western United States as a tabula rasa for the revolution’s ideas of liberty.

China in Seven Banquets reviewed in the Spectator

Added on 06/07/2024

In February 1985 I had the good fortune to be a guest in Hong Kong at the Mandarin hotel’s 21st birthday celebration, a lavish three-day reconstruction of the sort of imperial banquet given during the Qing dynasty by the Kangxi emperor (1654-1722) and his grandson the Qianlong emperor (1711-1799).

Vienna reviewed in the Guardian

Added on 03/07/2024

According to the journalist and historian Richard Cockett, Vienna “lit the spark for most of Western intellectual and cultural life in the twentieth century”. From psychoanalysis (Freud) and nuclear fission (Lise Meitner), to the design of shopping malls (Victor Gruen) and fitted kitchens (Margarete Lihotzky), Viennese men and women played a crucial role in transforming the way we live and think.

Leslie Ramos writes in the Art Newspaper

Added on 02/07/2024

UK arts funding sits on a three-legged stool of public investment, commercial revenue and support from philanthropists and corporate sponsors. The system offers diversification should one source fall short and limits any undue influence on artistic decisions. But right now, all three legs are starting to wobble, and people fear a collapse.

The Last Sane Woman reviewed in Literary Review

Added on 01/07/2024

Nicola Long is a few years out of art school when she comes across an archive containing a dead sculptor’s letters to a friend. The sculptor, Donna, was about her age when she wrote them and in similar circumstances: broke, disenchanted but convinced – or determined to be convinced – that being a sculptor is right.

Negotiating With the Devil reviewed in the TLS

Added on 28/06/2024

Should governments talk to terrorists? Should war criminals be included in dialogue? When trying to bring peace, should we “negotiate with the devil”? In this short and elegant new book, Pierre Hazan tackles the moral dilemmas that face would-be mediators.

Waste and the Wasters reviewed in the TLS

Added on 28/06/2024

Eleanor Johnson’s Waste and the Wasters: Poetry and ecosystemic thought in medieval England is a moving and powerful study of neglect and ecological damage as reflected in the literature of the Middle Ages. Medieval people have a lot to teach us about waste, Johnson argues. They understood it and they were frightened of it – and so should we be.

The Tyne Bridge reviewed in the Morning Star

Added on 27/06/2024

Paul Brown explores the history and significance of the Tyne Bridge, arguably Tyneside’s greatest industrial achievement, and one of many attractions that draws visitors from around the world to the city of Newcastle.

Spycraft reviewed in Historia

Added on 25/06/2024

Early modern Europe was a hotbed of espionage, where spies, spy-catchers, and conspirators pitted their wits against each other in deadly games of hide and seek. Theirs was a dangerous trade — only those who mastered the latest techniques would survive.

The Last Sane Woman reviewed in the Observer

Added on 23/06/2024

The title of Hannah Regel’s assured debut novel presumably alludes to Angela Carter’s description of the potter Michael Cardew as “the last sane man in a crazy world”. Two of Regel’s three female characters are aspiring ceramicists. Neither achieve Cardew’s fame. The Last Sane Woman is a study in artistic endeavour, disappointment and envy.

Normandy reviewed in Aspects of History

Added on 22/06/2024

When one thinks of D-Day, June 6th 1944, the first images that spring to mind are of brave soldiers disembarking landing craft and rushing onto the beaches to face the machine-guns of the defending Germans. Films, such as Saving Private Ryan and The Longest Day have enhanced those images.