Martyn Bedford
Clough’s Wake
Most Leeds United fans of a certain age have a Brian Clough anecdote. Here’s mine: it’s August, 1974, and I’m a 14-year-old autograph hunter, loitering as the first-team squad troops off the training pitch at Elland Road. The players are unfriendly – a scowling Billy Bremner, a sullen Allan Clarke, a grumpy Johnny Giles head straight for the dressing room. But the new manager lingers among the throng of supporters to pose for snapshots, sign his name, enjoy the banter. Eh, you’ll need a wide-angle lens to fit my big head in. He even helps a woman to resolve a camera glitch before posing again alongside her son. My turn next; I get Cloughie’s autograph, a smile and a shoulder squeeze. I can’t stand the bastard, but in that instant I’m a little in love with him.
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
While you're waiting for the March issue of Literary Review to pop through your letterbox, have another read of February's cover piece: Richard Davenport-Hines on the stormy letters Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Hardwick wrote to one another.
http://ow.ly/iHKh50ywe1x
What's the worth of being zen when the icecaps are melting and populism looms? The world's leading thinkers including @ronpurser will assess the 'mindfulness' craze at the world's largest philosophy and music festival, @HTLGIFestival, this May. Learn more: http://ow.ly/STu650ywARQ
'Feminists have been caricatured so often that it’s worth recalling the many obstacles placed in the path of women campaigning for equal rights.'
@polblonde on @helenlewis's new book about difficult women throughout history.
http://ow.ly/Is9c50ywe7G