The role of surrealism and the cultural milieu of Paris in the 1940s helped inspire Boulez's emotional and radical music. CP's last book - on Eric Satie - was excellent.
Fleming's own ideal of the 'complete man' is the source for the subtitle. NS has left no stone unturned in pursuit of a 'complete' portrait in writing this immense and engaging biography.
An account by a London financier of her family in Japan over the last 150 years. The huge changes they have navigated are described with sympathy and careful research.
The subject is the author's grandmother, an editor at the Hogarth Press who was close to Yeats, dallied on the fringes of Bloomsbury and left her husband the Duke of Wellington for Vita Sack... read more
A joyous and detailed biography of this extraordinary man, whose house in Cambridge is still a sanctuary for the artistically-inclined. His circle included Ben and Winifred Nicholson, Henry... read more
Inspired by Darwin and von Humboldt, ARW travelled to the Amazon Basin and the Malay Archipelago. He published a paper on natural selection in 1858, a year before Darwin's Origin of Species... read more
A fascinating exploration of travel in C17th India: merchant-cum-gentleman Thomas Roe is whisked away as ambassador to Mughal India where he plays the dangerous (and often disappointing) gam... read more
Gyari died in 2018 after a decade as chief negotiator with China over the status of Tibet. His account will be indispensable to anyone wishing to understand that country's modern history.
Ostensibly about the life of the Greek philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras, this beautifully illustrated volume examines the idea that harmony and beauty are not only inherent in the wo... read more
LCW's 1947 memoir of her life as a gallerist; at the Wertheim Gallery she showed a swathe of English Modernist artists - Alfred Wallis, Christopher Wood, Barbara Hepworth, Henry Moore, Cedri... read more
Looks at Jane's contribution too in this extraordinary personal and creative partnership. SFC's earlier book To See Clearly: Why Ruskin Matters was excellent.
From the library of Marguerite Littman.
Skelton’s first volume of memoirs covers her youth, war years in Cairo and Athens and marriage to Cyril Connolly; full of gossip and insights int... read more