I recently visited a wonderful Stanley Kubrick exhibition in Rome and was reminded of a small piece of my own original Kubrick memorabilia, this 1962 movie tie-in paperback edition of one of my absolute favourite novels – Vladamir Nabokov‘s Lolita. First reissued by Corgi in 1961, this is the fourth 1962 reprint and although hardly …
Some of my favourite historic book jackets are those designed by Vanessa Bell for the Hogarth Press, and in particular, for the books written by her sister, Virginia Woolf. Vanessa Bell, together with her husband Clive Bell, painter Duncan Grant as well as Virginia and Leonard Woolf, belonged to the group of artists and writers …
I’ve known the historical novelist Adam Williams for several years now and have been lucky enough to have him sign his novels for me when he’s been visiting Italy. He’s just launched his own personal Website – Adam-Williams.net which is definitely worth a look – his family background in China makes for fascinating reading. Here’s …
Monkey is the title of Arthur Waley’s popular 1942 abridged translation of the traditional Chinese folk tale Journey to the West which was first published during the Ming Dynasty in the 16th century and is now ascribed to the scholar Wu Cheng-en. It actually translates only thirty of the hundred chapters of the original tale. …
When I was a child my favourite contemporary writer was, without a doubt, Penelope Lively. Many of her books dealt with ghosts or the supernatural, or played tricks with layers of time; I remember that I was glued to them and would very nearly have devoured them in one sitting if allowed! The Ghost of …
Joseph Heller (1923, Brooklyn, NY – 1999, Long Island, NY) lived most of his adult creative life in the shadow of his brilliant first publication, a work of genius that quite literally spoke to an entire generation, was the Zeitgeist book that encapsulated the anti-war mood of the times and even gave the world a …
Short news report of the 1999 Whitbread Award for Poetry which was posthumously awarded to Ted Hughes for his astounding and at times devastatingly moving ‘Birthday Letters’ (first published in 1998). The award was accepted by Frieda Hughes, the daughter of Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath, who bears a striking resemblance to her mother. Incidentally, …
