Richard Cockett
Another Fine Mess
Apocalyptic Realm: Jihadists in South Asia
By Dilip Hiro
Yale University Press 354pp £18.99
After eleven years of war, the loss of thousands of lives and the expenditure of billions – maybe trillions – of dollars on both aid and warfare, it now seems likely that to bring some sort of stability, if not actual peace, to Afghanistan, America and its allies will have to cut a deal with the very same Taliban leadership that they thought they had crushed in 2001.
Secret negotiations with the Taliban have been proceeding for the last two years. At some point the Taliban’s ruler of Afghanistan from 1994 to 2001, Mullah Mohammad Omar, might even have to be brought directly into the negotiations. He remains alive and well, is still the Taliban’s undisputed leader, and
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
It wasn’t until 1825 that Pepys’s diary became available for the first time. How it was eventually decrypted and published is a story of subterfuge and duplicity.
Kate Loveman tells the tale.
Kate Loveman - Publishing Pepys
Kate Loveman: Publishing Pepys
literaryreview.co.uk
Arthur Christopher Benson was a pillar of the Edwardian establishment. He was supremely well connected. As his newly published diaries reveal, he was also riotously indiscreet.
Piers Brendon compares Benson’s journals to others from the 20th century.
Piers Brendon - Land of Dopes & Tories
Piers Brendon: Land of Dopes & Tories - The Benson Diaries: Selections from the Diary of Arthur Christopher Benson by Eamon Duffy & Ronald Hyam (edd)
literaryreview.co.uk
Of the siblings Gwen and Augustus John, it is Augustus who has commanded most attention from collectors and connoisseurs.
Was he really the finer artist, asks Tanya Harrod, or is it time Gwen emerged from her brother’s shadow?
Tanya Harrod - Cut from the Same Canvas
Tanya Harrod: Cut from the Same Canvas - Artists, Siblings, Visionaries: The Lives and Loves of Gwen and Augustus John by Judith Mackrell
literaryreview.co.uk