A gardener's control is illusory - thanks to a myriad of other - "often argumentative" - organisms that have their own ideas about how things should be run.
Recounts the author's quest for Adele Hugo, who followed the object of her (unrequited) love, a British soldier, to the Caribbean, and then returned to live out the rest of her days in a Fre... read more
The story of one of the most tumultuous moments in British history, which analyses how James I's rule was haunted by Elizabethan political norms and values.
The distinguished historian uses neglected sources to present CdeM as a much-traduced campaigner for the peaceful coexistence of Catholics and Protestants, and as a patroness of the arts.
In 1942, aged 24, the great and defiant Canetti began to write notes, aphorisms and meditations about death - he was dead against it - and, by extension, about and for life; he only stopped... read more
A novel (Tatting, 1957) in which a just-married young couple go to Cornwall where the inhabitants are definitely odd, and a group of short stories about the complexities of love and sex (Man... read more
It has been raining - constantly - for years; in a city that is largely submerged, three sisters contend with a sinister legacy. Tender, spooky, apocalyptic.
How did Oxford colleges, chapels, pubs, societies, nooks and crannies inspire Lewis and his friends? By the Professor of English Language and Literature at Magdalen. Some illustrations.
VM was the author of The Map of Knowledge, a compelling account of the survival of the ancient classics in the Muslim world, and their re-emergence in the West. Now she turns her attention t... read more