Charles I is not quite the most recognisable of English sovereigns. Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, even Queen Victoria are more immediately familiar. But Charles is the connoisseur’s king, the man who brought to the benighted British Isles the light of the Italian Renaissance, the monarch whose court nurtured a mode of portraiture that, refined in […]
When the Crown Prince of Nepal shot dead nearly his entire family last June, one journalist described it to me as the first genuine news event she could remember. September 11 was yet to come. Since I had written about India, and with India being close to Nepal, it was suggested that I might go […]
It is only to be expected that the Queen, in her Golden Jubilee year, should enjoy the publication of a biography or two to commemorate her feat, especially since the music industry has decided more or less to ignore the whole event. There will be a couple of anti-Jubilee songs – one by Billy Bragg […]
To most people alive today, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother was a diminutive figure in floating sweet-pea chiffon crowned by a face-framing hat, gloved hand waving from a Royal Ascot coach or accepting a birthday bouquet from some adoring member of the public. What lay behind that sweet, impenetrable smile? Was it, as her biographer […]
There are many books about Boudica, and more continue to appear. Most are bad. This account, by two archaeologists, is a good one, and gives us all that we know for sure about this interesting figure, and all the myths and fantasies which have been built up around her. She was a contemporary of the […]
The most decisive developments of Henry VIII’s turbulent reign came in the 1530s, when the king denied the authority of the Pope, asserted his own supposedly God-given right to control the Church, and set about redesigning English religion, a process which he was to continue until the end of his reign. These actions were to […]
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Knowledge of Sufism increased markedly with the publication in 1964 of The Sufis, by Idries Shah. Nowadays his writings, much like his father’s, are dismissed for their Orientalism and inaccuracy.
@fitzmorrissey investigates who the Shahs really were.
Fitzroy Morrissey - Sufism Goes West
Fitzroy Morrissey: Sufism Goes West - Empire’s Son, Empire’s Orphan: The Fantastical Lives of Ikbal and Idries Shah by Nile Green
literaryreview.co.uk
Rats have plagued cities for centuries. But in Baltimore, researchers alighted on one surprising solution to the problem of rat infestation: more rats.
@WillWiles looks at what lessons can be learned from rat ecosystems – for both rats and humans.
Will Wiles - Puss Gets the Boot
Will Wiles: Puss Gets the Boot - Rat City: Overcrowding and Urban Derangement in the Rodent Universes of John B ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Twisters features destructive tempests and blockbuster action sequences.
@JonathanRomney asks what the real danger is in Lee Isaac Chung's disaster movie.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/eyes-of-the-storm