Gorgeous colour images, as well as translations and commentary on these celebrated Persian poems. Both manuscripts date from the C15th and are exquisitely illustrated. This will be ravishing... read more
A labour of love and scholarship, this is a study of the extraordinary Royal Library of Dom Joao V (1706-1750) of Portugal that was destroyed in 1755 in the Lisbon earthquake. The library co... read more
The title could pass off as a short story by M.R. James or as one of the exploits of Robert Louis Stevenson's little-known, rather Ruritanian sleuth called Prince Florizel. It is in fact a d... read more
A vast array of material is expertly woven together in this illuminating look at embattled authors and their literature: Anne Frank, Orwell, Biggles...
From the earliest printing to C21st zines: a very engaging account. The author is Prof of Eng Lit at Balliol when not noodling about with like-minded eggheads and a Model 4 letter press.
The 40-year relationship between the prodigious writer and scholar (biographer of Gandhi, amongst other things, and a JS customer) and his original editor at Oxford University Press.
A vivid portrait of a complex man approached through twelve books, including his mother's diary and Lolita. Beguiling and intriguing, he did not shun controversy.
A charming self-published book about Great Bardfield, the Essex village that became home to several artists, including Ravilious and Bawden; like a picture within a picture, it's also about ... read more
Translation and interpretation are not straightforward, and never were... With matchless scholarship and sensitivity, Dr Barton compares multiple readings to reveal their ambiguities and int... read more
Using West's 1930s masterpiece Black Lamb, Grey Falcon as a vade mecum, Allan has written a wonderful, personal portrait of the countries that made up the former Yugoslavia.
From the Bible to Simon Schama, a huge investigation of how the writing of history influences the record of human experience, and therefore its development.
We heard about Molotov's library in Rachel Polonsky's superb Molotov's Magic Lantern (£12.99). Now we have a portrait of Stalin through the books he read - and he was an avid reader all his... read more
Like a detective novel of the time, the story of two booksellers who uncovered the forgeries of a pompous bastion of the literary scene in 1930s' London.
Several of the principal compilers of the OED have already been sung - not least the editor James Murray, who took over two decades to reach the letter 'T'. It is his newly-discovered addres... read more