One thing that can, and perhaps should, be said about A Natural History of English Gardening 1650–1800 is that it is a spectacularly beautiful piece of book-making. Its spacious pages are printed on gloriously heavy matt-coated stock, its elegant full-cloth binding features head- and foot-bands, and its hundreds of pictures, mainly in colour, are laid […]
Some of us find it remarkably difficult simply to go for a walk. We need an excuse, a project, a literary precedent. We don’t want our wanderings, or our accounts of them, to be simply strolls in the park. And so, in these two books by Iain Sinclair and Simon Armitage, both great walkers, and […]
Predicting the future is a hazardous venture. Western Union initially scorned the new-fangled invention of telephones, and the chairman of IBM once envisaged a world market for five computers. Adding to the list of misjudgements, Peter Moore reveals in this thought-provoking book the parliamentary mockery greeting an MP who promised in 1854 that reliable weather forecasts would soon be available. Not for the last time, the House of Commons got it wrong: a century and a half later, Britain’s Meteorological Office has more than 1,700 employees and a budget of over £80 million.
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
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